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Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This
milque·toast    Audio Help   [milk-tohst] Pronunciation Key
–noun (sometimes initial capital letter)
a very timid, unassertive, spineless person, esp. one who is easily dominated or intimidated: a milquetoast who's afraid to ask for a raise.


[Origin: 1935–40, Americanism; after Caspar Milquetoast, a character in The Timid Soul, comic strip by H. T. Webster (1885–1952), American cartoonist]
Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
milquetoast

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© 2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
milque·toast    Audio Help   (mĭlk'tōst')  Pronunciation Key 
n.   One who has a meek, timid, unassertive nature.


[After Caspar Milquetoast, a comic-strip character created by Harold Tucker Webster (1885-1952).]

milque'toast'y adj.
Word History: An indication of the effect on the English language of popular culture is the adoption of names from the comic strips as English words. Casper Milquetoast, created by Harold Webster in 1924, was a timid and retiring man named for a timid food. The first instance of milquetoast as a common noun is found in the mid-1930s. Milquetoast thus joins the ranks of other such words, including sad sack, from a blundering army private invented by George Baker in 1942, and Wimpy, from J. Wellington Wimpy in the Popeye comic strip, which became a trade name for a hamburger. If we look to a related form of popular culture, the animated cartoon, we must of course acknowledge Mickey Mouse, which has become a slang term for something that is easy, insignificant, small-time, worthless, or petty.

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Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
milquetoast 
1938, from Caspar Milquetoast, cartoon character created by H.T. Webster in 1924 as "The Timid Soul." Probably a variation of milksop (see milk).

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2001 Douglas Harper
WordNet - Cite This Source - Share This
milquetoast

noun
a timid man or boy considered childish or unassertive [syn: sissy

WordNet® 3.0, © 2006 by Princeton University.
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