Several stories posted here contain slang and terms as people used them at the time the story took place. Many are no longer found in the normal lexicon of our society. Some older words and their usage in this context have passed from the common language.
For example, I wrote my noir crime novel, Shortening Shadows, as an author might have created it at the time in which it takes place, 1935. As a result, the narration and dialogue contained slang and terms from that time period. I provided a Glossary at the back of the book to help the reader in that regard. Likewise, on this Jargon page, a similar alphabetical glossary is offered to aid the reader as those stories with such terms are posted on this website.
The words or phrases that may most likely fall into this category are highlighted and underlined in the stories. If you click on the word or phrase, it will bring you to this page for the definition or explanation. Then you can return to the story.
A-shirt: A tank top-style undershirt that had no sleeves or collar and usually had wide shoulder straps. Nowadays, it is commonly referred to as a “wife-beater.”
Add up: Make sense
Alienist: An archaic term for a psychiatrist or psychologist, which fell out of favor by the middle of the twentieth century
Alderman: A man’s pot belly
Amble: Walk
Angle: An approach, motivation, explanation; Also, one’s business
Ankle: Walk, as in “Ankle past him slow.”
Artillery: Guns, weaponry
Ashtray: A vessel or small dish used for – say, you are young, aren’t you?
Az men git dem tayvl a hor, vil er di gantse bord: If you give the devil a hair, he’ll want the whole beard.
B-girls: Women who entertain bar patrons and encourage them to spend freely
Back-window: To escape, skip out, elude somebody
Badger game: Blackmail practiced on a man who is lured by a woman into a compromising situation and then threatened by her male accomplice
Bag man: Person who collects money from a criminal enterprise and carries it from place to place
Bangtails: Racehorses; also, Ponies
Bank shot, A: A long shot
Bark: Tough exterior, nerve when describing a person; rough bark indicates a person has an especially tough exterior or a lot of nerve
Beanery: A diner or restaurant, sometimes denoting a cheap place
Bean shooter: A small-caliber handgun
Beater: An automobile
Bedsit: A one-room apartment which serves as both bedroom and sitting room
Bedsitter: A building of one-room apartments which serve as both bedroom and sitting room
Beef: To complain, to grumble, a complaint or trouble, or harangue somebody; also, Gripe, Grouch
Beezer: Nose
Behind the eight ball: In a difficult position, a tight spot or a highly dangerous or disadvantageous position
Belly drawer: The shallow, usually wide, drawer centered just below a desktop
Bender: A drinking spree
Bent: Dishonest, corrupt
Bim: A woman or bimbo
Bindle punk: A chronic itinerant misfit, wanderer, and often a criminal, called such because they carried a “bindle,” the bundle in which a hobo carried all his worldly possessions; also Bindle stiff are chronic wanderers; itinerant misfits, criminals, migratory harvest workers, and lumber jacks. So named because they also carried a “bindle.”
Bird: A man or a person, either male or female, but frequently female
Biscuit and baby column: A newspaper column featuring articles of interest to women
Bite an egg: Eat a meal
Bite / biting the linoleum: To die, dying
Blind pig: A location where liquors and alcoholic beverages were sold illegally; also, called blind tigers, pour houses, and speakeasies, speaks
Blind tiger: A location where liquors and alcoholic beverages were sold illegally
Blotto: Drunk, tight, stinko
Blow: Leave
Blower: Telephone
Boiler: An automobile; also, a crate, bucket, heap, machine, bus (a large car), or flivver (which is a Ford car in particular, or any car in general)
Boiler room: A room where a bank of phones or where money counters are located, for a bookmaking joint or a gambling house
Boob: A dumb guy
Borsalino: An Italian-made fedora
Bottle blonde: A person, usually a female, whose hair has been bleached blond
Box: A safe
Brace: Question, grab or shakeup somebody, especially to get them to divulge information; also, to prepare, steel, or fortify one’s self or something
Breezer: A convertible automobile
Broad: A woman, often with a connotation of coarseness, unmannered
Broadsheet: A newspaper; also a rag, daily, paper, tabloid, gazette
Broderick, the: A thorough beating, purportedly named for Johnny Broderick, a New York City detective who became known in the 1920s and 1930s as one of the city’s toughest cops, part of which stemmed from his beating gangsters and suspects. His reputation was so well known these beatings they became known as “The Broderick.”
Brodie, to pull a: To jump from a high place, e.g., a bridge, building, etc., or to commit suicide. Derived from Steve Brodie, who jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge in 1886
Brown bread: Dead
Browse: Make out, kiss, neck, etc.
Bruno: Tough guy, enforcer, as in “He (thought he) was a real Bruno.”
Bucket: An automobile; ; also, a crate, heap, boiler, machine, bus (a large car), or flivver (which is a Ford car in particular, or any car in general)
Bulge: An advantage, as in “The kid had the bulge on the man.”
