DCHP-3

flunkey

DCHP-1 (pre-1967)

Entry from the DCHP-1 (pre-1967)

This entry may contain outdated or offensive information, terms, and examples.

1n. Lumbering

a cook's helper. Also spelled flunky.

See: cookee

Quotations

1908
". . . I know the bosses say that it costs them more than five a week to feed a man, taking into account the wages of the cook and flunky . . . ."
1956
"You're a flunkey," he said. "Report to the cook."
1959
A flunky (a "stooge" or subservient person) was a sidesman in the days of liveried servants and the word still occasionally appears in occupational lists as equivalent to "cookee" or "choreboy."
2n. Maritimes

an apprentice fisherman assigned the menial tasks.

Quotations

1923
He had learned the fisherman's strenuous trade, as "flunkey," "trouter," "header," and then . . . he was considered fit to take the bow oar of a dory.
3n. West

See quote.

Quotations

1954
. . . the general farm worker is known as a hired man, a flunkey, a chore-boy, or just a labourer.