| 词汇 | collyers’ mansion |
| 词源 | Collyers’ Mansion. A legendary house in New York City where brothers Langley and Homer Collyer were found dead in 1947 among some 100 tons of valuables and trash, including newspapers, magazines, and a myriad of things garbage cans can yield. The Collyers were packrats extraordinary whose mansion in Harlem once signified their prestigious family. Ap- parently, the brothers were victims of their own booby traps, set to catch intruders. A Collyers’ mansion (or house) has come to mean any such house almost anywhere—inhabited dwellings filled with debris that are especially dangerous to firefighters. The phrase has often been transferred from parents to children, as in the words, “Get that room of yours cleaned up: It looks like the Collyers’ House!” |
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