1920’s Crime Slang & Popular Words

The 1920s didn’t just roar; they whispered in a colorful, coded language born from Prohibition, underground speakeasies, and the jazz age.

If you wanted to navigate the underworld back then, you needed to know your “onions.”

Here is a breakdown of 1920s crime slang to help you talk like a proper “heavy.”

EXPLORE

The Law and the Lawless

The Fuzz / The Buttons: The police.
Gumshoe / Flatfoot: A detective or police officer.
Prohi: A federal Prohibition agent (the guys smashing the barrels).
Grifter: A con artist or someone who lives by their wits.
Heavy: A hired thug or a bodyguard.
Stool Pigeon: An informer or snitch.
Pinch: To get arrested. “Nerts, Al Capone just got pinched.”
Chokey: Jail
Sent up the river: Jail

The “Business” of Crime

Bootleg: Illegal liquor (originally named for hiding flasks in bootlegs).
Bathtub Gin: Poor quality homemade alcohol (often literally made in tubs).
Speakeasy: An illicit establishment that sells alcoholic beverages.
The Big House: Prison (specifically Sing Sing or any federal penitentiary).
Taking for a Ride: Taking someone to a remote location to murder them.
Heist: A robbery.
Joint: A place of business, usually an illegal one.
Torpedo: A hired killer

Money and Weapons

Cabbage / Lettuce / Scratch: Money.
Grand: $1,000.
C-note: A $100 bill.
Iron / Heater / Gat: A handgun.
Chopper: A Thompson submachine gun (the “Tommy Gun”).
Shiv: A knife or improvised blade.
Chicago Typewriter: Tommy gun

Words to Know

Kisser: Mouth. “Boom, right in the kisser.”
Gasper: cigarette, “fag” (also of the 1920s) Gasper: “Gaspers” were cigarettes,
Giggle water: liquor, alcoholic beverage
“Go chase yourself!”: “Get out of here!”
Sheba: An attractice woman
Tomato: An attractive woman
Cream puff: A coward
Sinker: a doughnut
Jake: If everything is okay, it’s “jake.”
Sheik: An attractive man

Writer’s Notes

In the Galliano Club books, gangster Benny Rotolo uses many of these terms, picked up from when he was a torpedo for Chicago’s North Side gang. This differentiates him from characters who live outside the gangster orbit and adds a fun dose of authenticity.

BTW, my grandfather, a former deputy sheriff during Prohibition, considered “cream puff” the ultimate insult.