Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US) an ambitious, go-ahead person, ‘the coming man’.

1890		H. Palmer Base Ball Field 91: He piled up error after error, but Dan said he was a ‘comer’ [OED].
1902		Ade Forty Modern Fables 2: [He] was pointed out as a Comer in the Business World.
1906		S. Ford Shorty McCabe 8: I dropped into the only thing I knew how to do, trainin’ comers to go against the champs.
1911		G. Bronson-Howard Enemy to Society 330: When it comes to talkin’, anybuddy ’ud think Jeffries was still a ‘comer’!
1927		(con. 1910s) S. Lewis Elmer Gantry 289: I want this man — he’s a comer — he’d be useful to me.
1930		W.R. Burnett Iron Man 25: He’s a comer, Coke. He looks clumsy but he’s fast.
1933		C. Drew ‘Gorilla Grogan’ in Bulletin (Sydney) 26 July 40/2: [H]e gives me an earful of how he’s got a local heavyweight under his pinion who has bumped off a few third-raters and is looked upon as a comer.
1947		N. Algren ‘Depend on Aunt Elly’ in Texas Stories (1995) 104: The kid was one of those soldiers’ champions who’d looked like a comer around the camp PX.
1950		Pittsburgh Courier (PA) 8 Apr. 20/1: What’s to become of the comer, the younger struggling performers who are trying to make their way.
1957		G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 238: Now this I call nishertive. You’re learning, Daniels, you’re a comer.
1966		‘Tom Pendleton’ Iron Orchard (1967) 108: Boyd Hallam [...] who Hoss described as a ‘real comer’.
1977		Ben-Veniste & Frampton Stonewall 95: Dean was thirty-one years old in July 1970 when he became counsel to the President of the United States. He was a comer.
1987		R. Campbell Alice in La-La Land (1999) 129: Bama was twenty-seven and a comer. His foot was on the ladder.
1999		Guardian Guide 12–18 June 7: Fraser’s a real comer.
2007		A.C. Shepard Woodward and Bernstein 36: He was already somebody we thought of as special—a comer. A hot reporter.
2024		J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 249: A man called Angleton, a comer from this new American outfit called the CIA.

2. (US) a business, club or project promising success.

1949

Phila. Eve. Bulletin 9 Sept. 41: He said the club [the New York Yankees] is a comer [ W&F].