Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a fool, an idiot.

1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 25 Aug. 22/2: As an alternative, The Bulletin proposes that every member supporting this scheme or robbery be branded ‘Dingbat’ on the forehead and turned loose.
1907		‘O. Henry’ ‘Past One at Rooney’s’ in Strictly Business (1915) 261: Love at first sight [...] is to be found among unsophisticated creatures such as the dove, the blue-tailed dingbat, and the ten-dollar-a-week clerk.
1912		T.A. Dorgan Daffydils 9 Oct. [synd. cartoon strip] Honus Reilly the Dutch harp and Benny Dickteen were holding an earnest conversation in the Dingbat Cafe.
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 14 Aug. 4/5: Who was the Ding bat Mabel F. came home with [...] She must be hard up for a bloke .
1919		Eve. World (NY) 25 Nov. 20/2: I don’t like to be called ‘dingbat’ when there is no point for it.
1926		J. Black You Can’t Win (2000) 63: If you was some kind of a rank dingbat you wouldn’t have been invited down here.
1934		(con. 1920s) J.T. Farrell Young Manhood in Studs Lonigan (1936) 382: He felt he was acting and talking like a goddamn dingbat.
1944		D. Runyon Runyon à la Carte 25: The one of his own back in the U.S.A. is a dingbat.
1957		‘Nino Culotta’ They’re a Weird Mob (1958) 29: ‘Some ding bat after that job.’ ‘Ding bat.’ ‘He sounds a bit crackers ter me.’.
1969		B. Jackson Thief’s Primer 152: if you come in [to prison] with a pair of Stacy Adams shoes on, automatically you’re classified as ‘not a dingbat’.
1978		A. Maupin Tales of the City (1984) 245: The one who nailed your mother, dingbat!
1980		C. James Unreliable Memoirs 160: Our office was a transit camp for dingbats [...] It was my first, cruel exposure to the awkward fact that the arts attract the insane.
1994		J. O’Connor Secret World of the Irish Male (1995) 202: The Australians are already on the beer. One of them is singing ‘Pommie dingbats stuck at home, doo-dah, doodah’.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 254: [A]ny half-pie dingbat who knew these Cross denizens well would’ve been an instant jerry to it.
1999		E. Bunker Mr Blue 68: Before Chessman, a convict carrying legal documents around the yard was either a dingbat or a con man.
2001		Herz & Steinberg Amer. Pie 2 [film script] No, you dingbat. You don’t just go groping away.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl.
2015		S. King Finders Keepers (2016) 14: She thought Tom was a dingbat.
2020		S.A. Crosby Blacktop Wasteland 197: ‘Pull the trigger, dingbat’.

2. a tramp, a vagrant.

1902		Dly Jrnl (Salem, OR) 26 July 1/3: The dingbat will not take up with the yeg or ‘dyno’.
1909		Up-To-The-Times Mag. 4 2316: The past master of hobodom is the ‘whiteliner’, a combination of the ‘dingbat’ And the ‘yeggman’.
1918		‘A-No. 1’ Mother of the Hoboes 44: The Rating Of The Tramps 33. Stew Bum 34 Ding Bat 35 Fuzzy Tail 36 Grease Ball 37 Jungle Buzzard the dregs of vagrantdom.
1923		‘Gila Monster Route’ in N. Anderson Hobo 194: A dingbat sat on a rotten tie.
1935		Charleston (WV) Daily Mail 27 June 8/8: The Bowery is still full of them [...] rynos, dynos and dingbats (old bums).
1940		E. Curry Hysterical Hist. of Aus. 41: I took some of my rottenest ships [...] hoping against hope that they would sink and drown the dod binged ding-bats.
1948		They Live by Night [film script] Some dingbat robs a filling station [W&F].
1951		N. Algren Chicago: City On the Make 70: The jungle hiders come softly forth: geeks and gargoyles, old blow winos, sour stewbums and grinning ginsoaks, young dingbats.
1964		(con. 1920s–40s) in J.L. Kornbluh Rebel Voices.
1991		K.C. Kearns Dublin Street Life and Lore 212: I learn a lot about human nature on the streets. You see all the lunacies and down-and-outs and dingbats.

3. (US, also ding) a derog. term for an Italian.

1911		Congressional serial set 307: [note] On the one hand the ‘white men’ comprise the natives and north European immigrants, while all of the south and east Europeans are colloquially known as ‘Dingbats’ .
1942		Dly Teleg. (Sydney) 27 July 4/6: As here, Japs are nips. Italians are ding bats or dings. Germans are still jerries.
1944		P. Kendall Dict. Service Sl. n.p.: dingbats . . . Italians.
1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.

4. (US tramp) a labourer.

1915

Morn. Tulsa Dly World (OK) 13 June 19/1: Dingbat — A laborer; known also as a shovel flirt or stiff or groundhog.

5. (Aus. milit.) a batman, an officer’s servant.

1918		Aussie (France) 6 Aug. 13/2: And, lo, he smoketh his master’s cigarettes and [...] sometimes he cometh a gutzer. [...] Then the Dingbat to avert his master’s just wrath sayeth: ‘Lo, while I slept a pongo came, took thereof and did smoke.’.
1932		(con. WWI) L. Mann Flesh in Armour 161: The lieutenant and his dingbat slid down into the trench.

6. (US) a woman.

1944		O. Ferguson ‘Vocabulary for Lakes, [etc.]’ AS XIX:2 104: A woman who is neither your sister nor your mother is a dingbat, a baloney, or a split-tail.
1975		J. Roe The Same Old Grind 99: ‘Who’s the old dignbat [...] send her over’.

7. (US) a derog. term for a Chinese person.

1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
1983		C. Heath A-Team 2 (1984) 21: I’ve spent time roaming alleys, dealing with that Confucian dingbat Mr Lee.
1985		R.G. Barrett You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 154: The rest of the drunken horde spotted the Chinese. ‘Yay boys. Let’s get the dingbats’.

8. (Aus.) something categorised as foolish, pointless.

1996

J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 48: In all truth, the plan Cyril The Dip outlined quietly in the Marble Bar that arvo was by no means a dingbat of a concept.