File 13

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, my name is Maria. I am calling from Indianapolis, Indiana.

And what’s on your mind?

I work at an office, and my co-workers and I use a term that is called File 13, and we use it whenever we have paperwork that we don’t want to process. So, for example, we’ll say, I’m sending this to file 13 or I’m going to file 13 this paperwork.

Wow. So all your paperwork is optional?

No. We actually use the term when we want to throw it away.

Oh, I see. So this is just expressing a wish.

Exactly. So I didn’t know exactly what file 13 was and why it meant that we wanted to throw away the paperwork.

Really good question. Where did you pick it up? Do you know?

I just picked it up from hearing my co-workers say it.

Oh, you didn’t know it before you started working there?

No, I never did.

Oh, okay.

And they never call it the round file? Or the circular file?

No, maybe it’s an Indiana thing, but we have to say file 13.

Oh, it’s bigger than Indiana.

It dates back to the 1940s, and it came up during the time of World War II. And for a long time, File 13 was only used by people in the military to refer to exactly what you’re talking about, anything that you would just put in the trash, put in the rubbish bin, the dustbin, what have you.

And some people, however, have used File 17 in the same way. There’s a theory on Wikipedia that’s very specious that I encourage people not to put much credence in. Just put it in File 13.

Yeah.

Well, I would go edit the entry, but if you edited everything that was wrong on Wikipedia, it’d take quite a while. But their theory is that there was some particular chapter 13 in a regulation about the dismissal of military personnel that had something to do with that. And I can find, and that other people who do what I do, researching the history of words, have found zero evidence that this theory has any credibility whatsoever.

So it’s a big origin unknown, except for the fact that it starts to pop up in the early 1940s during World War II. And somewhere by the late 1960s, it was thoroughly outside of the military world and in civilian life and started to pop up in environments. By the 1970s, when I started going to school, I had teachers who would use it.

Well, don’t you think it’s just as plausible that it has to do with 13 being unlucky and unwanted?

Maybe, but why 17?

Skipping the 13 floor.

Well, as a variation on file 13.

Maybe.

It’s a bigger file.

Yeah.

Maybe.

It’s for worse stuff.

Paperwork you really don’t want to do.

And that’s the best theory, that it has something to do with the unlucky 13.

Yeah.

And then circular file is, of course, your trash can.

Right.

The military brought it with them after the war.

Yeah.

I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating that any time we have a large military effort in the United States, you bring these people from a wide variety of lives, different neighborhoods and countries and states and occupations together, in this really intense situation. And language is transmitted the same way that viruses are transmitted. It all comes in, and it all goes back out. And so it’s a very vigorous creation of new words takes place during wartime.

Yeah, anytime you get a bunch of people together all doing one thing together, they make new language. Sometimes they make babies, too, but lots of language.

So, Maria, good luck with your paperwork.

Thank you.

I will try not to say it too loudly.

Yeah, not too loudly.

The manager is walking by.

Thanks, Mia.

Okay, tell everyone in the office hi.

Thank you very much.

Okay, bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Is there a word in your workplace that has you scratching your head? You can give us a call about it. The number is 877-929-9673 or send it an email to words@waywordradio.org.