Bull: A detective, a prison guard, uniformed police officer, or a plainclothes railroad cop
Bump(ed): To kill; also bump(ed) off
Bump gums: To talk about nothing worthwhile
Bunco artist: One who defrauds people
Burg: A town
Burn: Kill
Burn: To turn over to or to tell what one knows (possibly to the police)
Burned up: Angry, steamed, hot under the collar, “That burns me up!”
Burn the road: Speed; drive fast, possibly too fast; burn rubber; leave marks; etc.
Bus: A big car
Bushwah or bushwa: Bull, nonsense, baloney, rubbish
Button man: A professional killer
Button the lip: Be quiet, shut up, pipe down, put a sock in it
Button your chin: Keep quiet; also, pipe down; as in, “Button your chin.”
Butts: Cigarettes; also, gaspers, smokes, coffin nails, fags
Buzzer: A policeman’s badge
C: $100.00; also a C-note
Cabbage: Money, dough
Cabbie: A taxi / cab driver
Call box: A telephone randomly located on city sidewalks and used, in bygone days, by police officers to check in or to report crimes, emergencies, fires, etc.
Can: The bathroom; May also refer to a car or jail
Can house: A brothel, a bordello, a place where prostitutes were available
Caper: A robbery or other illicit undertaking
Carriage trade: Well-to-do or upper-class people, patronage by these people
Case dough: A nest egg … the theoretically untouchable reserve for emergencies
Cathouse: A brothel, bordello, a house of ill repute
Caught in the rain: In trouble, facing trouble, in a tight spot
Cellarette: A cabinet or sideboard for keeping bottles of wine or liquor
Cheaters: Eyeglasses; sometimes refers to sunglasses
Cheese it: Used as an imperative as a warning of danger to run or get away or to hide or put things out of sight
Chesterfield: A couch; also, a sofa, davenport, and divan
Childbed fever: Referred to postpartum infections
Chill, chill off or To put the chill on: Kill
Chin: To have a conversation, to talk; also, chinning
Chinch: A target, the person one is following, assignment, or suspect
Chinese angle: A strange or unusual twist or aspect to something, as in “You’re not going to find a Chinese angle in this case.”
Chippie or chippy: A prostitute; also, a floozy, trollop, pro skirt, joy girl, strumpet, round-heels, dame, broad, woman, girlfriend; connotation is possibly “piece of ass” or an easy lay
Chiseler: A swindler or cheater
Chopper: A machine gun
Chum: Pal, buddy
Chump: A stupid or foolish person
Clam: A dollar or a mouth
Clean sneak: An escape with no clues left behind
Clip joint: In some cases, a night-club where the prices are high and the patrons are fleeced, but can also refer to a casino where the tables are fixed
Club fighters: Local professional boxers with mediocre fight records
Clubhouse: Police station
Coffin nail: Cigarette; butt, fag, smoke, gasper
Confidential lay: Working in confidence for someone else; a secret job
Cookie: A woman
Copacetic: Okay, fine, as in “She was copacetic with me.”
Cop, copped: To win, as in a bet
Cop it sweet: To accept a penalty / sentence / jail time without complaint or squealing
Copper / cop: Policeman
Crab: Figure out; also, ruin, mess up, sabotage, bung up; Also, to complain, nitpick, pester, henpeck
Crack wise: To smart mouth
Crate: An automobile; also, a heap, bucket, boiler, machine, bus (a large car), or flivver (which is a Ford car in particular, or any car in general)
Crazy as a bedbug: Another way of saying loco, crazy
Creampuff: A pushover; Also, a weak sister
Crikey: A mild oath
Croak: Kill
Croaker: Doctor, sawbones or nurse
Crooner: A singer, usually referring to a male singer, but not always
Crumb: An undesirable man
Cumann na mBan: Literally “The Women’s Council” but calling themselves “The Irishwomen’s Council”. It is an Irish republican women’s paramilitary organization formed in Dublin on April 2, 1914, merging with and dissolving Inghinidhe na hÉireann. In 1916, it became an auxiliary of the Irish Volunteers.
Curtains: Death, the end of something or someone
Cut a rug: Dance
Cutter: A medical examiner or coroner; can also refer to a doctor generally
Dago / dagoes: A pejorative term for a person of Italian descent; also, wop
Daily or dailies: A newspaper or newspapers
Daisy: A man who is none too masculine; also Nancy
Dame: A woman; also, a twist, skirt, jane, broad, frail, doll, frill or gal. A dish, a doll face, or a looker is an attractive version of the same gender
Dance card: A card listing partners for scheduled dances at a social event; also, a calendar of engagements
Dangle: Leave, get lost
Darb: Something remarkable or superior, often referring to a woman
Davenport: An upholstered sofa; also, a divan, chesterfield, settee, lounge
Dead soldier: An empty bottle, as in “Two scotch bottles, one a dead soldier.”
