OK?

[milly143]

What is "OK" an abbreviation of?

[cupid04]

okay

[craft1948]

okeydokey?

[pa___ul3]

oll korect I've heard I think, from German, although a Greek lad I work with insist it's origins are Greek.

[dr b]

This was discussed nearly to death a few months ago, but I can't find the thread. Short answer - no one knows

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okay

[NOX]

I one heard (how true it is I don't know) that such was the American dislike of the English after the War of Independance that is was a joke abrreviation of ' All clear' - spelled ' Orl Klear' just to be different from the Brits and that it caught the American imagination and fell into common usage. This may be an urban myth- I really dunno.

[milly143]

Sorry Dr b, but I hadn't seen that or I wouldn't have asked.

Your answer is similar to Pauls Nox. That's the problem though, there seems to be a variety of answers.

[ljdksa]

oll korrect

[dr b]

milly - I wasn't implying you should have seen it, I was hoping to link to it because there was a good discussion. The wiki article is actually quite complete.

[pa___ul3]

looks like I made the German bit up then!

[scotman]

This is from Chambers online

OK1 abbreviation, US state Oklahoma. Also written Okla.

OK2 or okay colloq, originally US, adj all correct; all right; satisfactory • an okay song. adverb well; satisfactorily. exclamation expressing agreement or approval; yes; certainly • OK! I'll do it! noun (OKs, OK's or okays) approval, sanction or agreement. verb (OK'd or OK'ed, Ok'ing; okayed, okaying) (often give something the OK) to approve or pass something as satisfactory.
ETYMOLOGY: 19c: probably from American English oll korrect, a facetious spelling of all correct.

[Quizmonster]

In 1830s Boston, there was a craze for initialisms, much the same as our current ‘LOLs', ‘CUL8Rs' and ‘IMHOs' in text messages. Thus, they had ‘KG' for ‘Know Good' (no good) and ‘SP' for ‘small potatoes' (unimportant), for example. ‘OK' for ‘Orl Korrekt' (all correct) appeared in the ‘Boston Morning Post' newspaper in 1839. This is the earliest-recorded version of the new ‘word'.
The next year, the Democrats started the ‘OK Club' to support Martin Van Buren, who was standing in the 1840 presidential election. "OK" in this case stood for "Old Kinderhook", which was his nickname, as he'd been born at Kinderhook in New York State. As a result of these two factors, 'OK' and, later, ‘Okay' became widely popular and are still with us today.
Alternative explanations are sometimes offered - including over a dozen listed below - but there is not a shred of hard evidence to support any of them. They fall under two main headings...language-based and people-based.
cont...

[Quizmonster]

...cont
A. Language. 1. Scots ‘Och aye' misheard as ‘OK'; 2. Greek ‘olla kalla' (all good); 3. Finnish ‘oikea' (exact); 4. French ‘au quai' (at the quay); 5.French ‘oc' (the equivalent of ‘oui' in the langue d'oc French dialect); 6. Mandingo (African) ‘o ke' (certainly); 7 Wolof (African) ‘waw kay' (yes indeed); 8. Zero killed (battle report).

B. People. 1. ‘Old Keokuk' (an Indian chief); 2. ‘Oberst Kommandant' (General Schliessen who fought against British forces in the War of Independence); 3. Obadiah Kelly (well-known freight agent); 4. ‘Open Key' (telegraphists' jargon); 5. ‘Ole Korrek' (President Jackson's supposed mis-spelling).
In the end, the ‘orl korrekt' explanation is the only one that can be reliably confirmed, so my advice is to go with that and forget all the other etymythology!

[guilliebrougues]

whenever i say okay ok. i mean alright. in others words when anyone says how are you i could say i'm alright or i am okay. it's just an expression really, it's just the way you answer the question .or if you ask someone do do something for you, they could say ok okay or alright.

[Quizmonkey]

A whole book has just been published on this very subject, recently reviewed in the press: 'OK: The Improbable Story of America's Greatest Word' by Allan Metcalf (£8.89 on Amazon).