Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (also bum off) to beg (for); thus bum a fag v., to ask for a cigarette; bumming adj., begging.

[1633		Rowley Match at Midnight I i: tim: What have you bumming out there goodman fyle? smith: A vice sir, that I would faine be furnisht with a little money upon’t].
1827		High Life in London 30 Dec. 2/1: [H]e had bought an, old coat for 2l, off Money Moses, who had bummed him for it.
1863		Criminal Life (NY) 19 Dec. n.p.: [I]nstead of bumming round Moses for his Medford, hash, and chance to fish wipes out of his customers’ pockets.
1878–9		A. Garcia Tough Trip Through Paradise (1977) 67: They were bumming us for anything we had.
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 241: I bummed a cigarette from one of the chaps.
1901		Lead Daily Pioneer-Times (SD) 11 July 2/3: Two seedy and disreputable individuals [...] had both been drinking [...] all the booze they could bum.
1902		Bulletin (Sydney) 6 Sept. 29/1: There was four or five stool-pigeons there – a dry an’ bumming crowd, / I shouted for the lot of them; I shouted very loud.
1907		R. Service ‘New Year’s Eve’ Songs of a Sourdough 75: Perhaps I can bum a little booze if the boys are feeling good.
1918		Wkly Journal-Miner (Prescott, AZ) 16 Oct. 4/2: ‘Maple sugar hell,’ remarked the visitor as he bummed another Camel from the news-hound.
1921		P. & T. Casey Gay-cat 58: Just a hobo kid off the road [...] Bummed me for a meal.
1932		(con. 1919) Dos Passos Nineteen Nineteen in USA (1966) 545: They bum drinks and omelettes avec pommes frites.
1941		K. Tennant Battlers 81: You gotta have a woman to bum for yer, just as you gotta have a dog to bark for yer.
1948		(con. 1944) N. Mailer Naked and Dead 4: He has forgotten his cigarettes and he bums one from a man sittting a few feet away.
1950		N. Cassady letter in Charters (1993) 201: The hard habit of lushing [...] pushed me through the door to bum a quickie off him.
1968		N. Heard Howard Street 63: Butch bummed another cigarette.
1972		G.V. Higgins Friends of Eddie Coyle 69: This brand-new Olds, which I assume they get with the money they bum off the sensible people.
1973		F. Huelin ‘Keep Moving’ 8: [T]hinking over my first experience of ‘bumming’ tucker.
1980		(con. 1940s–60s) H. Huncke ‘Detroit Redhead’ in Eve. Sun Turned Crimson (1998) 111: I was [...] getting by bumming off friends and acquaintances.
1986		C. Hiaasen Tourist Season (1987) 236: Let me bum a cigarette.
1987		B. Chatwin Songlines 276: ‘Yes,’ he chuckled. ‘I bummed the Chief of Police ... in Nice!’.
1996		A. Close Official and Doubtful 288: He’d bummed lunch off a different bird every day since he arrived.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 280: [A] copy of the Evening Chronicle which I have bummed from a little gay cha-cha dancer.
1997		K. Elyot My Night with Reg 56: benny: Can I bum a fag? john offers him one. benny takes two and puts them in his mouth.
2003		S. Murphy Murders of Mutchrose Village 101: I’ll let myself out, besides I’ll see if I can bum a fag off your landlady.
2008		D.R. Pollock ‘Giganthomachy’ in Knockemstiff 68: She was always bumming lifts from the people that she worked with.
2012		N. Pettigrew ‘Wakey Wake’ in ThugLit Dec. [ebook] ‘Newports, eh/ Mind if I bum one?’.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 109: [I] lit a cigarette. Babs bummed a smoke.

2. (also bum around) to act lazily, to do nothing positive.

1863		Boston Herald 2 Aug. 2/5: They are just fit to stay in this city, vegetate in the back slums, read the News and Express, bum round rum-shops [DA].
1876		Wheatland Free Press 4 Mar. 2/2: The Professor is readier with his stock of puzzling questions to ‘flunk’ the student, who spent his time ‘bumming’ the night before, depending on luck for his next day’s success [DA].
1891		Bird o’ Freedom (Sydney) 4 Apr. 2/3: How doth the bumming ‘used-to-be,’ / Approve each bygone minute.
1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 25: bum, v.t. To loaf, especially waste time while cutting a recitation.
1920		F.S. Fitzgerald This Side of Paradise in Bodley Head Scott Fitzgerald III (1960) 103: Well, what are you going to do [...] bum around for two more years as a has-been? [Ibid.] 216: Reckin I been bummin’ too long.
1935		R. Chandler ‘Nevada Gas’ in Spanish Blood (1946) 148: Too many grifters bummed around in its worn leather rockers.
1950		B. Rose 6 Jan. [synd. col.] Fellows with whom I’ve bummed around [W&F].
1953		(con. 1909) A.C. Inman diary in Aaron (1985) 81: We have to stay on the lot all day and do nothing but bum around.
1959		‘Paul Merchant’ ‘Sex Gang’ in Pulling a Train’ (2012) [ebook] [He] bummed around, shot snooker, and generally wasted the time till something popped.
1973		B.S. Johnson All Bull 117: The fleshpots of the Mediterranean, where I spent two rich years bumming around in poverty.
1986		C.W. ‘Bill’ Getz ‘Bumming Around Town’ in G. Logsdon Whorehouse Bells Were Ringing (1995) 96: I was bumming around town, not spending a dime, / So steps in a whorehouse, to have a good time.
2000		Observer Mag. 9 Apr. 70: I tend to just bum around.

