Well this is a pretty easy thing to describe. Every home has one. You sit on it to watch TV. You nap on it after a hard day of work (or play). Maybe you cuddle on it with your significant other.

It's a sofa.

Or a davenport.

My niece found an old picture of herself as a little girl sitting with her two cousin's at her Grandpa's house. What is that you guys were sitting on?

The davenport.

Yep, tis true. My parents (her Grandparents) never owned a sofa. But they sure owned a few davenport's through the years. I don't think my Dad ever used the word 'sofa' his entire life. It was always...davenport. I kind of think maybe he thought 'sofa' was a high-falutin' word...which to him meant expensive.

Yes, a davenport and a sofa may be the same thing, but davenport was cheaper.

So all these years later I got to thinking, 'Where did he ever get that word 'davenport'.

Well according to Wikipedia, it came from A.H. Davenport and Company and became what they call a 'genericized trademark'. I suppose kind of like Kleenix has become genericized for tissue paper (By the way I never thought in my whole long life I would ever use the word 'genericized').

The article goes on to say that 'davenport' became hugely popular in the mid-western states in particular and essentially meant the same as sofa.

The A.H. Davenport Company is now defunct. And, apparently, the word 'davenport' is also headed to the dust bin of memory.

And I know, I know, it's neither a sofa or a davenport...it's a couch.

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