The Wail of the Wowser: Saving Australians from themselves
Australia has a rich and colourful slang, as the 6000 or more words in Sidney J Baker's The Australian Language show, and at least one has gained international currency - the mangificent word 'Wowser'. The great American Lexicographer, H.L. Mencken, described it as an 'excellent noun' and himself used it. The sleuths of the big Oxford English Dictionary found it in the London Daily News in 1909, and the next year, it even crept into the staid London Morning Post.
What is a Wowser? The closest approximation in English is 'kill-joy' and in American, 'blue nose'. The Oxford Dictionary definition is 'a Puritanical enthusiast or fanatic'.
Australian Definitions
In 1910, when Sydney's liberal-minded Cardinal Moran used the word three times in a speech, a newspaper held an enquiry into its meaning. William Holman, New South Wales Attorney-General, said a wowser was 'a man who, being entirely destitute of the greater virtues, makes up for their lack by a continuous denunciation of the little vices'.
In 1912, the Premier of Western Australia, John Scaddan, gave a more succinct definition: 'a person who is more shocked at seeing two inches of underskirt than he would be at seeing a mountain of misery'.