Why corner?

Written by

Ophelia Benson

in

Words.

Trump appeared confounded by a common phrase during a public appearance in Nevada on Thursday.

…

Delivering a speech on the benefits of his policy, which allows employees who receive tips to deduct up to $25,000 in tips when filing their taxes, the 79-year-old came across a term he claimed to have never heard before.

“The great big beautiful bill also slashed taxes on millions of Americans, small businesses, including restaurants, dry cleaners, corner stores,” the president said, before pausing to add an aside.

“What is a corner store?” He asked the room. “I’ve never heard that term. I know what a corner store is, but I’ve never heard it described… A corner store. Who the hell wrote that, please?” He added, looking around as the audience laughed.

Ok but this one time I don’t think he was just lost in the fog. “Corner store” is a peculiar label because as far as I can tell it doesn’t actually mean corner store but rather convenience store aka small general store that sells the kind of thing you don’t want to go to a supermarket for. It’s an idiom. I think what he meant was not “what is it” but “why is it called that”. As someone who frequently wonders why things are called that, I think we can give him a pass on this one. Mind you, it is very eccentric and perhaps diagnostic to break into one’s own speech about something else to muse on the meaning of a common idiom.

So why are they called corner stores?

When I was a child we lived a few miles outside of town, with fields all around, growing alfalfa or pasturing cows. About three fields away there was a small everything store, which I would walk to through the fields on Saturday mornings to spend my allowance on the penny candy in a glass and wood case at the front of the store. It feels like about 1850 at this distance. Anyway…it was literally a corner store, but we called it the general store. Or Musselman’s, the name of the owner, known to the grownups as Spud.

So, are all 7/11s on corners, or are some in the middle of the block?

Comments

2 responses to “Why corner?”

  1. Artymorty Avatar
    Artymorty

    My guess is that it sounds folksy and evokes small communities, in kinda the same way that speechwriters endlessly harp about Main Street USA.

    Such geographic references to neighbourhood street corners and small-town central thoroughfares conjure a Mayberry image that pols on both sides of the aisle just love.

    Me, I’ve always just called them convenience stores — well, except when I lived in Montreal, where they’re called dépanneurs (literally, something or someone that gets you out of a jam) or just “the Dep”.

    And I probably dabbled in using “bodega” once or twice, trying, pretentiously, to sound like a local while visiting New York.

  2. iknklast Avatar
    iknklast

    I never called them corner stores, but I’ve heard them called that. Like Arty, we called them convenience stores (though when you live more than 9 miles from the nearest one, they aren’t particularly convenient).

    I suspect the origin of the phrase dates back to earlier in the last century, when zoning didn’t prohibit such stores in residential areas, and they might more likely be on the corner to be convenient to more streets? That would be my guess. Now that we zoned everything to be in its own little neighborhood, it just sounds strange.

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