Deck: A pack of cigarettes, as in “a deck of Lucky Strikes.”
Depression Cake: Also known as Wacky Cake, it originated in the Great Depression. It is a cake made without milk, eggs, or butter.
Dick: A detective
Digs: Accommodations, lodgings
Dime: A ten-year prison sentence. A nickel would be a five-year sentence
Dinge: Referring to a black person (with racist connotations); also referred to as smoke, dark meat, or shine
Dip: A pickpocket
Dip the bills: Have a drink
Dish: A pretty woman; also, a twist, frail, skirt, jane, broad, dame, doll or gal. A doll face, or a looker is an attractive version of the same gender
Divan: A couch; also, a sofa, davenport, and chesterfield
Dive: A shabby and disreputable establishment (such as a bar or nightclub)
Dodgy: Evasive, tricky. It can also refer to something not good, reliable, or sound
Dog collar: A clerical collar
Dogs: Feet
Doing figure eights: Nervous, highly concerned, climbing the walls, agitated, pacing
Doll, Dolly: A woman
Dollface: Affectionate form of address to a woman
Dope: Drugs, of any sort; Also, hop, junk. Information, or to have figured out for, as in “I had him doped as”
Dope: A fool, foolish person, silly fool
Dope: Information, the facts, as in “the straight dope”; also, can mean or to have something or someone figured out, as in “She had him doped as a copper.”
Doper: one who takes dope; drug user; drug addict, or dope fiend, dopehead
Doppelgänger: German for someone who looks like someone else; alter ego, double, or lookalike
Double O: Eyeball, look at, as in “Put the double O on her.”
Dough: Money, cabbage; Also, jack
Down-at-the-heels: Shabby
Drag: Influence securing special favor; pull; political influence
Draw a lot of water: To have a lot of influence; to exert great influence
Dressed to the nines: Perfectly dressed in the most fashionable attire
Dries: Those having or advocating a policy prohibiting the manufacture or distribution of alcoholic beverages
Drift: To let go of, as in “I let it drift.”; also, can mean get lost, scram, leave; also, Blow, Dust, Push off, Take the air, Scram, Beat it, Breeze off, Take off, Turn blue, Make with the feet, Go spit in your hat, Go fry a stale egg, Go kiss a duck, Push off
Drop a nickel: Make a phone call, sometimes meaning to the police to inform on someone
Drop the veil: Drop the pretense, stop pretending, abandon the cover story or the lie, as in “Drop the veil, brother. I know all about you.”
Duck soup: Easy, a piece of cake
Duds: Clothes, generally; also rags
Dump: A disorderly, slovenly, or objectionable place
Dupe: As a noun, means a patsy, one who is deceived or cheated easily; as a verb, means to deceive or cheat easily
Dust: A look, as in “Let’s give it the dust”
Dust: Leave, depart
Dust: Nothing, as in “You’re dust to me now.”
Dustup: Rumpus, disturbance, excitement; also tangle
Dutch act: Committed suicide, as in “The mug pulled the Dutch act.”
Eel juice: Liquor
Egg: A man
Egghead: A brainy person
Election Cake: A boozy fruit-and-spice cake, dating from colonial days, which became known as an Election Cake. The recipe required 30 quarts of flour, 10 pounds of butter, 14 pounds of sugar, 3 dozen eggs, spices, alcohol and 12 pounds of raisins
Eyeball: Look at
Fade: To go away, get lost
Fag: Cigarette; butts, smokes, coffin nails, gaspers
Fan: Rifle, search, rummage through
Fan dancer: A female dancer who performs, either entirely nude or apparently so, while concealing herself throughout by manipulating two large fans, typically constructed from ostrich feathers
Fast wagon: An ambulance
Filly: A young woman, a girl
Fin: A five-dollar bill; a sawbuck is a ten-dollar bill; a double-sawbuck is a twenty-dollar bill
Fireplug: A fire hydrant
Fit up (to): To frame
Flag: To pay a visit to someone
Flame-top: Redhead
Flash: A flashlight
Flatfoot: Cop; also, a flattie, copper, bull, or gumshoe
Flick or Flicker: A moving picture
Flit: Move quickly from one place to another, disappear, escape
Flivver: A Ford car in particular, or any car in general; also, a heap, crate, bucket, machine, boiler
Floater: A corpses in the water
Floozy: A usually young woman of loose morals
Flop: A residence, usually a run-down joint; also to go to bed
Flophouse: A cheap rooming house or hotel
Flush: Having a large amount of money, relatively speaking
Fortune tea cakes: Up to around World War II, fortune cookies were known as fortune tea cakes
Frail: A woman; also, a twist, skirt, jane, broad, dame, frill, doll or gal. A dish, a doll face, or a looker is an attractive version of the same gender
French postcard: A somewhat erotic postcard-sized photograph, sold by furtive characters
Frill: A girl with the connotation of one who is easy or cheap; also, a floozy
Frisk: To search a person or place
G’s: $1000; also, large, a grand
G-men: Agents of the Federal government
Gaff: Residence
Galoot: A large, oafish man
Gambit: A plan, scheme, business, play or procedure; e.g., “Having a broad involved will help his gambit.”
