Learn English – Origin of the term “High and dry”

Merriam-Webster Online's definition explicitly associates button-down with collars:

1 a of a collar : having the ends fastened to the garment with buttons b of a garment : having a button-down collar

2 or buttoned-down : conservatively traditional or conventional; especially : adhering to conventional norms in dress and behavior [button-down businessmen]

and it dates the first known use of the adjective to 1934. However, a Google Books search demonstrates that the usage is at least 18 years older.

From an ad for Wolff's Shirt Shops, in The Yale Literary Magazine (February 1916):

"B 366" "The Student" This Shirt has been voted upon the men of all Leading Colleges "THE SHIRT." The above cut portrays its exactness—it is made of a High Grade Birdseye White Oxford, has a long deep pointed button down Collar with soft French Cuffs,

From Northwest Catalog Co. [Minneapolis, Minnesota], Catalog (1918) [snippet]:

White Summer Shirt 27B4730—Men's shirt made of fine white pongee with watch pockets, turnover button-down collar, imitation French cuffs, cut coat style button over five pearl buttons, cut full and roomy, and is a cool, comfortable summer shirt that can be

From an ad for Buttrick & Frawley, in The Cornell Countryman (January 1921):

Shirts and Neckwear to the King's Taste, and Prices on Both to Yours

Newest Cravats 75¢ Up

White Cheviot Shirts with button-down collar $3 to $4.50

From "Fashion Forcast for Jackets and Coats," in The Boys' Outfitter (May 1921):

Among the novelties is the vestee jacket, as depicted in [illustration] Number 241. This has a button-down collar and outside breast pocket.

From an ad for Yale Co-op in The Yale Alumni Weekly (May 19, 1922):

Do you remember the especially fine white sport shirt you used to buy at the Yale Co-op? We still carry that same make and get orders for these shirts nearly every day from some part of the country. Single or French cuffs—button-down collar. New stock just arrived.

Another early instance spells the adjective without a hyphen—and doesn't refer to collars at all. From an ad in Vanity Fair (1927) [snippet]:

Perfect fit is assured by the small buttondown belt at the back which adjusts to your exact measure. Exclusive with us, these shorts cannot be obtained elsewhere.

A Google Books search also turned up several (but considerably fewer) early examples of "buttoned-down collar," including one especially early (but unverifiable) instance from a 1911 Sears Roebuck catalog.

From "Horse Show Fashions pro-English," in The Clothier and Furnisher (December 1921):

Then, too, the evidence indicated that we have not seen the last of the white shirt with attached, buttoned-down collar. The college enthusiasts are sticking to it longer than usual. An occasional stiff bosom shirt appeared, one of character having light and dark cross stripes of pink.

From "Collars," in The Clothier and Furnisher (April 1922):

Great interest is manifested in the attached collar shirt. These shirts are being produced in Oxford cloth with a range of colors ; the soft, buttoned-down collar giving a certain dress effect.

To sum up, the Google Books search results suggest that "button-down collar" first achieved significant popularity in the northeastern United States among college students in the 1910s and early 1920s, and caught on more generally from there. At least one contemporaneous clothing industry journal (The Clothier and Furnisher) seems to have preferred the spelling buttoned-down, but the majority of haberdashers opted instead for button-down, and that spelling won out. I doubt that the shirt sellers in question based their decision on any grammatical theory.

Early occurrences of 'choked up' and 'choked' in baseball settings

In the context of sports, use of choke to mean "blow an easy opportunity" seems to go back to baseball in the years shortly after World War II. The Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (1994): has this entry as one of its definitions of choke:

choke v ... 2. Esp. Sports to become tense or lose one's composure in a critical situation.Also choke up.

The dictionary then offers an example from Bill Roeder, Jackie Robinson (1950):

In one of the vital pennant battles in St. Louis, Robinson grabbed at his throat to signify that Bill Stewart, the umpire, was "choking up." Stewart threw him out of the game.

A second early example from baseball (also cited in the Random Hose dictionary) is from Jim Brosnan, Pennant Race (1962). Here's how Brosnan describes the scene in early June 1961 at his hotel home (during baseball season) in Cincinnati a few hours after he had blown a late lead for the Reds and lost a game to the Cubs:

The doorman didn't notice me slinking into the foyer. He was working a patron who'd checked out of the hotel, and said, "The Reds really choked again today. That puts the Dodgers in first. They'll never win the pennant."

I didn't even eat dinner that night.

These examples—particularly the Jackie Robinson one—suggest that early users of the slang term choked really did equate failing under pressure with losing the ability to breathe and to function normally, and thus with failing to maintain one's composure and to perform well.

I should perhaps add that "choking up" as Jackie Robinson used the term has nothing to do with "choking up" in the sense of gripping a bat one or more inches above the knob of the bat. In the latter case, the thin part of the bat handle is imagined as the neck of the bat (the widest part of the bat is called its head), so "choking up on the bat" means gripping the bat slightly closer to the head, which, done within reason, can help improve one's bat control at the cost of some loss in power.

Early occurrence of 'choke in the clutch'

A Google Books search finds an instance of "choke in the clutch" in Paul Krassner's The Realist, issues 71–98 (1968–1974) [combined snippets]:

23 July 1968

It was during Indian batting practice that I first actively participated in don Don's cryptically esoteric hallucinatory religious ceremony, or he called it, his "little pre-game show." I was taking extremely careful notes regarding don Don's concoction:

There were several small pieces of rosin from the pitcher's mound, three one-inch squares of pine tar rag, a scratched recording of the Star Spangled Banner sung by Eddie Fisher and Mel Ott, two hot dogs with French's mustard (a creamy yellowish substance) and two beers. Don Don said that the mustard was not essential but that it did make the recording more palatable.

I told don Don that I was terribly afraid, that I had never experienced anything like this before and that my mother expected me home for dinner after the game. He said not to be afraid since the Great Team Spirit would protect me and that by the bottom of the fourth we would be well on our way to the land of the Grand Slam and the Perfect Game. So knowing that you don't walk a guy intentionally with the bases loaded, we proceeded to ingest a mixture of all the ingredients.

"I am pleased that you did not choke in the clutch," don Don said.

This article was probably published in 1968 or soon thereafter. The story appears to be a burlesque of Carlos Castañeda's The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge, (which was published in 1968), and the diary entries that make up the story include dates from July and August 1968. On the other hand, the version in Google Books is presented in snippet-view format, and it appears in a collection of issues of The Realist stretching from 1968 (issue 71) to February 1974 (issue 98), so its precise publication isn't clear from the Google Books data.