The Atlantic Collins 1850-58

“The pilot seizes the king-pin, he heaves down with a strong arm.” Page 39

The cultural meaning of this statement in Whitman’s time would be referring to the operation of a ship. The pilot is the person driving the ship and the king-pin is the device he uses to steer it.

Whitman wrote this over 100 years before I was born and 150 years before I read it. Coming from the cultural background of the 20th and 21st centuries, the image that immediately flashed in my mind when I read this line was not of one steering an old ship, but a pilot of an airplane who was thwarting an attack from a terrorist attempting to highjack the plane.  The airplane was invented in 1903, over 50 years after Whitman wrote this line in Song of Myself.  If Whitman were writing this line today what do you think it would say?

King-pin is defined as:

1.  Bowling:  headpin, the pin at the center; number five pin

2. Informal.  the person of chief importance in a corporation, movement, undertaking, etc.

3. Informal. chief element of any system, plan or the like.

4. a kingbolt

5. either of the pins that are a part of the mechanism for turning the front wheels in some automotive steering system.

Origin:  1795 – 1805; King + pin   Dictionary.com Unabridged 

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