The "Oxford English Dictionary" places the earliest published non-idiomatic use of the phrase in the "New Albany Daily Ledger" (New Albany, Indiana, January 30, 1855) in an article called "The Judge's Big Shirt." "What a silly, stupid woman! I told her to get just enough to make three shirts; instead of making three, she has put the whole nine yards into one shirt!" The first known use of the phrase as an idiom appears in "The Mitchell Commercial", a newspaper in the small town of Mitchell, Indiana, in its May 2, 1907 edition: