Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Gopher \Go"pher\, n. [F. gaufre waffle, honeycomb. See
   {Gauffer}.] (Zo["o]l.)
   1. One of several North American burrowing rodents of the
      genera {Geomys} and {Thomomys}, of the family
      {Geomyid[ae]}; -- called also {pocket gopher} and {pouched
      rat}. See {Pocket gopher}, and {Tucan}.

   Note: The name was originally given by French settlers to
         many burrowing rodents, from their honeycombing the
         earth.

   2. One of several western American species of the genus
      {Spermophilus}, of the family {Sciurid[ae]}; as, the gray
      gopher ({Spermophilus Franklini}) and the striped gopher
      ({S. tridecemlineatus}); -- called also {striped prairie
      squirrel}, {leopard marmot}, and {leopard spermophile}.
      See {Spermophile}.

   3. A large land tortoise ({Testudo Carilina}) of the Southern
      United States, which makes extensive burrows.

   4. A large burrowing snake ({Spilotes Couperi}) of the
      Southern United States.

   {Gopher drift} (Mining), an irregular prospecting drift,
      following or seeking the ore without regard to regular
      grade or section. --Raymond.

Source : WordNet®

gopher
     n 1: a zealously energetic person (especially a salesman) [syn: {goffer}]
     2: any of various terrestrial burrowing rodents of Old and New
        Worlds; often destroy crops [syn: {ground squirrel}, {spermophile}]
     3: burrowing rodent of the family Geomyidae having large
        external cheek pouches; of Central America and
        southwestern North America [syn: {pocket gopher}, {pouched
        rat}]
     4: burrowing edible land tortoise of southeastern North America
        [syn: {gopher tortoise}, {gopher turtle}, {Gopherus
        polypemus}]

Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

gopher
     
         A {distributed} document retrieval
        system which started as a {Campus Wide Information System} at
        the {University of Minnesota}, and which was popular in the
        early 1990s.
     
        Gopher is defined in {RFC 1436}.  The protocol is like a
        primitive form of {HTTP} (which came later).  Gopher lacks the
        {MIME} features of HTTP, but expressed the equivalent of a
        document's {MIME type} with a one-character code for the
        "{Gopher object type}".  At time of writing (2001), all Web
        browers should be able to access gopher servers, although few
        gopher servers exist anymore.
     
        {Tim Berners-Lee}, in his book "Weaving The Web" (pp.72-73),
        related his opinion that it was not so much the protocol
        limitations of gopher that made people abandon it in favor of
        HTTP/{HTML}, but instead the legal missteps on the part of the
        university where it was developed:
     
        "It was just about this time, spring 1993, that the University
        of Minnesota decided that it would ask for a license fee from
        certain classes of users who wanted to use gopher.  Since the
        gopher software being picked up so widely, the university was
        going to charge an annual fee.  The browser, and the act of
        browsing, would be free, and the server software would remain
        free to nonprofit and educational institutions.  But any other
        users, notably companies, would have to pay to use gopher
        server software.
     
        "This was an act of treason in the academic community and the
        Internet community.  Even if the university never charged
        anyone a dime, the fact that the school had announced it was
        reserving the right to charge people for the use of the gopher
        protocols meant it had crossed the line.  To use the
        technology was too risky.  Industry dropped gopher like a hot
        potato."
     
        (2001-03-31)