When did the phrase "shit the bed" originate? (edited)

[Orrex]

[font color=red]Edited to add: In this context, the phrase is taken to mean "totally screwed up that situation" rather than some literal reference to shit or a bed.[/font]

I heard it on an episode of Mad Men, and it struck me as clearly anachronistic.

But then I thought that maybe I need to lighten up.


Thoughts?

[Lochloosa]

1. I first heard it when I was about 3 years old.

[Orrex]

2. Doh!

Should have seen that one coming. Doh!

[olddots]

3. I believe it was started in Norwood Mass. in 1893

[Hassin Bin Sober]

4. I heard it first from a nursing home admin.

I always assumed it was nursing home talk.

[Kaleva]

5. Often, when a person dies, they shit the bed.

When that happens, that person has passed the point of no return. When a mechanical device or situation is beyond any hope of repair, it has "shit the bed".

[Orrex]

6. Well, yeah. I know what it means. When did that particular usage begin?

Honestly, I never heard it even once before about 2012, but it could easily have been in use long before that.

[Kaleva]

8. Your question was first asked here at DU in 2004

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x652426

[Orrex]

9. Cool--very interesting!

That pegs it eight years earlier than I was able to confirm.

Now we just need to trace it back another 40 years or so to make it part of Roger Stirling's lexicon!

[Kaleva]

10. I first heard it back in the 60's

[Orrex]

12. In that same context? Again, interesting!

That might be all the answer I need. I distinctly remember the first time I heard it, because it struck me as particularly amusing. I had no idea that it had been bouncing around for decades before that!

[Joe Shlabotnik]

20. I read it in 'Sterling's Gold'

I think on page 40. Great book btw.

[Major Nikon]

7. I always thought it was an obscene derivative of the idiom...

You've made your bed, now lie in it.

I always thought, 'You've shit the bed, now lie in it' made more sense. Who wouldn't want to lie in a made bed? And why would you make your bed right before you lie in it?

[Orrex]

13. That's an interesting--and logical--interpretation

Worth considering, definitely.

[NutmegYankee]

11. It's at least several decades old, probably older.

Beyond the older more vulgar meaning, it probably came into common use as machines and devices began to be commonplace and then fail completely.

[Orrex]

14. I guess the trick now is to find it in print from that era.

It seems like a phrase that Vonnegut would have loved to use if he'd heard it in the 60s, or Robert Anton Wilson if he'd heard it in the 70s.

[Initech]

15. It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia took that phrase to new extremes a couple years ago.

"Who Pooped The Bed" is a classic episode.

[WinkyDink]

16. Found on a Sumerian clay cylinder.

[lame54]

17. It was on a wednesday morning - just after taco tuesday

[Orrex]

18. That's awesome.

Everything is awesome.

[Skittles]

19. I can honestly say I have never heard that expression

[MicaelS]

21. I heard it as a child, 50 years ago....

In the context of a car that was totally unrepairable. Since cars were pretty easy to fix back then, that meant it was really and truly dead. And yes, it is anachronistic today.