truck

plural trucks

1. countableuncountableA small wheel or roller, specifically the wheel of a gun carriage.

   1 more example

   “Put that cannon up once, and I'll answer for it that no Injin faces it. 'Twill be as good as a dozen sentinels,” answered Joel. “As for mountin’, I thought of that before I said a syllable about the crittur. There's the new truck-wheels in the court, all ready to hold it, and the carpenters can put the hinder part to the whull, in an hour or two.”

   1843, James Fenimore Cooper, chapter 3, in Wyandotte

2. countableuncountableThe ball on top of a flagpole.
3. countableuncountablenauticalOn a wooden mast, a circular disc (or sometimes a rectangle) of wood near or at the top of the mast, usually with holes or sheaves to reeve signal halyards; also a temporary or emergency place for a lookout. "Main" refers to the mainmast, whereas a truck on another mast may be called (on the mizzenmast, for example) "mizzen-truck".

   But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the main-truck higher than the kelson is low?

   1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “'”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC

4. AustraliaCanadaIndiaUScountableuncountableA heavier motor vehicle designed to carry goods or to pull a semi-trailer designed to carry goods; (in Malaysia/Singapore) a such vehicle with a closed or covered carriage.

   We rented a truck big enough to carry the whole load in one trip.

   2 more examples

   A line of fifty trucks from the Zenith Steel and Machinery Company was attacked by strikers-rushing out from the sidewalk, pulling drivers from the seats, smashing carburetors and commutators, while telephone girls cheered from the walk, and small boys heaved bricks.

   1922, Sinclair Lewis, chapter 1, in Babbit

   That's why driving truck became more than a job for many in the industry. Driving truck was a lifestyle.

   2009, James Beach, Peterbilt: Long-Haul Legend, page 48

   Synonyms: lorry

5. UKcountableuncountablerail transportA railroad car, chiefly one designed to carry goods.

   Synonyms: goods wagon, freight wagon, goods carriage, freight carriage, goods truck, freight truck, freight car

6. countableuncountableAny smaller wagon or cart or vehicle of various designs, pushed or pulled by hand or (obsolete) pulled by an animal, used to move and sometimes lift goods, like those in hotels for moving luggage or in libraries for moving books.

   Goods were therefore conveyed about the town almost exclusively in trucks drawn by dogs.

   1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter III, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC

   2 more examples

   He closed the door, locked it, and took out the key in readiness. When Mr Lidmarsh returned with the water he found Carrados seated on a market truck.

   1927, Ernest Bramah [pseudonym; Ernest Brammah Smith], Max Carrados Mysteries

   From the doors of these rooms went men with loaded trucks, to the platform where freight cars were waiting to be filled; and one went out there and realized with a start that he had come at last to the ground floor of this enormous building.

   1905 April–October, Upton Sinclair, chapter III, in The Jungle, New York, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 26 February 1906, →OCLC

7. USabbreviationcountableuncountablerail transportAbbreviation of railroad truck or wheel truck; a pivoting frame, one attached to the bottom of the bed of a railway car at each end, that rests on the axle and which swivels to allow the axle (at each end of which is a solid wheel) to turn with curves in the track.

   Synonyms: bogie

8. countableuncountableThe part of a skateboard or roller skate that joins the wheels to the deck, consisting of a hanger, baseplate, kingpin, and bushings, and sometimes mounted with a riser in between.
9. countableuncountableentertainmentA platform with wheels or casters.
10. countableuncountableDirt or other messiness.

    “Nothing! Look at your hands. And look at your mouth. What is that truck?”

    1876, Mark Twain, chapter I, in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

present singular third person trucks · participle present trucking · participle past trucked · past trucked

1. intransitiveTo drive a truck.

   My father has been trucking for 20 years.

2. transitiveTo convey by truck.

   Last week, Cletus trucked 100 pounds of lumber up to Dubuque.

   1 more example

   Colson was to truck the 'plane to Alice Springs, where it would be trained to Adelaide for repairs.

   1931, Ion L. Idriess, Lasseter's Last Ride, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 46

3. USintransitiveslangTo travel, to proceed.First known use 1960s

   Instead, when relatives heard that the right ship had docked, they trucked over to Ellis Island and waited desperately by the Kissing Post.

   2009 May 20, Maggie Koerth-Baker, “Ten important kisses in history”, in Mental Floss, CNN

   3 more examples

   I want to tell you a story from 'way back: / Truck on down and gig me, jack / In eighteen hundred and sixty-five / A hep cat started some jive / He said, "Come on, gates, and jump with me / At the Juneteenth Jamboree."

   1940, Sam Price, “June Teenth Jamboree”, performed by Louis Jordan

   I brought them around again, hard, and some fluff hit me in the face, cool and wet. . .and I laughed and trucked on down, a mad. fiddler dancing to my own music, happy and alone in my private white world.

   1974 October 28, Skiing, volume 27, number 2, page 194

   In November 1978, Hay and Starratt trucked on down toward the Classic City in a VW Van (of course), following the Grateful Dead's tour […]

   2022 August 12, Lee Valentine Smith, “Athens band still Squallin' after all these years”, in Atlanta Journal-Constitution

4. CanadaUSintransitiveslangTo persist, to endure.First known use 1960s

   Keep on trucking!

