Subject: Re: Why is root named "Charlie"?
From: "Kevin Oberman"
To: Greg Lehey
Cc: Dennis Jun , [email-masked]
Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 14:06:50 -0700

From [email-masked] Fri Jul 20 23:08:14 2001
> Date: Fri, 20 Jul 2001 11:35:09 +0930
> From: Greg Lehey
> Sender: [email-masked]
>
> On Thursday, 19 July 2001 at 11:51:07 -0700, Dennis Jun wrote:
> > Just outta curiosity, anyone know why root is
> > named "Charlie"? I hope it's not in reference
> > to the BSD Daemon which some people incorrectly
> > refer to as "Chuckie." ;)
>
> The most plausible thing I've heard is that it's a reference to a
> baseball player called Charlie Root.  I don't know if he really
> existed, but if he did, it would seem to fit.

Getting way too far off topic...

Not bad for someone not from the US! (Though I have no idea if Greg
may have lived in the US at some time.)

Charlie Root was a pitcher for the Chicago Cubs from about 1925
through about 1940. Career ERA of 3.59 and a lifetime record of 201
wins and 160 losses.

He was a steady, very durable performer for many years. Sadly, his
greatest claim to fame was giving up the "called shot" home run to
Babe Ruth in the 1932 World Series. He was also named the Cubs all
time right-handed pitcher in 1969 (and I'm not sure that any Cub since
69 has been better).

I assume that whoever came up with the name on the root account had
probably heard of the name from somewhere and used it as the name of
the root user. How many famous "Root"s are there, after all.

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