Word.ws English Dictionary

Orthogonian

Orthogonian noun: a member of the Orthogonian society, a social club at Whittier College founded by Richard M. Nixon in opposition to the wealthy elites at Whittier.

Noun

Orthogonian (plural Orthogonians)

  1. A member of the Orthogonian society, a social club at Whittier College founded by Richard M. Nixon in opposition to the wealthy elites at Whittier.
    • Orthogonians, like Nixon, saw themselves as hardworking "regular" people fighting against a powerful elite (personified by the Franklins) for status and wealth.2016, Steven Hyden, Your Favorite Band Is Killing Me
    • Fellow Orthogonians considered him an idealist who emphasized Orthogonian rituals to develop moral behavior among the members.2023, Paul Carter, Richard Nixon: California's Native Son, page 40

Adjective

Orthogonian (comparative more Orthogonian, superlative most Orthogonian)

  1. Pertaining to or characteristic of the Orthogonian society and its ethos of appealing to working-class values and opposition to a wealthy ruling elite.
    • Nixon would employ the same Orthogonian politics in his adult career.2011, Chris Matthews, Kennedy & Nixon: The Rivalry that Shaped Postwar America
    • In place of "flower power" and "the struggle," America was offered what Rick Perstein in Nixonland calls an "Orthogonian” worldview. In its pure form, this ideal embraced the virtues of a productive, humble, and obedient adulthood.2015, Dr. Bill Thomas, William H. Thomas, Second Wind, page 51

Examples of Orthogonian in a sentence

  • Al Stoll, a longtime Orthogonian who graduated from Whittier in 1949, surmised that Nixon possibly started the Orthogonian Society to compensate for the fact that he was a nonfactor on the field.2023, Michael Richman, George Allen: A Football Life:
  • Stone explored the Orthogonian concept thirteen years earlier in Nixon, though he did it with a lot less nuance.2016, Steven Hyden, Your Favorite Band Is Killing Me:

Forms of Orthogonian

Noun
pluralOrthogonians
Adjective
comparativemore Orthogonian
superlativemost Orthogonian

Origin of Orthogonian

Coined by Richard M. Nixon in 1930 from Ancient Greek ὀρθός (orthós, “straight”), Ancient Greek γωνία (gōnía, “corner, angle”), + -ian, to mean "straight shooter".

Questions about Orthogonian

What does Orthogonian mean?
Orthogonian means a member of the Orthogonian society, a social club at Whittier College founded by Richard M. Nixon in opposition to the wealthy elites at Whittier.
How do you use Orthogonian in a sentence?
Al Stoll, a longtime Orthogonian who graduated from Whittier in 1949, surmised that Nixon possibly started the Orthogonian Society to compensate for the fact that he was a nonfactor on the field.
What part of speech is Orthogonian?
Orthogonian can be a noun or an adjective.
What is the plural of Orthogonian?
The plural of Orthogonian is Orthogonians.

Words near Orthogonian in the dictionary

  1. orthogonalizing
  2. orthogonally
  3. orthogonals
  4. orthogonia
  5. orthogonial
  6. Orthogonian
  7. Orthogonians
  8. orthogonium
  9. orthogons
  10. orthograde
  11. orthogradely

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Orthogonian (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “Orthogonian.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/orthogonian. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.