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Winston Churchill Did Not Coin the Phrase ‘Iron Curtain’

5 minute read

Exactly 69 years ago, on Mar. 5, 1946, Winston Churchill stood in a college gymnasium in Fulton, Mo., at the beginning of the Cold War, while President Harry S. Truman sat behind him in a gown and mortarboard. Speaking to students gathered at Westminster College, he accepted an honorary degree and famously condemned the Soviet Union’s ways: “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.”

The actual title of Churchill’s speech was “Sinews of Peace,” though most people know it as the “Iron Curtain speech.” Over the years there has been another twist of the record. Churchill often gets credit for coining that metallic metaphor—on that stage—for the figurative barrier drawn across Europe between the capitalist West and the communist East. But he did not. In fact, there’s evidence of the phrase being used to mean exactly that a good 26 years earlier when an E. Snowden (seriously) published a travelogue about her adventures in Bolshevik Russia.

So why do quotes get false histories? Lots of reasons.

Misattribution can be convenient. It’s easy not to question a coinage that it seems plausible—especially when it just so happens to give us good gravitas by association.

“You reach for a famous name to give authority,” says Elizabeth Knowles, editor of the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. “You want to say Churchill said it. Because you have associated what you’re saying with that particular person, it gives the saying a bit more oomph.” Iron curtain just feels like something a dulcet, witty orator like Churchill would come up with, right? And it’s a much clearer signal that you’re educated and that your words have heft if you attribute a quote to Winston Churchill than to Snowden, an unremembered member of a trade-union delegation.

Many times people invoke quotations that were never said at all.

“Play it again, Sam.” Neither Bogart nor Bergman said these words.

“Elementary, my dear Watson.” Doyle wrote no such thing.

“Beam me up, Scotty.” Sorry, nope.

These get passed on because we wish people had uttered them. “A misquotation of that kind can be, almost, what you feel somebody ought to have said,” says Knowles. “It summarizes for somebody something very important about a particular film, a particular relationship, a particular event.” Even if it’s made up and especially if it’s close to things people really did say, we embrace it as gospel. After all, Bergman did utter, “Play it, Sam,” in Casablanca. And Bogart did say, “If she can stand it, I can! Play it!”

Sometimes misquotations get handed down because they convey the right idea and sound better to us than what the person actually said.

In 1858, Abraham Lincoln gave a speech in which he said, “To give victory to the right, not bloody bullets, but peaceful ballots only, are necessary.” Over time, that sentiment been recrafted as, “The ballot is stronger than the bullet.” The latter version is snazzier. Even when sources know this precise phrasing was probably never really used by Lincoln, they continue to pass it on. Take Dictionary.com’s quotes site, where the well-sourced quote from 1858 is in the fine print. Also in fine print is the admission that the quote in giant font across the top of the page was “reconstructed” 40 years after Lincoln was supposed to have said it. Which, as far as editors at Oxford are concerned, he did not.

Screen shot taken from Dictionary.com

“It’s a very natural thing, that we edit as we remember,” Knowles says. “So when we quote something we very often have in mind the gist of what’s being said. So we may alter it slightly and we may just make it slightly pithier or simpler for someone else to remember. And that’s the form that gets passed on.”

While it may be easier to remember that Churchill invented the iron curtain, here’s the real history:

In its earliest use, circa 1794, an “iron curtain” was a literal iron screen that would lowered in a theater to protect the audience and auditorium from any fire occurring backstage. From there, it became a general metaphor for an impenetrable barrier. In 1819, the Earl of Muster described the Indian river Betwah as an iron curtain that protected his group of travelers from an “avenging angel” of death that had been on their heels in that foreign land. Then, in 1920, Ethel Snowden made it specifically about the East and West in Throughout Bolshevik Russia (1920):

At last we were to enter the country where the Red Flag had become a national emblem, and was flying over every public building in the cities of Russia. The thought thrilled like new wine … We were behind the ‘iron curtain’ at last!

Read TIME’s original coverage of the Mar. 5, 1946, speech, here in the TIME Vault: This Sad & Breathless Moment

Read next: You Can Now Own a Vial of Winston Churchill’s Blood

See Photos From the Speech that Made 'Iron Curtain' a Household Term

Churchill speaks in the gym from a rostrum decorated with shrubs and radio microphones. His small audience sat on hard, borrowed bleachers.
Caption from LIFE. Churchill speaks in the gym from a rostrum decorated with shrubs and radio microphones. His small audience sat on hard, borrowed bleachers.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
A long line of people waiting to enter the building where Sir Winston Churchill is making his speech, Missouri, 1946.
A long line of people waiting to enter the building where Sir Winston Churchill is making his speech, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Crowds welcoming British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.
Crowds welcoming Sir Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Harry S. Truman and Sir Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.
Harry S. Truman and Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Crowds welcoming British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.
Crowds welcoming Sir Winston Churchill, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
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Caption from LIFE. President McCluer of Westminster College escorts Churchill. McCluer wangled Churchill visit by getting Truman to endorse his invitation.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
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Winston Churchill and Harry S. Truman, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Crowd listening to Winston Churchill speak, Missouri, 1946.
Crowd listening to Winston Churchill speak, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Harry S. Truman (stage, L) listening to Winston Churchill make a speech regarding the Communist threat which became famous as the "Iron Curtain" speech.
Harry S. Truman (stage, left) listening to Winston Churchill make a speech regarding the Communist threat which became famous as the "Iron Curtain" speech.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Sir Winston Churchill (2L) talking with President Harry S. Truman (2R).
Prime Minister Winston Churchill (second from left) talking with President Harry S. Truman (second from right).George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Winston Churchill smiling while President Harry S. Truman waves his hat, Missouri, 1946.
Winston Churchill smiling while President Harry S. Truman waves his hat, Missouri, 1946.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images
Churchill and Truman wave for photographers.
Caption from LIFE. Churchill and Truman wave for photographers. Churchill astonished Truman with his knowledge, not always accurate, of American history. At Harper's Ferry, W. Va. he remarked "That's where Jackson seized McClellan's stores." Actually the stores were under General Halleck's command.George Skadding—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images

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