   2 more examples

   It has been five months since I left Mt. Diablo , and I'm still trucking along gaining slowly and I'm just a few pounds from my goal healthy weight. I'm the happiest I've been in my life because through my experiences with anorexia I[…]

   1988, Krista Brown, Prepared Statement, to the United States House Select Committee on Children, Youth, and Families, regarding 'Eating Disorders: The Impact on Children and Families', July 31, 1987, page 22

   “What's ol' Harrison up to these days, Larry?” Grandpa asked. “Oh, he's still trucking along,” Uncle Larry replied.

   2018 September 4, Brittany Terwilliger, The Insatiables, Amberjack Publishing, →ISBN

5. intransitivefilm productionTo move a camera parallel to the movement of the subject.
6. slangtransitiveTo fight or otherwise physically engage with.

   Both deputies were big, made of dense flesh and tough experience. . . . I wouldn't have wanted to truck with either one of them.

   1993, Sue Grafton, "J" Is for Judgment

7. slangtransitiveTo run over or through a tackler in American football.

present singular third person trucks · participle present trucking · participle past trucked · past trucked · alternative trock

1. dialectalintransitiveTo fail; run out; run short; be unavailable; diminish; abate.
2. dialectalintransitiveTo give in; give way; knuckle under; truckle.
3. dialectalintransitiveTo deceive; cheat; defraud.

present singular third person trucks · participle present trucking · participle past trucked · past trucked

1. ScotlandUKdialectalintransitivetransitiveTo tread (down); stamp on; trample (down).

present singular third person trucks · participle present trucking · participle past trucked · past trucked

1. dialectalintransitivetransitiveTo trade, exchange; barter.

   We will begin by supposing the international trade to be in form, what it always is in reality, an actual trucking of one commodity against another.

   1848, John Stuart Mill, Principles of Political Economy: With Some of Their Applications to Social Philosophy. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: John W[illiam] Parker, […], →OCLC

2. dialectalintransitiveTo engage in commerce; to barter or deal.

   But while this businesse was in hand, Arrived one Captaine Argall, and Master Thomas Sedan, sent by Master Cornelius to truck with the Collony [...]

   1624, John Smith, Generall Historie, Kupperman 1988 edition

3. dialectalintransitiveTo have dealings or social relationships with; to engage with.

plural trucks

1. dialectalin pluralintransitiveobsoleteoftenSmall, humble items; things, often for sale or barter.

   There was sheds made out of poles and roofed over with branches, where they had lemonade and gingerbread to sell, and piles of watermelons and green corn and such-like truck.

   1884, Mark Twain, chapter 20, in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

   1 more example

   It happened in this way, on a day when I was indulging in a particularly greenery-yallery fit of gloom. Norah rushed into my room. I think I was mooning over some old papers, or letters, or ribbons, or some such truck in the charming, knife-turning way that women have when they are blue.

   1911, Edna Ferber, chapter 5, in Dawn O'Hara, the Girl who Laughed

2. dialectalhistoricalintransitiveThe practice of paying workers in kind, or with tokens only exchangeable at a shop owned by the employer [forbidden in the 19th century by the Truck Acts].
3. USattributivedialectalintransitiveoftenGarden produce, groceries (see truck garden).

   "Wid dat, Brer Rabbit 'low dat Mr. Man done been had 'im hired fer ter take keer er his truck patch, an' keep out de minks, de mush-rats an' de weasels.

   1903, Joel Chandler Harris, chapter 11, in "Brother Rabbit's Cradle", New Stories of the Old Plantation

   2 more examples

   As the home house people (the industrious part of them at least) might want ground for their truck patches, they might, for this purpose, cultivate what would be cleared. But I would have the ground from the cross fence by the Spring, quite round by the Wharf, first grubbed, before the (above mentioned) is attempted.

   1792 November 4, George Washington, (Please provide the book title or journal name), quoted in The writings of George Washington from the original manuscript sources: Volume 32, 1745-1799.

   I obtained my first view of a lunar city. It was built around a crater, and the buildings were terraced back from the rim, the terraces being generally devoted to the raising of garden truck and the principal fruit-bearing trees and shrubs.

   1923, Edgar Rice Burroughs, chapter 10, in The Moon Maid

4. dialectalintransitiveusuallySocial intercourse; dealings, relationships.

   "How can I decide?" said I. "You have not told me what you want of me. But I tell you now that if it is anything against the safety of the fort I will have no truck with it, so you can drive home your knife and welcome."

   1890 February, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “The Strange Story of Jonathan Small”, in The Sign of Four (Standard Library), London: Spencer Blackett […], →OCLC, page 240

5. dialectalintransitiveusuallyRelevance, bearing.

   Many people involved in classical music today, themselves gay, see no reason why their sexuality should have any truck in their music.

   1983 December 17, Kenneth Hale-Wehmann, “Coming Out on Record: A Triumph in Gay Music”, in Gay Community News, volume 11, number 22, page 15

   1 more example

   For this reason, Washington is a wonderful and proven humbler of the Texan conceit: Washington isn't a state, and yet it is metaphorically bigger than Texas. It's where Texas learns that not everyone is in love with Texas. (Where yer from orig'nally has no truck here.)

   2001 January 19, Hank Stuever, “A Fantasy as Big As All Texas”, in Washington Post