Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) homosexual, pertaining to homosexuality.

1932		C. McKay Gingertown 53: Whar’s dat fruit-eating sonova granny’s?
1934		(con. 1920s) J.T. Farrell Young Manhood in Studs Lonigan (1936) 195: The guy was fruit.
1952		Kerouac letter 8 Feb. in Charters I (1995) 338: All girls go fruit, black girls go fruit for mexican girls.
1964		Lavender Lex. n.p.: fruit:– One of the oldest terms for homosexuals. Rarely in use among the gay, then usually as ‘He is just as fruit as I am’.
1975		J. Wambaugh Choirboys (1976) 254: He couldn’t remember if it applied only to fruit cases or whores as well.
1989		C. Hiaasen Skin Tight 200: That doesn’t automatically make it no fruit bar.
1999		J. Ridley Everybody Smokes in Hell 68: Sounds like some kind of fucking pansy fruit name.
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 128: Eldon Peavy was a fag [...] Eldon Peavy owned a Reno fruit bar.
2011		J.J. Connolly Viva La Madness 328: Samuel [...] decides that it’s some fruit hangout. You don’t have to be homosexual to be a fag these days.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 21: ‘So Michael Wilding’s a gay caballero?’ ‘In spades, love. His house is known as the “Fruit Stand”’.