Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. the female body, usu. in the context of prostitution.

c.1700		London-Bawd (1705) 1: She sets up for Procurer of fresh Goods for her old Customers.
c.1758		J. F---g Epistle of a Reformed Rake 47: There is so much reason to expect a constant supply of fresh Goods at Market.
1765		Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies 85: Miss Pl-wd-n [and] Miss Nancy Pl-wd-n, Red-Lion-Street [...] They are both excellent goods.
1771		R. King New London Spy 94: That pursey beldam has her emissaries [...] who look out for fresh goods.
1779		Nocturnal Revels 2 75: She soon obtained as pretty an assortment of fresh goods as could be found in London.
c.1850		Peeping Tom (London) 13 52/3: ‘My lord, the prisoner says, that John Sterry had her goods for his.’ [...] ‘Then ask her, [...] what goods she means.’ ‘Why, my lord, such goods that I can’t for shame tell’.
1862		Bath Chron. 6 Feb. 6/2: Dr Franklin used to say that rich widows are the only piece of second-hand goods that sell at prime cost.
1913		G.J. Kneeland Commercialized Prostitution in N.Y. City 87: A young girl apparently eighteen years of age: She was the ‘fresh goods,’ – the object of the ‘line-up,’ as it afterwards developed. [Ibid.] 91: Hearing of places where business is better, owners and pimps shift their ‘goods’ about.
1960		(con. 1940s) G. Morrill Dark Sea Running 158: See the strawberry blonde? She’s nice goods.
1965		(con. 1930s) R. Wright Lawd Today 154: I wasn’t so hot on taking secondhand goods, see?
1990		R. Campbell Sweet La-La Land (1999) 39: Mimi and Moo [...] were showing the goods in a neon glow.
2006		Cham ‘Fat Punnany’ 🎵 She have di body weh seh rae ’pon do Coca Cola shape / [...] goods to keep nigga head turnin’.
2010		A. Steinberg Running the Books 82: I’d kick myself in the ass, ass backwardz if I didn’t attempt to get the goodz, knowin’ that I wanted a piece of the pie.
2013		P. Abbott ‘Allure Furs’ in ThugLit Feb. [ebook] ‘Be a good girl and show him the goods’.
2023		(con. 1962) J. Ellroy Enchanters 274: Two women doffed their bikini tops and flashed their goods.

2. constr. with the, the real thing, the ideal thing or person.

1899		Ade Fables in Sl. (1902) 4: Well, when it comes to Reverence you’re certainly There with the Goods!
1903		A. Binstead Pitcher in Paradise 80: If Fred had caused a stuffed tiger [...] to be entered in a race and then put his bunch in to back it, he would surely have been there with the goods.
1907		J. London Road 114: He thought I was the real goods, liked me because I was not stupid, and liked me a bit, too, I think, for myself.
c.1910		H.E. Lee ‘Tough Luck’ Variety Stage Eng. Plays 🌐 You are the real goods why without you a Royal flush is impossible and besides if I had the message I’d admit you to a front seat and wouldn’t let you buy a ticket.
1911		J. Masefield Everlasting Mercy 12: It’s all your own, but don’t be rash – / He’s got the goods if you’ve got cash.
1911		‘Sing Sing No. 57,700’ My View on Books in N.Y. Times Mag. 30 Apr. 5/6: Take it from me, Bo, Nat [Nathaniel Hawthorne] is there with the goods.
1914		E. Dyson Spats’ Fact’ry (1922) 155: We jolt him up with a couple of old and ugles [...] and then [...] we race him at the real goods.
1925		Wodehouse Carry on, Jeeves 182: ‘There’s something in this, Bertie.’ ‘It’s the goods.’.
1929		W.R. Burnett Little Caesar (1932) 16: Otero was the goods.
1936		A.E. Duckett ‘Truckin ’round Brooklyn’ in N.Y. Age 11 July 7/1: Leonard Diggs is keeping that heart warm for Inez Robsinson...Looks like the real goods.
1937		J. Curtis There Ain’t No Justice 62: Tommy was captivated. She was the goods and no error.
1942		A. Christie Body in the Library (1959) 73: Her name’s Miss Marple [...] Where crime is concerned she’s the goods.
1951		Cusack & James Come in Spinner (1960) 247: The real goods. You can tell the pure merinos in a minute after jumped-up bitches like D. D. T. and her crowd.
1953		I. Hamilton Till Human Voices Wake Us 93: They went out thinking The Hill [i.e. Mt Eden Prison] was the goods.
1956		‘Raymond Thorp’ Viper 77: It’s [i.e. cocaine] the goods [...] have you got any more samples?
1962		R. Serling ‘The Whole Truth’ in New Stories from the Twilight Zone 17: That’s the goods, isn’t it?
1970		E. Thompson Garden of Sand (1981) 208: Old Pokey Nose thought he was the real goods.
1974		G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 20: He had considered what Rosi was offering. Even if the American failed to come up with the goods, chapter and verse, it still meant the end of Jack Manso and his firm as it existed.
1981		G. Johnston Fish Factory 1: ‘Little Willy was getting himself quite well organised with that dark-haired bit.’ [...] ‘Any minute now Little Willy should be unwrappping the goods.’.
1992		A. Duff One Night Out Stealing 84: So, at his reflection, I look the goods, right?
1998		R.G. Barrett Mud Crab Boogie (2013) [ebook] The blonde-haired bloke from Queensland looked the goods, obliterating everyone in his path.
2002		D. Shaw ‘Dead Beard’ at www.asstr.org 🌐 Every jam jar in my yard is the goods, I don’t deal in anything that’s stoke on trent, and never mind the slander about car salesmen always telling pork pies.
2016		D. Whish-Wilson Old Scores [ebook] Organisational charts. Bank statements, receipts, money transfers. ‘This looks the goods, Frank. Even if it’s a year old’.
2018		29I. Welsh Dead Man’s Trousers 29: You fucking came up with the goods.