Gams: Legs, especially a woman’s; also, pins, underpinnings
Ganef: A thief, a rascal (Yiddish)
Gargle: Drink, as in “Let’s find a blind pig and gargle.”
Gasper: Cigarette; also, butt, smoke, coffin nail, fag
Gassing: Talking, chatting
Gat: A gun; also, rod, heater, roscoe, iron, hardware, weapon, handgun, firearm, artillery
Gat zal eykh bentshn: God bless you; God may bless you
Gate, to give the: To give someone the gate is to show them the door, invite them to leave, break up with someone
Gee: Man; a right gee is a good, upright, trustworthy man, as in “He’s a right gee.”
Geetus: Money
Get a slant at: Take a look at
Get wise to yourself: Smarten up to your circumstances
Giggle juice: Liquor
Gink: A man
Gin joint: Bar
Gin mill: A bar, a speakeasy or other drinking establishment
Give /giving the air: Brush(ing) off, break(ing) up with, dump(ing)
Glaum. To see, to take a look; To catch on to
Glom: To see or take a look at; can also mean to steal or pinch
Go climb up your thumb: Go away, get lost
Go off the boil: To experience less success than hoped for
Goog: A black eye
Goon: Thug; also, hood, hoodlum, punk, hooligan, gangster, mobster, plug-ugly, lummox, henchman, roughneck, ruffian, rowdy
Go over the edge with the rams: To get far too drunk
Gooseberry lay: Stealing laundry off clotheslines and selling it
Goose egg, A: Nothing, zero
Gorilla: Muscular man
Gowed up: On dope, high
Grab(bed) (a little / some) air: Put your hands up
Grand: $1000.00; also can be referred to simply as a G, as in 30 G’s
Grass: An informer or to inform
Grease: Bribe, as in “grease the palms of” someone
Grease-joint: A cheap eating place, known for its greasy food
Greasy spoon: A cheap diner or restaurant, often of inferior quality
Grift: Confidence game, swindle
Grifter: A con man
Grouch: complaint; beef; reason to grouch; a grudge
Grub: Food
Gull: A stupid or gullible person who is the target of a shadowing
Gum band: A rubber band
Gum(ming) up: Interfere (ing) with, mess(ing) up, as in “Don’t … gum every play I make”
Gumshoe: A cop, usually a detective; also a private detective; also, dick, shamus, peeper, keyhole peeper, private dick, PI; gumshoeing is detective work
Gun(ning) for: Look for, be after
Hack: A taxi, cab, taxicab
Handful of clouds, A: The smoke that comes from a gun when it’s fired
Handle: Name
Happy lady: A prostitute
Hard: Tough
Hard number: Tough guy; also, hard guy, hard boy, toughie
Hardware: A firearm
Harnessed bull: A uniformed police officer
Hash house: A cheap restaurant
Hatchet man: A killer or gunman
Hawkshaw: A detective
Hayburner: A horse one loses money on
Haywire: Crazy, emotionally or mentally upset or out of control
Heap: An automobile; also, a crate, bucket, boiler, bus (a large car), machine or flivver (which is a Ford car in particular, or any car in general)
Heart balm: Generally, refers to money received in a Breach of Marriage Promise (Breach of Promise) suit
Heater or heat: A gun; also, gat, roscoe, iron, hardware, weapon, handgun, firearm, artillery
Heebie-jeebies: The jitters, the creeps
Heel: Undesirable man, a jerk, a lowlife
Highbinder: A corrupt politician
Highbrow: A person who possesses or has pretensions to superior learning or culture
High sign: A gesture, word, or phrase used a signal of approval or warning
Hispano-Suiza: A luxury car manufactured by a Spanish automotive / engineering company at the time of this story
Hockshop: Pawnshop
Hooch: Liquor, booze
Hood: From hoodlum, a criminal of some sort; Also, hooligan, goon, thug, gangster, mobster
Hoodlum: A criminal of some sort; Also, hood, hooligan, goon, thug, gangster, mobster
Hoofer: A dancer; hoofing can mean dancing
Hoofing it: Walking, traveling on foot
Hooker: A prostitute; also, a drink of strong liquor, as in “a stiff hooker of whiskey”
Hooligan: A criminal of some sort, a roughneck
Hoosegow: Jail; Also, cooler, lockup
Hoover flag: Pockets turned inside out on a man’s pants, indicating that he had nothing
Hop: Drugs, mostly morphine or derivatives like heroine
Hophead: A drug user; A drug addict, especially heroin; a pot smoker, dope fiend
Hopped up: High, drugged, tripping
Horn: Telephone
Hotel dick: Also known as a house detective, a house dick is a person who is employed to prevent disorderly or improper conduct of patrons or visitors
Hot pants: Randiness, horniness
Hot seat: A position of danger, uneasiness, or embarrassment
Hubbub: Noise or an uproar
Hush money: Cash paid to someone to keep quiet about a particular matter or set of facts the payer does not want made public
In a lather: In an agitated or overwrought state
In hock: Indebted to, owed money to
In the chips: Having money to spend
Iron: A gun or a car
Jacks: Toilets
Jake: Fine, okay, acceptable
Jalopy: A car
Jam: Trouble, a tight spot
Jammed: Intoxicated; tight; stewed to the hat; pie-eyed; piffled; shot; shellacked; canned; out like a light; potted; jiggered; tanked
Jane: A woman
Jasper: A man (perhaps a hick); sometimes refers to a handsome fellow
Java: Coffee; also, joe, as in “a cup of joe”
Jaw: Talk
Jellybean: Boyfriend
Jitney: An unlicensed taxicab
Jobbed: Being ambushed, beaten, done a number on, e.g., I was jobbed by some crumb.
Joe: Coffee, as in “He had a growing need for a cup of joe.”; also, java
Joe Rickey – A Democratic lobbyist living in Washington, D. C., during the late 19th century, for whom the Gin Rickey was named.
John Law: The police
Joint: A place, especially a bar, nightclub, or restaurant, as in “I’ll be at the usual joint”; also, can refer to prison, as in “He’s doing ten years in the joint.”
Joker: Wise guy, smartass
Jolt: A prison sentence; also, referred to as a stretch; can be described in terms of a coin, as in “He did a nickel in Joliet,” meaning a five-year sentence, jolt, or stretch
Joss house: A Chinese temple or shrine; also, descriptive of a residence with an abundance of Chinese decorations or artifacts
Journeyman fighters: A pugilist, who is slightly more respected than a club fighter, with a superficially good fight record
Joy: The shortened name commonly used for Mountjoy Prison in Dublin. Frongoch was an internment camp used to house Irish prisoners after the 1916 Rising
Joy girl: A prostitute; also, a chippy, pro skirt, happy lady, sleepy-time girl, streetwalker, lady of the evening, round heels, hooker, hired companion
Jug: Jail
Jujus: Marijuana, marijuana cigarettes
Keyhole peeper: A private detective; also, a house dick or house peeper
Kerfuffle: A disturbance, a fuss
Kick off: Die
Kip: A bed or sleep
Kisser: Face or mouth
Knock(ed) off: Kill(ed)
Knockout: A lulu, a looker, a doozy, a dilly
Kohl: A preparation used to darken the edges of the eyelids
Lady of the evening: A prostitute
Lam, lam off: Flee hastily, run away, escape, disappear, go away, get lost, as in “The frail I saw through the window must’ve taken it on the lam.”; also, to be on the run
Lamps: Eyes
Large: $1,000.00. Two hundred and fifty large would be $250,000.
Lather: An agitated or overwrought state
Lavaliere: A pendant on a fine chain that is worn as a necklace
Lavender marriage: A male–female mixed-orientation marriage, undertaken as a marriage of convenience to conceal the socially stigmatized sexual orientation of one or both partners
Law, the: The police
Lay: A job of some sort
Lay an egg: Screw up, mess up
League, The: The mob who controlled the south side of Gil Tanner’s hometown. The gang was a mix of Irish and “Western European” members, commonly referred to as the “League of Nations gang” or “the League,” for short.
Lid: Hat
Lip: A criminal defense lawyer
Lit: Drunk
Loan shark: One who lends money to individuals at exorbitant rates of interest; Also, a money lender, money-monger, shylock. Loan sharking is the act of doing it.
Lockup: Holding cell or jail
Lollipop: A person who is lacking experience, naive, weak, or without a backbone
Looker: An attractive version of a a twist, skirt, jane, broad, frail, dame, doll or gal. Also a dish or a doll face
Losing on points: A boxing term, meaning to be losing a bout in terms of points awarded to each boxer by the judges
Lothario: A man whose chief interest is seducing women; also, sheik
Lousy with: Full of, brimming with
Love nest: A place (such as an apartment) used for amorous and often illicit rendezvous
Lowdown: The details, a rundown, the skinny
Lug: Man with a connotation of thick-headedness or limited ability or usefulness; not necessarily connoting goon, thug, hard boy; also, can be a bullet or an ear
Lulu: A knockout, a looker, a doozy, referring to a woman
Lunger: Someone infected with tuberculosis
Machine: In this context, refers to a car; also, a crate, bucket, boiler, bus (a large car), heap or flivver (which is a Ford car in particular, or any car in general)
Made: Recognized, as in “She made me as I followed her on the sidewalk.”
