grease-monkey

plural grease-monkeys

1. alternativeAlternative form of grease monkey.

   During my second week here I got a job with the Ryan Company, working in the hangar half-days, Saturdays and Sundays, as a grease-monkey.

   1929 January, Alan Gibson, quotee, “A Byrd Applicant Take to the Air”, in Boys' Life, volume 19, number 1, New York, N. Y.: Boy Scouts of America, page 56

   2 more examples

   “I left you a rather trim and attractive young woman. And certainly clean. What has happened to you? You look like a grease-monkey, Jan.”

   1944, Lida Larrimore, Bugles in Her Heart, New York: Grosset & Dunlap, page 152

   Where Babcock has proprietary technologies, they will be preserved and developed, in so far as they help to give the company an edge over its rivals. But make no mistake, if Parker and Salmon have their way, boiler suits are the workwear of yesteryear at Babcock. Graduates, not grease-monkeys, are the typical employees of the future.

   1994 November 5, Ross Tieman, “Yachtsmen on a long-term voyage to recovery”, in The Times, number 65,104, London, page 25