pete n.1
1. (also pete-box) a safe.
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Enemy to Society 73: A man equipped with burglar’s tools would be kneeling behind the safe and drilling it open; those ‘petes’—as cracksmen call them—in people’s houses are generally very easy to open silently. | |
| Vocab. Criminal Sl. | |
![[Can]](/static/img/flags/can.png "Canada") | ‘Thieves’ Sl.’ Toronto Star 19 Jan. 2/5: SAFE Pete. | |
| Man’s Grim Justice 46: Then he told me what kind of a safe it was [...] ‘It’s a front-lock pete.’. | |
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | (con. 1929) I Am a Fugitive 162: He received life in Michigan when a copper was bumped off during a pete job. | |
| Rough Stuff 90: If the inside keyster of the pete was locked, then I had the jemmy to burst it open with. | |
| ‘Butch Minds the Baby’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 344: Nobody opens pete boxes for a living any more [...] this is a very soft pete. It is old-fashioned, and you can open it with a toothpick. | |
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). | |
| Men of the Und. 81: They cracked a small pete. | |
| Go-Boy! 109: I came across a four-hundred pound safe inside a large cabinet. This was the first pete I had encountered. |
2. (US) nitroglycerine, used to open safes.
| Criminal Sl. (rev. edn). |
3. see pete-man
In compounds
see sense 1 above.
(US Und.) safe-cracking.
| Men of the Und. 324: Pete-busting, Safe-cracking. |
safe breaking.
| ‘The Informal Execution of Soupbone Pew’ in From First to Last (1954) 67: I’m careful about them pete jobs, so’s not to blow up no harmless persons. | |
| Man’s Grim Justice 95: One shot ‘pete jobs’ were in order after the Blackstone fiasco. |
(US Und.) a safebreaker.
| Enemy to Society 105: Why, you’ve already caught four ‘pete-men’ who attempted to drill the safe, caught ’em redhanded—the best ‘petes’ in the country. | |
| St Louis Post-Despatch (MO) 16 Jan. 25/1: Where do you get off to bawl me out, you imitation pete (peterman, safe blower). | |
| Hop-Heads 17: I knew them to be yeggs, one of them a ‘pete man’ (safe blower) of almost national fame. | |
| (con. 1929) I Am a Fugitive 161: Hard-boiled Jack Martin, killer, heist guy, pete man and jail breaker extraordinary. | |
 | Criminology 47: If the ‘pete-man’ is arrested and must go to trial, he maneuvers to be indicted in accordance with this statute. | |
| ‘I Was King of the Safecrackers’ in Hamilton Men of the Und. 138: No peteman would frazzle his nerves trying to assault such forts. | |
| Men of the Und. ix: A ‘pete-man’ [...] may devote months of patient study to mastering the mechanics of safe construction. | |
| Naked Lunch (1968) 24: Old Pete men suck the black smoke in the Chink laundry back room. | |
| A Man Called Intrepid (1979) 369: The Cracker was a peteman, a safecracker with an encyclopedic knowledge of locks. | |
| Hooligans (2003) 23: The woman was killed by a bomb. Whoever scratched the other two knew what he, or they, were doing. It looks like a couple of Petes to me. | |
| Steel Storage 114: A peteman is a yegg. A guy who blows safes. | |
| Running the Books 242: I used to be a peteman. That’s the old name for guys who hit up safes. |
In phrases
(US Und.) to crack a safe with explosives.
| Spokane Press (WA) 22 Sept. 7/3: ‘Sniffing a pete’ [...] means forcing a safe with the aid of explosives. |