hoodlum, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

hoodlum n.

[ety. unknown. The term was coined in San Francisco c.1870–2 and spread across the US by the end of the decade, generating a number of popular etymologies. Among them, according to H.L. Mencken (1880–1956), is the idea of a local newspaperman who, keen to coin a term to describe the street gangs that were plaguing the city’s streets, decided simply to reverse the name of a leading gangster, one Muldoon. This created noodlum, and a printer’s error, substituting ‘h’ for ‘n’, did the rest. Other theories include a reference to a gang rallying-cry, ‘Huddle ’em!’, and to roots in the Bavarian dialect term Hodalump, which carries exactly the same meaning, in various terms in Spanish and among US Indian languages. B&L’s suggestion of an origin in the pidgin English hood lahnt, lazy, is not feasible. It is tempting to bring in the near-synon. SE hooligan, but that word was British and was noted only when it began appearing in London police reports c.1898; see Asbury, The Barbary Coast (1933), pp.150–3 for possible etys., and his persuasive opting for the ‘huddle ’em’ theory]

(orig. US)

1. an unpleasant person or a street ruffian.

[1866		Daily Eve. Bulletin (San Francisco) 15 Dec. (19th Century U.S. Newspapers) Lazarus Moses, the alleged Fagan of the Hoodlum Band of young thieves, was arrested last evening on a charge of receiving stolen goods].
1871		Overland Monthly and Out West Mag. (CA) Aug. 163: If the young ‘Hoodlum’ merely takes up his stand at the corner of the streets [...] we hurry him off to prison, and punish him for his obedience to the law of Nature.
1880		Edinburgh Eve. News 26 Aug. 3/5: On his passage through the streets of San Francisco [...] he is mobbed and pelted by the juvenile hoodlums.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 31 Jan. 20/1: The interests of justice would be better served by keeping out stipendiaries in a state of Black Fast, and then letting them loose on our hoodlums, just as the lions were started in on the thieves and loafers of ancient Rome.
1887		‘Aus. Colloquialisms’ in All Year Round 30 July 65/2: In San Francisco [the larrikin] becomes a ‘hoodlum, ’ a scoundrel whose delight it is [...] to descend in force [...] upon the detested Chinaman, with results by no means pleasing to those natives of the Flowery Land .
1894		Truth (Sydney) 29 July 3/6: ’Twill [i.e. a ‘cat’] flay the skin of the hoodlums thin who flourish by Botany Bay.
1896		S. Crane George’s Mother (2001) 114: The small hoodlums of that vicinity all avoided the spot.
1909		H. Lawson ‘Biddy O’Dowd’ in Roderick (1967–9 II) 351: And hear outside in the lane at night / The half-grown hoodlums yap.
1915		Van Loan ‘On Account of a Lady’ in Taking the Count 144: I wouldn’t waste my time on hoodlums like you.
1920		Bulletin (Sydney) 12 Feb. 7/3: Persons of lecherous instincts, brutal-assault hoodlums and others.
1925		Dos Passos Manhattan Transfer 24: For an officer to countenance hoodlums and rowdies . . .
1933		(con. 1868) H. Asbury Barbary Coast 150: The most industrious persecutors of the Chinese in San Francisco were the hoodlums [...] The name by which they were designated was of San Franciso coinage. It was first used by newspaper men there during the latter part of 1868, and for at least two years always appeared in print spelled with a capital H and enclosed within quotation marks.
1948		So. Weekly 3 July 3/2: This mob of cowardly hoodlums aroused the girls’ camp in the dead of the night [DA].
1958		Kerouac letter Spring in Charters II (1999) 123: Was drunk 2 weeks ago, got beat up by hoodlums.
1966		H.S. Thompson letter 27 Apr. in Proud Highway (1997) 567: In the afternoon [...] I play basketball with the local hoodlums to keep in shape.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 31: Three kiddie hoodlums came in, grabbed her fur coat right off her back.
1981		A.K. Shulman On the Stroll 3: Their passengers dissect the shows, oblivious of the gang of hoodlums across the street.
2009		N. Flexner Disassembled Man [ebook] Don’t ever talk to your mother that way [...] I didn’t raise a hoodlum.

2. a thug or gangster.

1907		J. London Road 153: It is true, those immediately outside my circle, [...] called me ‘tough,’ ‘hoodlum,’ ‘smoudge,’ ‘thief,’ ‘robber,’ and various other not nice things.
1930		Eddie Lang [instrumental title] March of the Hoodlums.
1947		I. Shulman Amboy Dukes 52: I’ve a classful of congenital hoodlums.
1951		(con. 1880s) S. Longstreet Pedlocks (1971) 96: Some hoodlum I don’t know with a big mouth and a lot of cash.
1959		C. Himes Crazy Kill 72: Eight young hoodlums [...] looking like an assemblage of exotic grasshoppers.
1968		N. Heard Howard Street 63: My son wouldn’t think of doing something like that if it wasn’t for those hoodlums.
1975		D. Goines Inner City Hoodlum 221: We’ve got ourselves a young hoodlum.
1987		T. Wolfe Bonfire of the Vanities 508: The kids Ed ran with all became hoodlums or cops.
1998		Hip-Hop Connection Dec. 4: The rapper who was self-styled as the Intelligent Hoodlum.
2003		A.N. LeBlanc Random Family 83: Cesar had gone from acting like a hoodlum to being one [...] He called himself a stickup kid.

In derivatives

hoodlumish (adj.)

pertaining to a ruffian, gangster or thug.

1887

Sacramento Daily Record Union 5 July 3/1: The hoodlumish whites, who were responsible for the damage, ran away.

In compounds

hoodlum wagon (n.)

(US) a police vehicle used to convey arrestees or prisoners, the ‘Black Maria’.

1900

Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 10 Mar. 11/3: She went down the line on the whole family and when the hoodlum wagon arrived [...] offered to trim the coppers.