Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US milit., also greaseball grunt) a short-order cook; a kitchen worker.

1923		(con. 1917–18) T. Boyd Through the Wheat 164: ‘Ho there, you yellow greaseball, what do you want?’ He hailed one of the mess helpers who was approaching.
1934		‘Hinky-Dinky’ in Lomax & Lomax Amer. Ballads and Folk Songs 559: Our grease-ball is a goddam dirty bum, / He bails out swill and makes the slum.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 107: grease ball [...] a kitchen worker [...] greaseball grunt A cook’s helper.
1952		J. Jones From Here to Eternity (1998) 512: He’s a greaseball [...] He gets paid to fix sandwiches.

2. (US) any filthy or offensive person; thus the lowest category of tramp.

1917		‘A-No. 1’ From Coast to Coast with Jack London 123: At Reno every hobo, ranging from the aristocratic ‘comet’ down to the lowliest of low ‘grease balls,’ registered his moniker.
1928		R.J. Tasker Grimhaven 146: The greaseball wins his name for an obvious reason, for the woolly texture of his clothing absorbs an unlimited amount of grease and dust.
1938		R. Chandler ‘The King in Yellow’ in Spanish Blood (1946) 88: She was a wide-eyed kid that fell for a flashy greaseball.
1942		R.L. Bellem ‘Color of Murder’ Dan Turner – Hollywood Detective Dec. 🌐 Stand still, grease-ball — before I drill for oil in your ellybay!
1956		H. Ellison ‘Made in Heaven’ in Deadly Streets (1983) 184: When that greaseball closes up, we knock him a good one.
1977		(con. 1949) J.G. Dunne True Confessions (1979) 358: What are you doing giving absolution to that greaseball?
2001		K. Sampson Outlaws (ms.) 172: It’ll be to do with what the greaseball was just telling me.
2006		P. Shannon Davey Darling 67: They were all greaseballs, the Applebys. So I wanted to thump him.

3. attrib. use of sense 2.

1986		C. Hiaasen Tourist Season (1987) 258: I never asked you what it’s like to be the Stone Crab queen, with a dozen greaseball contest judges staring up your crotch.
1993		M. Myers et al. Wayne’s World II [film script] Greaseball metallers in cooler muscle cars swarm around the Mirthmobile.

4. (orig. US) a derog. term for a person of any Latin race, e.g. Italian, Greek, Puerto Rican, various South Americans etc.; also attrib.

1922		Ogden Standard Examiner 12 Apr. 6/5: Mother— ‘Well, dear, did you have a good time last night?’ Daughter— ‘Oh, Mom, it was perfectly blaah — nobody there but a lot of cake-eaters and grease balls’.
1934		B. Appel Brain Guy (1937) 53: He whispered groggily something about the glory that was Greece, not these greaseballs, the ancient Greece with all her glories.
1938		D. Runyon ‘Too Much Pep’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 632: I have a lot of very good friends among the Italians, and I never speak of them as wops, or guineas, or dagoes, or greaseballs.
1943		I. Wolfert Tucker’s People (1944) 364: Love thy neighbour if he’s not a Catholic or a Jew or a Seventh Day Adventist or a nigger or a greaser or a ginzo or a hunkie or a bohunk or a frog or a spick or a limey or a heine or a mick or a chink or a jap or a dutchman or a squarehead or a mockie or a slicked-up greaseball from the Argentine.
1955		B. Appel Tough Guy [ebook] ‘We’ll raid that greaseball tomorrer!’ [...] The Greeky frankfurter man! The stingy greaseball!
1956		I. Fleming Diamonds Are Forever (1958) 154: I used to think your gangsters were just a bunch of Italian greaseballs.
1967		L. Bruce Essential Lenny Bruce 16: Three kikes, one guinea, one greaseball.
1974		(con. 1960s) R. Price Wanderers 160: ‘Greaseball,’ said one of the Dukes. Angry glances.
1987		T. Wolfe Bonfire of the Vanities 62: If he had to be the one to call this greaseball to accounts, then – but he regretted the greaseball, even in his thoughts.
1999		Indep. Rev. 12 Aug. 8: A banteringly remorseless singling out of the various ‘yids’, ‘niggers’ and ‘greaseballs’ present.
2000		C. Cook Robbers (2001) 238: Last thing they was doing was boosting luxury vehicles on special order [...] Greaseballs in LA and out east want them.
2005		J. Stahl I, Fatty 136: Never did like greaseballs.
2014		E. McNamara ‘Redline’ in ThugLit Jan. [ebook] ‘Good, the little greaseball’s gonna be out bait’.
2021		J. Ellroy Widespread Panic 99: [of a Lebanese] ‘He’s a greaseball. I’m very much attuned to racial distinctions’.
2021		P. Papathanasiou Stoning 306: [of a Greek] ‘Con, ya bloody greaseball bastard’.

5. (US) an automobile factory worker; a garage mechanic; also attrib.

1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 81: Grease Ball. – a garage or machine-shop assistant.
1991		B. Hamper Rivethead (1992) 201: For a guy who was born and raised in this Greaseball Mecca, there could be no more fitting place to go.

6. a derog. term of address to a Latin person.

1953		R. Chandler Long Good-Bye 183: I don’t get called a son of a whore by the help, greaseball.
1980		A. Payne ‘All Mod Cons’ Minder [TV script] 13: Comprennez? No speaky Inglese, you little greaseball?

7. a sycophant.

2007

S. Maloney Sucked In 140: The little grease-ball had his head so far up Merv’s bum you couldn’t see his neck.