elevatorful

plural elevatorfuls · plural elevatorsful

1. Enough to fill an elevator.

   They come in elevatorsful, with their children, and their witnesses, and their lawyers.

   1947 August 24, Nadine Mason, “Life’s Errors Go to Court: Divorce Judge’s Day Filled With Others’ Problems”, in Los Angeles Times, volume LXVI, part II (Local News), page 1

   4 more examples

   In gathering up the goods of producers the car-load is the common unit, and yet an iron-bound rule in a national statute touching the commerce by rail of 100,000 miles of road, comprehending movements of freight where grain by the elevatorful, coal by the output of a mine, wood by the acre, or sand by the hill, might work inconvenience where the exception would be sanctioned if no monopoly was created against the smaller car-load dealer.

   1884 June 18, Congressional Record: Containing the Proceedings and Debates of the Forty-Eighth Congress, First Session, volume XV, Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, page 5315

   Well, what the hell, any passing observer might observe, some elevators are stronger than others. Yet in each instance an elevatorful comes out at one ton.

   1977, Norman Ward, Her Majesty’s Mice, McClelland and Stewart, →ISBN, page 52

   The delegates trickled up, beginning about 7 p.m., then came by the handfuls, elevatorfuls and hundreds, finally making it all but impossible to move in the hall.

   1978 May 6, William Scaife, “...And a grand old party was had by all...”, in The Morning Union, volume 115, number 106, Springfield, Mass., page 1, column 3

   Forbidden City with its newly installed terrace was sold out last Saturday night-⁠-ten days in advance....The Chinese Skyroom turned customers away be^([sic – meaning by]) the elevatorfuls.

   1985, Tonia Chao, Communicating Through Architecture: San Francisco Chinese Restaurants as Cultural Intersections, 1849-1984, Berkeley, Calif.: University of California, Berkeley, →OCLC, page 130