ferry

present singular third person ferries · participle present ferrying · participle past ferried · past ferried

1. transitiveTo carry; transport; convey.

   Trucks plowed through the water to ferry flood victims to safety.

   1 more example

   We ferried our stock in U-Haul trailers, and across the months, as we purchased more cowflesh from the Goat Man — meat vanishing into the ether again and again, as if into some quarkish void — we became familiar enough with Sloat and his daughter to learn that her name was Flozelle, and to visit with them about matters other than stock.

   2007, Rick Bass, The Lives of Rocks

2. transitiveTo move someone or something from one place to another, usually repeatedly.

   Being a good waiter takes more than the ability to ferry plates of food around a restaurant.

   1 more example

   A “moving platform” scheme[…]is more technologically ambitious than maglev trains even though it relies on conventional rails. Local trains would use side-by-side rails to roll alongside intercity trains and allow passengers to switch trains by stepping through docking bays. […] This would also let high-speed trains skirt cities as moving platforms ferry passengers to and from the city centre.

   2013 June 1, “Ideas coming down the track”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 13 (Technology Quarterly)

3. transitiveTo carry or transport over a contracted body of water, as a river or strait, in a boat or other floating conveyance plying between opposite shores.
4. intransitiveTo pass over water in a boat or by ferry.

   They ferry over this Lethean sound / Both to and fro.

   1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC

plural ferries

1. nauticalA boat or ship used to transport people, smaller vehicles and goods from one port to another, usually on a regular schedule.

   Near-synonym: ferryboat

   2 more examples

   Islanders normally have to queue for half an hour to get on the ferry.

   To reach Mui Wo, a small town on Lantau Island, you take a ferry from central Hong Kong, and after a 30-minute ride arrive at a small square with a car park and bus stops blackened by fumes.

   2019 November 22, Ilaria Maria Sala, “After the Protests: How Will Hong Kong Vote?”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 22 Nov 2019, Opinion

   Synonyms: ferryboat

2. A place where passengers are transported across water in such a ship.

   to row us o'er the ferry

   1809, Thomas Campbell, Lord Ullin's Daughter

   2 more examples

   It can pass the ferry backward into light.

   1644, John Milton, Areopagitica; a Speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England, London: [s.n.], →OCLC

   She walked into the waiting-room of the ferry, and up the stairs, and by a marvellous swift, little run, caught the ferry-boat that was just going out.

   c. 1900, O. Henry, The Ferry of Unfulfilment

3. The service constituted by this watercraft's operation; the business (company) that operates such a service.

   In those days there was a ferry at Sleepytown. Modern roads and bridges for motor vehicles have rendered such local river ferries obsolete.

4. The legal right or franchise that entitles a corporate body or an individual to operate such a service: a right of ferry.

   granted a ferry to

   1 more example

   In 1794, the county court of Mason, granted a ferry to Benjamin Sutton, who owned two lots on the front of water street. In 1801, the same privilege was re-granted to him by the court. In 1797, a ferry was granted to Edmund Martin, by the county court. In 1808, a ferry was granted, by the county court, to Jacob Boon. In 1818, a ferry was granted, by the court, to J. K. Ficklin, and in 1823, another ferry was granted, by the court, to Benjamin Baylies. Bonds with security, were executed by the grantees respectively. The ferrys of Ficklin and Baylies have not been in operation for two or three years past. Those of Sutton, Martin and Boon, have been in operation ever since their establishment. Boon and Martin are both dead. Sutton sold his lots and ferry to Armstrong. Powers and Campbell, who attended to the ferrys granted to Boon and Martin, live in the state of Ohio. Armstrong resides in Maysville.

   1831 [1829 October 9], J.J. Marshall, Reporter of the Decisions of the Court of Appeals, quoting Judge Robertson, “Trustees of Maysville vs. Boon, &c. Appeal from Mason County Court”, in Reports of the Cases at Law and in Equity, Argued and Decided in the Court of Appeals of the Commonwealth of Kentucky, volume II, page 224

plural Ferrys · alternative Farry

1. countableuncountableA surname.
2. countableuncountableA census-designated place in Denali Borough, Alaska, United States.
3. countableuncountableA township in Oceana County, Michigan, United States, named after Thomas W. Ferry.
4. countableuncountableAn unincorporated community in Greene County, Ohio, United States.