butter-and-egg man

English edit

Pronunciation edit

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Noun edit

butter-and-egg man (plural butter-and-egg men)

  1. (US slang, dated) A prosperous dairy farmer (or other wealthy rural citizen), seen as coming into the big city and ostentatiously living it up.
    • 1946, Milton “Mezz” Mezzrow, Bernard Wolfe, “Them First Kicks are a Killer”, in Really the Blues, New York, N.Y.: Random House, book 2 (1923–1928: Chicago, Chicago), page 69:
      He puffed on the big cigar that he always had stuck in his face and posed back like a big butter-and-egg man.