3. to travel on the railroads as a tramp.

1896		Popular Science Journal L. 25: Several of the ‘lads’ had been ‘pulled’ at the Rapids for ‘bumming the freights’ [DA].
1910		S.F. Call 17 July 11/2: Every year [...] a large number of workmen quit their jobs [...] and start west, bumming it, becoming temporary tramps or ‘gay cats’.
1917		‘A-No. 1’ From Coast to Coast with Jack London 99: Of all unpleasantness a railroader most hates to be reminded that a hobo had successfully bummed his train.
1924		G. Henderson Keys to Crookdom 66: In the old days the yegg with his false keys, picks, jimmies, nippers, crowbars, axes and chisels ‘bummed’ his way into a town on a freight train at night.
c.1932		N. Algren ‘Lest the Traplock Click’ in Callithump mag. in Texas Stories (1995) 2: He had bummed in the reefer more times than he had thumbs on his left hand.
1937		‘Boxcar Bertha’ Sister of the Road (1975) 41: They got a big kick out of bumming their way.
1955		E. Hoagland Cat Man 104: [of a dog] Along with his masters, he’d bummed under freights and jungled by rivers and sweated out thirty-day stretches in jail.
2000		Sun. Times Mag. 6 Feb. 23: Garfinkle was the very opposite of the stereotype one might expect to see bumming on the rails.

4. (also bum around, bum out) to wander around.

1870		C.G. Leland ‘I Gili Romaneskro’ Hans Breitmann in Church 132: When der Herr Breitmann vas a yungling, he vas go, bummin aroundt, goot deal in de Worlt, vestigatin human natur.
1876		Besant & Rice Golden Butterfly II 193: Lyin’ out among the flowers while the bees were bummin’ around.
1899		J. Flynt Tramping with Tramps 253: The fellers you’ve been bummin’ with are nothin’ but skugees [a species of gay-cat].
1911		W. McCay ‘Midsummer day Dreams’ [comic strip] I’ve got an aunt that will allow me $250.00 a week spending money if I’d bum around Europe with her.
1918		E. Hemingway letter 14 May in Baker Sel. Letters (1981) 6: We bummed around and went up on the top of the Woolworth Tower.
1925		F.S. Fitzgerald Great Gatsby 154: He was probably bumming his way home.
1928		C. Panzram Journal of Murder in Gaddis & Long (2002) 87: A little nigger boy about 11 or 12 came bumming around.
1930		C.R. Shaw Jack-Roller 11: Besides robbin the gang went bummin downtown and to ball parks and swimming.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 7: Sammy bummed his way from the ghetto on New York’s Lower East Side.
1949		I. Shulman Cry Tough! 86: He wasn’t doin’ so hot here so he decided to bum out to the coast.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 223: He was a sailor and he bummed around some, like Jack London.
1961		Rigney & Smith Real Bohemia 77: Since his discharge he has ‘bummed around,’ writing poetry, still drinking.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 93: We chartered a boat and just bummed around.
1989		S. Armitage ‘It Ain’t What You Do It’s What It Does To You’ Zoom 20: I have not bummed across America with only a dollar to spare.
1991		Eble Campus Sl. Fall 1: bum – [...] wander around with no particular aim.
1994		G. Disher Crosskill [ebook] For two bucks he’d jack it all in and bum around overseas.
2011		J.J. DeCeglie Drawing Dead [ebook] Paris is great [...] I bummed around there awhile.

5. (US black) to steal someone’s lover.

1980

E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 231: bum (one) 1. Steal away another’s mate or lover.

6. (US black) to cheat, to rob.

1980

E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 231: bum (one) [...] 2. Cheat or rob.

7. to accompany.

1997

C. Hiaasen Lucky You 280: Maybe I will bum along.

8. (US campus) to dress in a casual manner.

1991		Eble Campus Sl. Fall 1: bum – dress sloppily.
2003		Eble Campus Sl. Nov. 1: bum – dress casually or carelessly: I stayed up all night studying for the final, so today I’m bumming.