“OK”/ means “all right”/ or “acceptable.” It expresses agreement or approval. Millions of people/ all over the world/ use the word/ “okay.” In fact, some people say/ the word/ is used more often/ than any other word/ in the world. Still, language experts/ do not agree/ where it came from.

Some say/ it came from the native American Indian tribe/ known as the Choctaws. The Choctaw word “okeh”/ means the same/ as the American word “OK.” Experts say/ early explorers/ in the American West/ spoke the Choctaw language/ in the nineteenth century. The language/ spread across the country.

But many people/ dispute this. Language expert Allen Walker Read/ wrote about the word “OK”/ in articles/ published in the nineteen sixties. He said/ the word/ began as a short way/ of writing a different spelling/ of the words/ “all correct.” Old stories say/ some foreign-born people/ would write all correct/ as o-l-l k-o-r-r-e-c-t/ but speak it/ as “OK."

Others say/ “OK” was a way/ to shorten Greek words/ that mean/ everything is fine. Still/ others say/ a railroad worker/ named Obadiah Kelly/ invented the word. They say/ he put the first letters/ of his names -- O and K --/ on each object/ people gave him/ to place/ on the train.

Another explanation is/ that “OK”/ was invented/ by a political organization/ that supported Martin Van Buren/ for president/ in the eighteen hundreds. They called their organization/ the OK Club. The letters O and K/ were taken/ from the name of the town/ where Martin Van Buren was born -- Old Kinderhook, New York.

Not everyone/ agrees with this explanation/ either. But experts do agree/ that the word/ is purely American/ and has spread to almost every country/ on Earth. Yet/ in the United States, it is used mostly/ in speech, not in writing. Serious writers/ would rather use such words/ as “agree,” “approve” or “confirm”/ instead. We hope/ this is OK/ with you!