Mark: A target of some sort; also, can be a sucker, victim of a swindle or fixed game
Marker: An IOU or promissory note, often associated with a gambling debt
Masher: A man who makes passes at women
Mean medicine: Tough, hard, as in “Watch out for that skirt. She’s mean medicine.”
Meat wagon: Ambulance or coroner’s vehicle
Megillah: An elaborate, complicated production or sequence of events, everything involved in what is under consideration, the whole ball of wax
Melon: Head
Mesca: Marijuana
Meshuggener: A foolish or crazy person (Yiddish)
Miscount the trumps: Misinterpret or misunderstand a situation, overlook something
Missus: Wife
Mitt: Hand, paw
M. O.: Modus Operandi. A distinct pattern or method of operation which indicates or suggests the work of a single criminal in more than one crime
Moll: Gangster’s girlfriend, woman friend, female partner
Moniker: Name or nickname
Moonshine: Homemade whiskey
Motorman: A driver of a trolley or streetcar
Mouse: A dark-colored swelling caused by a blow; also, a black eye
Mouthpiece: A lawyer; also, a shyster and lip, which usually refers to a criminal lawyer
Moxie: Courage, determination, guts
Muckety-muck: An important and often arrogant person
Mug: A face, puss, or pan
Mug: A man (sometimes referring to dumb ones), guy, person; possible connotation of not being entirely on the up-and-up
Muggles: Marijuana
Mush: Face; also a pan, mug, puss, button
Nag: A racehorse; also a bangtail
Namby-pamby: A weak, indecisive person; lacking character or substance
Nancy or Nance: A man who is not very masculine; also Daisy or Pansy
Newshawk: A newspaper reporter or an aggressive journalist
Newshound: A newspaper reporter or an aggressive journalist
Newsie: Someone who sells newspapers on the street or from a newsstand; can also refer to a newspaper reporter
Nibble /nibble one: Drink, to have a drink
Nickel: A five-year prison sentence
Noggin: Head
Noodle: Head
Not a dicky-bird: Not a sound, not an utterance
Number: A person, can be either a man or a woman
Numbskull: A dull or stupid person, a dunce
Obits: Short for obituary, referring to the obituary section of a newspaper
Off: To kill or murder; also, to go away or depart
Old Sparky: The electric chair
On the chisel: Embezzling, skimming cash, acting as a chiseler, scamming money
On the cuff: Free, on credit
On the nut: To be broke
On the quiet: Quietly, to be done quietly without arousing attention
On the square: Telling the truth
Orbs: Eyes
Orphan paper: Bad checks
Outfit: Criminal gang or mob
Pack: To carry something, especially a gun
Packing heat: Carrying a gun
Pal / pally: Form of address, buddy, friend; pally is same as “pal”, but with connotation of sarcasm
Palooka: Man, probably a little stupid, connotation of chump or loser, somebody not respected
Pan: Face, frequently as in poker-faced
Pansy: A weakling; pushover
Patsy: Person who is set up; a fool or a chump
Paw: Hand, mitt
Pay station: A pay telephone, in a booth or otherwise
PBX (private branch exchange): A telephone switchboard for an office (building), a hotel or an apartment building
Peeper: Detective, private detective, dick, shamus
Peepers: Eyes
Picture house: Movie theater
Piece of the action: A cut of the proceeds from a gambit, grift, or an operation
Pigeon: A prey, person being tailed, or person of interest; Also, a stool-pigeon; as a verb, can mean to inform on someone
Pinch (Pinched) : An arrest, capture, finger, nab, collar; also, catch red-handed
Pins: Legs
Pin your diapers on: Get dressed
Pipe: A sure thing, something easy; can also mean to look at something or to see or notice something
Play: A gambit, plan, scheme, business, scenario or procedure, e.g., “Having a second man along would certainly help his play.”
Plug: To shoot someone
Plugs: People; Also, thug, pug, toughie, palooka
Plug-ugly: A thug, toughie, especially, one hired to intimidate
Poke: A bankroll, a stake; also, a wallet or purse; the term usually applied to the money therein
Ponies, The: The horse races or race horses
Pony / ponies up: To pay money especially in settlement of an account / debt
Pour house: A location where liquors and alcoholic beverages were sold illegally
Pro skirt: A prostitute, a tramp, soiled dove, joy girl, lady of the line, sporting woman, doves of the roast, fallen angels, fallen frails, nymphs du prairie
Pug: A boxer, prizefighter, fighter, pugilist
Punk: Generally, a lowlife; also a hood or a thug
Puss: A person’s face or mouth; also Pan
Put on the feedbag: Eat
Put over: To achieve or carry through by trickery or deceit
Put the skids under: Put an end to, to force out
Put the wind up: Make someone nervous or afraid
Q.T. or q.t.: Something to be kept quiet
Queer: To ruin something or to put it wrong, as in “You ain’t gonna queer this investigation!”
