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dooryard
DCHP-3 (Apr 2023)
n. — New Brunswick
the yard closest to the door of a house, apartment building, or store.
Type: 2. Preservation — OED-3 classifies door-yard originally as "U.S", though, as Chart 1 shows, South Africa and Ireland show the highest frequencies today. Within Canada, dooryard is a New Brunswick regionalism, as it is used almost exclusively by residents of that province (see Chart 2) for what is called a front yard in the rest of Canada. Its transmission would have been via United Empire Loyalists in the 1780s from the U.S., where the term continues to be used. Dooryard is Canadian by virtue of being a New Brunswickism, via Preservation from U.S. English input. The New Brunswick occurrences are responsible for the .ca hits in Chart 1, which, coming from a small province, do not match the South African or Irish incidences.
COD-2 labels dooryard as "N Amer" but not as a Canadianism.
COD-2 labels dooryard as "N Amer" but not as a Canadianism.
Quotations
1983
The grandfathers, as was customary, did the heavy field work. They tended the cows, the vineyards, the fruit orchards, while the grandmothers worked closer to home. Theirs were the kitchen gardens and the birds in the dooryards.
1985
Agricultural Canada veterinarian Dr. Bill Austin of Belleville said the increase is of particular concern to animal owners.
"We've had a number of cattle come down with rabies and we have also had a lot of reports of dogs and cats being involved with foxes which come right up to the dooryards or backyards and tackle the dogs."
Austin said the situation is worse than it has been for a number of years.
1992
After that, the garbage crews let Daimachi see who was in charge.
Bags piled up first in the dooryards of apartment buildings. Soon they began to take over parking spaces. After a few weeks they began to overflow on to sidewalks.
1999
MacFarlane, 54, garnered national media attention and public support for taking justice into his own hands after he fired a .410 Remington into the rear end of a van fleeing from his northside business dooryard.
The local businessman had been guarding his store after a New Year's Eve break- in, the fourth robbery of his business in under six months. When a masked man smashed in the glass door of the business with a hammer around 4 a.m. on Jan. 6 and tried to make off with cigarettes, MacFarlane aimed a weapon at him. The thief fled the store and jumped into the van.
2005
"I found the sport of cycling," she says, "and the benefit of that is that you can leave right from the dooryard. It's like cross-country skiing or snowshoeing in that you can leave right from the dooryard whenever you want, and go for an hour, go for a day go for 10 days! I love it!"
2011
That brings us to County speak – those special words or phrases we seldom hear anywhere else. One term that our family always used was “dooryard”. Apparently it is common only to some who have lived here awhile, as newcomers certainly don’t seem to have a clue what is meant by that term. Yet, in the County, we do have Dooryard Gardens Landscaping in Milford. According to a website, Carleton County Colloquialisms (New Brunswick) a dooryard is that piece of property directly in front of, well – your front door, complemented by the backyard behind the house, and the farmyard, if you happen to own one. I don’t see the problem, but foreheads furrow whenever I use the term. Even a few residents who have lived in Prince Edward County for a number of years have never used the term, yet, others do.So, I will ask again – what’s in your dooryard?
2019
The calf eventually found her way to a farm owned by some people Livingston knew.
"I called them as soon as I knew where we were, and they said they were about to call me because a little calf had come running up in the dooryard. At that point, I'm thinking, the thing's only a month and a half old, it's gotta be tired, I know I was. It was probably six, six and a half kilometres."
2023
The town recognized Gloria Yachyshen's many contributions to the region's art and music fields with a certificate paying tribute to her efforts on behalf of the Dooryard Arts Festival and the Dooryard Christmas Concert. It also recognized Yachyshen's role with the Woodstock High School and the Town of Woodstock Theatre Committee, the Carleton County Music Festival and the Valley Young Players.
References
- COD-2 • dooryard
- OED-3
Images
Chart 1: Internet Domain Search, 12 April 2025
