Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. of a musician, band, actor or show, a single performance in one place only.

1894		N.Y. Clipper 28 July 334/2: A Good Agent or Business Manager, can Route or Book Show. [...] At Liberty for Circus, Tom, Repertory or One Nighter [...] 10 years' experience; salary reasonable.
1899		Times (Wash., DC) 4 June 14/5: His [theatrical] tour embraced nothing but one-nighters.
1903		Goodwin’s Wkly (Salt Lake City, UT) 28 Mar. 8/1: The Rose Coghlan one-nighters did ‘Mrs Tanqueray the Second’ to a house that one-night stunts usually get.
1910		N.Y. Tribune 25 Dec. 34/3: The one-nighter, with a new town to conquer every evening.
1916		Newark Dlly Advocate (OH) 27 Sept. 7: Scenery that exactly fits the situation, special properties and effects a la the one-nighter, bring the productions up to and a little above the average high-priced attraction.
1938		W. Winchell On Broadway 25 Aug. [synd. col.] She took up stock . . . He went in for one-nighters with his crew.
1944		E. Wilson 11 Mar. [synd. col.] ‘I [i.e. Tallullah Bankhead] was fighting the isolationists and doing one-nighters’.
1955		S. Allen Bop Fables 18: Say, fellas [...] I see here where the big bad wolf is playing a one-nighter in this area next week.
1961		J.A. Williams Night Song (1962) 118: They out tryin’ to make one nighters six and seven hundred miles apart.
1976		Cab Calloway Of Minnie the Moocher and Me 68: We [...] did some one-nighters through Ohio.
1999		K. Sampson Powder 73: Ally ran the best one-nighters in London.

2. an affair or sexual relationship of one night’s duration; the person with whom this occurs.

1952		(con. 1948) G. Mandel Flee the Angry Strangers 29: Which men? One nighters or a guy for all time?
1978		L. Kramer Faggots 30: He and Dinky had met and tricked seven years ago, a one-nighter.
2011		D.R. Pollock Devil All the Time 101: [H]e had soon found out about [...] the one-nighters with the pimple-faced punks.