3. (US Und.) constr. with the, stolen goods, contraband; usu. catch someone with the goods, to catch someone in the act.

1902		‘Hugh McHugh’ Back to the Woods 12: Every horse that finished last gave me the trembling lip as he crawled home, well aware of the fact that I had caught him with the goods.
1908		B. Fisher A. Mutt in Blackbeard Compilation (1977) 98: Wouldn’t you say ‘stung’: if you were a great special prosecutor and went around the world hollering your head off about graft and [...] you suddenly were caught with the goods yourself.
1911		G. Bronson-Howard Enemy to Society 294: She’s scared he might do somethin’ desprit ’count of the disgrace of bein’ caught with the goods!
1920		F. Packard White Moll 93: Did you read in the papers that I was arrested last night for theft, caught with the goods on me, but escaped?
1932		E.S. Gardner ‘Bird in the Hand’ in Goulart (1967) 285: Did you catch him with the goods?
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1954		Wodehouse Jeeves and the Feudal Spirit 175: I may be caught with the goods on me.
1962		P. Crump Burn, Killer, Burn! 129: We caught ’em with de goods, too, spying.
1976		P. Theroux Family Arsenal 203: You mean she didn’t come up with the goods?
1983		R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].
2001		N. Barlay Hooky Gear 32: Nobody notice Duane sidlin up to the goods.

4. constr. with the, accurate information, the truth, esp. when used in an unfriendly manner towards its subject.

1911		G. Bronson-Howard Enemy to Society 212: I’ve got the goods for Steve and what’s better ’n that.
1919		H.C. Witwer Smile A Minute 215: His sister got me with the goods the other day when she asked me to let her see the handwritin’ on the letter.
1920		F. Packard White Moll 172: Dat’s de straight goods.
1929		J.B. Booth London Town 275: Tom is not above using his power on the press in the City. It is a commercial age, and the Honourable Thomas is ‘out for the goods’.
1938		X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) 546: See you tomorrow with the goods.
1953		‘Curt Cannon’ ‘Die Hard’ in I Like ’Em Tough (1958) 23: ‘The goods, he said, ‘The goods. Honest.’.
2000		J. Ellroy ‘I’ve Got the Goods’ in Destination: Morgue! (2004) 174: My dad left his copies [i.e. of Confidential] out. I got the goods [...] My dad said Yul Brynner was a poonhound. He had the goods.
2023		F. Bill Back to the Dirt 175: ‘I say radio the hill, give ’em the goods. See if they want us to pursue or abort’.

5. (US) alcohol.

1906

A. Adams ‘Around the Spade Wagon’Cattle Brands 🌐 ‘Say [...] I have some choice old copper-distilled, sent me by a very dear friend in Kentucky.’ The goods were all he claimed for them.

6. (US Und.) money.

1896		F. Hutcheson Barkeep Stories 173: ’I’m kind o’ leary o’ being stuck up — not on ’count o’ being overloaded wid de goods, but I don’t want to take no chance o’ gettin’ a beatin’’.
1902		Wash. Times (DC) 14 Sept. 10/3: Goods— Money.
1909		F.H. Tillotson How I Became a Detective 91: Goods – Money.

7. (US) an attractive woman.

1913

J. London Valley of the Moon (1914) 125: I tell you she’s some goods. Watch me go across an’ win her from them cheap skates.

8. the male genitals.

[1748–49		Cleland Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure (1985) 81: That enormous machine of his [...] together with its bottom dependence, the inestimable bulse [i.e. package] of lady’s jewels, form’d a grand show out of goods indeed!].
1922		Joyce Ulysses 373: So grieved he also in no less measure for young Stephen for that he lived riotously with those wastrels and murdered his goods with whores.
1974		(con. 1960s) R. Price Wanderers 63: He would [...] do little dances of adjustment to secure and anchor his goods against the coming violence.
1996		(con. 1964-65) B. Thorpe Sex and Thugs and Rock ’n’ Roll 79: ‘Give us a feel.’ She grabbed my goods through the sheets.

9. drugs.

1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks n.p.: The goods, dope; any of the narcotics.
1938		H. Drake-Brockman Men Without Wives I i: She’ll caution you, me boy, and me too, if we don’t produce the goods. Where have you stowed it?
1955		‘Hal Ellson’ Rock 47: That boy was hidiong the goods [...] But I don’t smoke weed.
1969		R.R. Lingeman Drugs from A to Z (1970).
1977		A. Bleasdale Who’s Been Sleeping in my Bed 110: You have got the stuff, haven’t you? You did bring the goods?
1981		H. Gould Fort Apache, The Bronx 49: I put some goods out on the street [...] Forty bags with these kids from Jennings Street.
1981		D.E. Miller Bk of Jargon 341: goods: Drugs, usually in reference to sale or purchase.

10. constr. with the, sexual intercourse.

1985

B. Humphries Traveller’s Tool 8: They don’t even bother to get your Amex authorised before coming across with the goods.