Does he look like he would ‘fly off the handle’?

 Axes in American pioneer days were frequently handmade, with the pioneers whittling their own handles.  They would attach axe-heads shipped from back East.  The axe-heads would fit crudely to the helve and often flew off the handle while the woodsmen were chopping down trees  or preparing firewood. 

Often there would be injuries of the axeman or people near him.  The sudden flying of the head off the axe and the trouble this caused, would suggest a sudden wild outburst of anger…loss of self-control, or the losing of one’s head that expression ‘to fly off the handle’ describes. 

Original Pioneer Axe

It became a saying in 1844, when it was used in a Thomas Haliburton’s “Sam Slick” tale.  Taken from the Henry Holt Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins by Robert Hendrickson.

Have you flown off the handle lately?  Leave your comments

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