Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a ‘real man’, the implication being of character and integrity rather than sexual or physical prowess.

1911		M. Glass Abe and Mawruss 100: Nowadays, if a feller wants to make a success he must got to wear good clothes and look like a mensch, y’understand?
1931		G. Berg Rise of the Goldbergs 195: ‘Everyting vould be ulleright if that Mendel vas only a mensch,’* sighed Jake, finishing his fish. *Human.
1941		A. Kober My Dear Bella 78: What’sa metta you can’t fix by you the tie you should look like a mensch?
1953		S. Bellow Augie March (1996) 43: I want you to be a mensch.
1963		A. Baron Lowlife (2001) 121: Lovely people. A mensch. A gentleman.
1978		L. Kramer Faggots 217: To her credit, Dordogna took it like a mensch.
1981		J. Ellroy Brown’s Requiem 35: He had a lot of heart and a lot of class. A real mensch.
1985		S. Berkoff West in Decadence and Other Plays (1985) 119: To avenge the dead / to annihilate the oppressor / to be a mensh.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 16: Just quite callin em leche bags [...] Be a mensch. Show some respeck. They’w bwests.
2004		J. Ellroy ‘Hot-Prowl Rape-O’ in Destination: Morgue! (2004) 258: Danny the G. was a mensch.
2012		A. Prentice ‘The Break’ in Crime Factory: Hard Labour [ebook] He looked like the wise old Jewish mensch he often professed to be.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 166: He was a bomb builder, a macher, a mensch.