Now, the VOA Special English program, Words and Their Stories. Today, we tell about the word wildcat.(MUSIC)

    Humans have always depended on animals. From the beginning of human history, wild animals provided food, clothing and sometimes medicine.

    We may not depend as much on wild animals now. But we hear about them every day. Americans use the names of animals in many ways.

Many companies use animals to make us want to buy their goods. Automobile companies, for example, love to show fast horses when they are trying to sell their cars. They also name their cars for other fast powerful animals.

    Automobile manufacturers and gasoline companies especially like to use big cats to sell their products. They like lions, tigers and wildcats.

    When Americans say wildcat, they usually mean a lynx, an ocelot or a bobcat. All these cats attack quickly and fiercely. So wildcats represent something fast and fierce.

    What better way is there to sell a car than to say it is as fast as a wildcat. Or, what better way is there to sell gasoline than to say that using it is like putting a tiger in your tank.

    An early American use of the word wildcat was quite different. It was used to describe members of Congress who declared war on Britain in eighteen twelve. A magazine of that year said the wildcat congressmen went home. It said they were unable to face the responsibility of having involved their country in an unnecessary war.

    Wildcat also has been used as a name for money. It was used this way in the eighteen hundreds. At that time, some states permitted banks to make their own money. One bank in the state of Michigan offered paper money with a picture of a wildcat on it.

    Some banks, however, did not have enough gold to support all the paper money they offered. So the money had little or no value. It was called a wildcat bill or a wildcat bank note. The banks who offered this money were called wildcat banks.

A newspaper of the time said those were the days of wildcat money. It said a man might be rich in the morning and poor by night.

    Wildcat was used in another way in the eighteen hundreds. It was used for an oil well or gold mine that had almost no oil or gold in it. Dishonest developers would buy such property. Then they would sell it and leave town with the money. The buyers were left with worthless holes in the ground. Today, wildcat oil wells are in areas that are not known to have oil. Yet another kind of wildcat is the wildcat strike. That is a strike called without official approval by a union. During World War Two, an American publication accused wildcat strikers of slowing government production.

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    This VOA Special English program, Words and Their Stories, was written by Jeri Watson. I'm Warren Scheer.
    现在是VOA慢速英语词语典故时间。今天，我们将讲述关于wildcat的短语。

人类一向要依赖动物。从人类历史之初，野生动物就为人类提供食物，衣服，有时候还提供药物。

现在，人类对动物的依赖性可能不像以前那么大了。可是，我们每天仍能听到许多关于动物的话。美国人在许多方面都能用到动物的名字。

    许多公司使用动物来刺激我们购买他们产品的欲望。例如，汽车制造公司在试图销售他们的汽车做广告时经常用到快速奔跑的骏马。他们还经常用其他奔跑速度极快的动物来为自己的汽车命名。

汽车制造商和汽油公司在推销自己的产品时尤其喜欢使用大型猫科动物，例如狮子，老虎和野猫。

美国人说到野猫，他们通常指的是猞猁，豹猫或山猫。所有这些猫科动物的攻击速度都非常快，非常凶猛。所以wildcats通常指的是一些很快，很凶猛的事物。

    在销售汽车时，用as fast as a wildcat(像野猫一样快)来描述再好不过了。或者，在销售汽油时，最好的方法就是说，使用这种汽油如同putting a tiger in your tank(在油箱中放置一只老虎)。

    美国最初对wildcat的用法截然不同。这个词最初用来描述1812年对英国宣战的国会议员。当年的一份杂志称，wildcat congressmen回家了。

据说，他们不能面对将自己的国家卷入不必要的战争的责任。

     Wildcat也曾被用作钱的名字。在19世纪是这样使用的。当时，一些州政府允许银行自己印制货币。密歇根州一家银行印制的钱币上有野猫的图像。

然而，一些银行没有足够的黄金来支持自己发行的纸币。所以，这些纸币价值很低或者几乎没有价值。这被叫做 wildcat bill或者a wildcat bank note. 发行这些纸币的银行被叫做wildcat banks。

    当时的一家报纸称，那是wildcat money的时代，一个人早上可能还是富豪，晚上可能就变成穷光蛋了。

    19世纪，wildcat还有另外一个用法，用来指没有石油的油井或者没有黄金的金矿。不诚实的发展商会购买这样的资产，然后将它出售，随后携款潜逃。购买者收到的仅仅是地面上一个毫无用途的大坑。今天，wildcat油井值得是那些未探明蕴藏石油的提取。然而，另外一种wildcat指的是wildcat strike(野猫式罢工，自发罢工)，是工会在未通过官方许可的情况下进行的罢工。第二次世界大战期间，一家美国出版机构指责野猫式罢工者减缓了政府的生产。