Racket: A job or profession; also, can mean a business, career, caper, approach, angle, scheme (crime), game
Rackets: Usually refers to organized crime comprising illegitimate enterprise(s) made workable by bribery or intimidation; a fraudulent scheme, or activity
Rag: A newspaper; also, a daily, a broadsheet, or a tabloid
Rank: Observe, watch, give the once-over
Rap: Criminal charge; Hit; also, can mean to talk freely, give information, as in “Give us the rap.”
Rap, Gave him a: Telephoned; Also can mean a criminal charge, conviction, legal entanglement; Information, as in “He gave us the rap”; Hit; Also, can mean to talk freely, give information
Rat: Informer
Reefer: Marijuana
Ribbing: Giving a hard time; teasing, kidding
Rifle: Search, rummage through, fan
Right gee: A good guy; also, right guy
Ring: A gang, mob
Ring out: Sound / are familiar, as in “Those names don’t ring out.”
Rod: A handgun; also heater, gat, roscoe, iron, hardware, weapon, firearm, artillery
Rodded: Carrying a gun
Roscoe: A handgun; also heater, gat, rod, iron, hardware, weapon, firearm, artillery
Round heels: A woman of easy virtue
Rowdy: A troublemaker, a belligerent person
Rubberneckers: Onlookers
Rubout: A killing; To rub out someone is to kill them
Rumpot: A drunkard or an alcoholic
Rumpus: Disturbance, excitement, dust-up; also, a tangle
Run a book, to – To take bets; to take money and pay out more to those who correctly predicted the outcome, e.g., horse racing
Russian thistle: Tumbleweed
Ruttish: Lustful
Salt-and-pepper: Having black-and-white or dark and light color intermingled. A salt-and-pepper neighborhood is made up of both whites and blacks. Someone with salt-and-pepper hair would have a mixture of gray and dark hair.
Sap: A blackjack or a dumb guy. Gil called his sap “the persuader.”
Sap: A dumb guy; Also, a fool, fall-guy, love-struck sucker
Saratoga lake houses: A group of nightclubs operating in the vicinity of Lake Lonely on the east side of Saratoga Springs starting in the 1920s. They offered fine dining and entertainment along with illegal gambling and illegal liquor during Prohibition
Savvy: Having or showing perception or shrewdness; Also, practical know-how
Sawbones: A doctor
Sawbuck: Ten-dollar bill; a double-sawbuck is a twenty-dollar bill; a fin is a five-dollar bill
Sawing logs: Snoring loudly
Scrape one’s face / chin: Shave
Scratch: Money; also cabbage
Scribbler: A reporter or a minor or insignificant author
Send over: Send to jail, to prison
Set her cap at: Said of a woman who determines to gain the attentions of a man
Set one’s teeth on edge: To irritate, to induce an unpleasant sensation
Shake down: To search thoroughly
Shakedown: The act of obtaining from a person by force or intimidation something of value, usually money; also blackmail, extortion
Shamus: A private detective. Also, referred to as a private eye, a private dick, a gumshoe, or an operative
Sheik: A man held to be irresistibly attractive to romantic young women; a lothario
Shiv: Knife, blade, instrument for shanking
Shoot the works: To risk everything on one try or throw
Shyster: A person who is professionally unscrupulous, especially in the practice of law; also a mouthpiece
Simoleons: Dollars
Simp: A simpleton, a fool, a dolt
Sinker: A doughnut
Sitting on dynamite: In the crosshairs, on the hot seat; in the middle of an explosive situation (figuratively)
Situation: A job or a post
Skinful: a lot to drink; too much too drink; drink to excess
Skint: Penniless
Skirt: A woman; also, a twist, frail, jane, broad, dame, doll, or gal. A dish, doll, doll face, tomato, or looker is an attractive version of the same gender
Slag: A lewd or promiscuous woman
Sláinte: A word literally translating as “health” in the Irish language. It is commonly used as a drinking toast in Ireland
Slant: Viewpoint or angle
Slant, Get a: Take a look
Sleepy-time girl: A prostitute
Sleuth: Detective, private or official
Slug: A bullet or a shot of liquor or a large swallow of booze
Smackers: Dollars
Smart cookie: A clever or wily person
Smell from the barrel, Have a: Have a drink
Smoke: Denatured alcohol often served as booze during prohibition. It could be deadly
Smokes: Cigarettes; also, butts, fags, coffin nails, gaspers
Snap: A photograph; also, a verb meaning “to take a snap” or “to take a photograph”
Snap: Panache, style, stylishness
Snarling match: An argument, a confrontation that hasn’t reached violence yet
Snatch: Kidnap, abduct
Snooper: A detective
Snow: Cocaine
Sob-sister: Sentimental or impractical
Sod all: Nothing
Soup: Nitroglycerine
Soup jobs: Crack a safe using nitroglycerine
Speakeasy / speak: A location where liquors and alcoholic beverages were sold illegally, an illicit bar; also, blind tiger, pour house, blind pig, drum, gin mill, juice joint
Spill / spilling (something) / spill one’s guts: Talk, inform, as in “Spill it, punk!”
