Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) of a person, white; relating to white culture.

1911		Adventure Jan. 446: I saw a mardi-gras suit of clothes that might have been ofay on a negro minstrel.
1928		R. Fisher Walls Of Jericho 39: Either a crowd of fay boys would catch a jig and beat him up or a crowd of jigs would get a fay boy and teach him the fear of the Lord.
1929		C. McKay Banjo 4: I bummed you two times when you was strutting with that ofay broad.
1935		L. Hughes Mulatto in Three Negro Plays (1969) Act I: Look at me. I’m a ’fay boy. See these grey eyes?
1936		‘Hectic Harlem’ in N.Y. Amsterdam News 8 Feb, sect. 2: OFAY CHICK. – A white girl.
1942		W. Winchell On Broadway 24 Jan. [synd. col.] She is goin’ with the drummer of an o’fay band.
1944		D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 19: Us young homes, and lanes and hipstuds, gray and fay, and spook and spade.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 62: He was the first fay boy I ever heard who mastered this vital foundation of jazz music. [Ibid.] 182: The whole area [i.e. Harlem] was overrun by fay gangsters who got fat on the profits they raked in. [Ibid.] 205: That was the last ofay job I ever held in my life.
1952		E. Brown Trespass 28: Just like a goddam ’fay landlord.
1953		‘William Lee’ Junkie (1966) 156: Fey . . . White.
1959		J. Blake letter 23 Sept. in Joint (1972) 145: They sing in that style affected by such ofay-rich (shall we say?) outfits as The Platters.
1962		T. Southern ‘Razor Fight’ in Southern (1973) 31: They was standin’ on the corner [...] when a couple of o-fay chicks come strollin’ by.
1965		C. Himes Cotton Comes to Harlem (1967) 52: Loboy got a fay chick sommers.
1968		S.A. Williams ‘Tell Martha Not to Moan’ in Cade Black Woman (1970) 52: This fay dude want me to play at his house for fifty cent.
1971		D. Goines Dopefiend (1991) 164: It was just some ofay kids.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 88: A lot of the fay chicks would go for his revolutionary bullshit.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 21: I ain’t your son, you ofay fuck.
2000		F.X. Toole Rope Burns 173: You one them gray boys wish he a spade, a ofay boy lookina get soul.
2012		C. Stella Rough Riders 46: Ofay motherfucker.
2019		S.M. Jones Lives Laid Away [ebook] ‘You need to be gettin’ yo half-ofay ass up outta here’.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 281: ‘The mark’s an ofay stiff. The girl’s colored’.