caboose

EnglishEdit

English Wikipedia has an article on:

caboose

Wikipedia

Historic caboose on display in O'Fallon, Illinois

Alternative formsEdit

camboose

EtymologyEdit

From French cambuse, from Middle Dutch kabuys, kabuis (Modern Dutch kombuis (“galley; kitchen”)).

PronunciationEdit

IPA^(key): /kəˈbuːs/
Audio (AU)
(file)
Rhymes: -uːs

NounEdit

caboose (plural cabooses)

(obsolete, nautical) A small galley or cookhouse on the deck of a small vessel.
(historical, nautical) A small sand-filled container used as an oven on board ship.
- 1841, Journal of the Franklin Institute, page 113:
  This stove is to be made in the form of a Franklin, but is to be furnished with an oven, and other means of cooking; its appearance is therefore more like that of the old fashioned caboose, than of a Franklin stove.
- 1881, Eliza Davies, The Story of an Earnest Life, page 226:
  A tremendous billow, fringed with foam, swept over our deck, carrying the cook's caboose, cooking utensils and stove right overboard into the sea.
- 2002, Don Philpott, Cayman Islands:
  The kitchens were kept separate because cooking was done in a caboose, a wooden box filled with sand and heated by a wood fire.
(US, rail transport) The last car on a freight train, having cooking and sleeping facilities for the crew; a guard’s van.
Synonym: guard's van (obsolete)
(slang, baby-talk or euphemistic) buttocks
(slang, sports) The person or team in last place.
A youngest child who is born after a big gap in time.
- 1987, Harriet Wallace Rose, Something's Wrong with My Child!:
  Jimmy was seven and had just finished first grade, so that made Nancy our caboose baby — our bonus child — our swan song.
- 1987, Growing Child Research Review - Volumes 5-7:
  "Caboose" children, the late-born last offspring in the family, didn't suffer from this as much.
- 2007, Beth K. Vogt, Baby Changes Everything, page 145:
  After looking back on her own experience, she thought of some ways parents could help ease the transition for their caboose kid.