Squeeze: A boyfriend or a girlfriend
Squeeze, To: To press one’s advantage over another; Also, to obtain something from another by means of extortion or undue pressure
Stacks up or stack-up: The way in which things are situated or are arranged, often when compared with another circumstance, as in “Your story stacks up with his.”
Stake: A bankroll, poke
Stake out: To watch surreptitiously, to surveil
Stakeout: The process of watching or surveilling someone or a place
Stash: To hide someone or something
Stash out: Stakeout, to wait
Steady on: Take it easy, calm yourself
Step off: To be hanged
Stewed to the hat: Very drunk
Stiff: A corpse
Stiff-mobile: Coroner’s wagon
Stinko: Drunk, tight, blotto
Stir: Prison, jail
Stogie: An inexpensive cigar
Stoolie: A stool-pigeon, an informer
Stool-pigeon: Informer, a criminal who talks to the cops; also a rat, a fink
Strapped: Carrying a firearm
Strap watch: Wristwatch
Streetwalker: A prostitute
Sunday punch: A powerful or devastating blow, especially a knockout punch
Super: A term referring to the superintendent of a building
Swabbie: A sailor. Also, a swab, tar, or gob
Swag: Money, valuables, goods, the proceeds from a theft or robbery
Swanky: High classed, showy, ornate, ostentatious, glitzy
Swell: Good, fine, nice, acceptable, fun
Swells: People of high social position or who are dressed in the height of fashion
Tabloid: A newspaper
Tag: Someone following another person or the act of following another person; also, a shadow or a tail
Tail: Shadow, follow; or somebody who is following another
Take a gander: Take a look; have a look around
Take a plant: Hide, as in “I followed him into the lobby, took a plant, and watched.”; Also, to watch, to monitor, to keep lookout
Take a powder: Leave
Take a slant: Have a look at
Take it on the arches: Leave, go away
Take some air: Leave, go outside, or go for a ride
Talkies: Moving pictures with the audio of dialogue added
Tanakh: The Hebrew Bible
Tangle: A fight, a dust up
Tans: A pejorative used colloquially in Ireland, referring to the Black and Tan forces supplied by David Lloyd George to Ireland during the Irish War of Independence
Tenner: A ten-dollar bill, a sawbuck, a ten spot
Ten spot: A ten-dollar bill; Also a tenner, sawbuck
Throw lead: Fire a gun, shoot bullets
Thug: A bruiser, enforcer, goon, gorilla, gun-holder, gunpoke, gunsel, hesiter, hitman, hood, loogan, muscle, punk, redhot, soldier, torpedo, trigger man, wrong gee.
Tijuana bible: A small eight-page publication of cartoon erotica that became popular during the 1930s
Ticket: A private investigator’s license
Till: A cash register
Toffee-nosed: Snobbish
Tomato: A woman; also, a twist, frail, jane, broad, dame, doll, frill or gal. A dish, doll, doll face, skirt, or looker is an attractive version of the same gender
Tommies: British soldiers
Torch singer: One who specializes in singing songs of unrequited love; also, referred to a torcher
Tosspot: A drunkard or a sot
Trilby: A soft felt hat with an indented crown, much like a soft fedora
Tumble: Figure out, understand, realize, deduce, have an insight
Twist: A woman, with possible connotation of girlfriend, or somebody seen on the side (play on “screw”)
Two o’clock beauty queen: A less than attractive woman
Two to a mule: In droves
Up-and-down: Give a look over, as in “to give something the up-and-down”
Up the river: In jail, usually a state prison; also, behind bars locally
Vamp: A woman who uses her charm or wiles to seduce and exploit men
Vigorish: Interest taken by a bookie or a gambling house on debts. Sometimes referred to as vig.
Wag: A wit, a joker
Wets: Those having or advocating a policy permitting the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages
What gives?: What do you mean? What’s really going on?
Wheats: Pancakes, as in “a stack of wheats”
Wheel gun: A revolver
Wheelman: The driver of a motor vehicle, often used in terms of criminal activity
White night: A sleepless night
Wind someone up (to): To jerk them around
Wing mirror: Side-view mirror
Wire: Telephone line, as in “Hold the wire, I’ll get her.”
Wisecrack: A joke, smart-assery, jape
Wise head: A smart person, not always used as a compliment
Wizzel dizzel: Irish slang meaning to urinate
Wrong number: Not a good fellow; also, a mistake or bad information
Yap: Mouth
Yegg: A safecracker who can only open easy safes or, generally, a tough character
Yips: The jitters, creeps, a state of nervous tension