''A-okay'' or ''A-OK'' () is a more

intensive word form In grammar, an intensive word form is one which denotes stronger, more forceful, or more concentrated action relative to the root on which the intensive is built. Intensives are usually lexical formations, but there may be a regular process for for ...

of the English term '' OK''. The phrase can be accompanied by, or substituted with, the

OK sign ''OK'' (spelling variations include ''okay'', ''O.K.'', ''ok'' and ''Ok'') is an English word (originating in American English) denoting approval, acceptance, agreement, assent, acknowledgment, or a sign of indifference. ''OK'' is frequently ...

History

The phrase "" had been in use at least as far back as 1952, when it appeared in an advertisement by Midvac Steels which read "A-OK for tomorrow's missile demands""The Golden Age of Advertising - the 50s", p. 57, Ed. Jim Heimann,

Taschen Taschen is a luxury art book publisher founded in 1980 by Benedikt Taschen in Cologne, Germany. As of January 2017, Taschen is co-managed by Benedikt and his eldest daughter, Marlene Taschen. History The company began as Taschen Comics, pu ...

2005.

US Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

Lt. Col. John "Shorty" Powers popularized it while serving in the 1960s as

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...

's public affairs officer for

Project Mercury Project Mercury was the first human spaceflight program of the United States, running from 1958 through 1963. An early highlight of the Space Race, its goal was to put a man into Earth orbit and return him safely, ideally before the Soviet Un ...

, the "voice of Mercury Control". He was reported as attributing the expression to astronaut

Alan Shepard Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr. (November 18, 1923 – July 21, 1998) was an American astronaut, naval aviator, test pilot, and businessman. In 1961, he became the second person and the first American to travel into space and, in 1971, he beca ...

during his historic ''

Freedom 7 Mercury-Redstone 3, or ''Freedom 7'', was the first United States human spaceflight, on May 5, 1961, piloted by astronaut Alan Shepard. It was the first crewed flight of Project Mercury. The project had the ultimate objective of putting an astr ...

'' flight, which was the United States' first manned space flight. In his book '' The Right Stuff'', author

Tom Wolfe Thomas Kennerly Wolfe Jr. (March 2, 1930 – May 14, 2018)Some sources say 1931; ''The New York Times'' and Reuters both initially reported 1931 in their obituaries before changing to 1930. See and was an American author and journalist widely ...

wrote that Powers had borrowed the expression from NASA engineers who used it during radio transmission tests because "the sharper sound of ''A'' cut through the static better than ''O''". The NASA publication, ''This New Ocean: A History of Project Mercury,'' says in a footnote that "A replay of the flight voice communications tape disclosed that Shepard himself did not use the term" and that "Tecwyn Roberts of STG and Capt. Henry E. Clements of the Air Force had used 'A.OK' frequently in reports written more than four months before the Shepard flight."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aokay American English words English words Interjections Slang Project Mercury