The millennials likely started this. In the past week I have heard my wheelhouse 8 times now. In a press conference this morning Pelosi even used it, and she is 103.
Pelosi said, “When you talk about the whistleblower, you’re coming into my wheelhouse. I have more experience in intelligence than anybody in the Congress.”
It's the room in the ship that has the steering wheel. It entered metaphorical usage in baseball, referring to the zone that a hitter was most likely to dominate. Then it spread to other metaphorical usage in the 50s and 60s.
Originally, literally a house for storing spare wagon wheels, back when they took a year to make and only a week to break. Since then, the word has been re-used for a dozen different things.
Oddly enough, the meaning was always clear - my comfort zone, the area where I dominate, whatever. But it was only when this thread questioned its overuse I stopped to think "what the hell IS a wheelhouse?"
It's the room in the ship that has the steering wheel. It entered metaphorical usage in baseball, referring to the zone that a hitter was most likely to dominate. Then it spread to other metaphorical usage in the 50s and 60s.
jimboston wrote:So we have two competing originals for the term...
Spare wheel storage Steering Room in a Ship
I always thought it had something to do with a Mill. Like an old fashioned grinding mill.
Check the link.
A place for storing wagon wheels, first recorded in 1808. An enclosure around the ship's steering wheel, first recorded in 1835.
I win by a generation. Irony...
Can you prove that those uses of the word are actually related to each other though? Set is an Egyptian god and also what you must build in rummy. Does that mean rummy is based on Egyptian mythology?
What I mean precisely is that it is possible to assume that the baseball usage comes from the naval usage. I would argue that the wagon and ship usages are independent developments.
It's the room in the ship that has the steering wheel. It entered metaphorical usage in baseball, referring to the zone that a hitter was most likely to dominate. Then it spread to other metaphorical usage in the 50s and 60s.
