Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (Aus./UK Und.) to steal.

1839		H. Brandon Dict. of the Flash or Cant Lang. 167: I speeled to the crib, where I found Jim had been pulling down sawney for grub.
1857		J. Archbold Magistrate’s Assistant (3rd edn) 446: To steal from shop doors – to pull down.
c.1863		gloss. in Occurence Book of York River Lockup in Seal (1999) 37: I pulled down a fan and a roll of snow.
1882		Sydney Sl. Dict. 9/2: Dick went pulling down sawney for grub last week, when a cop pinched him. He’s gone in the country for a rest. Dick went stealing bacon from shop-doors for food last week, when a policeman arrested him. He’s gone to jail for one year.

2. to provide (with).

1960

Elmore James ‘Fine Little Mama’ 🎵 She’s my red-hot mama / And she sure can pull me down.

3. (also pull) to earn, usu. money, e.g. I pulled down £500.

1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 193: Didn’t pull down a dollar from one of them.
1903		A.H. Lewis Boss 108–9: Your instinct is to pull down each day’s beef each day.
1912		Ade Knocking the Neighbors 154: She was not pulling down any Ribbons at Beauty Shows.
1912		Day Book (Chicago) 15 Aug. 24/2: He pulls down a salary of $6,000 a week.
1917		Wodehouse ‘The Mixer’ in Man with Two Left Feet 75: They aren’t keen on dogs here unless they’ve pulled down enough blue ribbons to sink a ship, and mongrels [...] don’t last long.
1920		Ade Hand-made Fables 204–6: If a Pin-Head in a Plaid Ulster could take a Hoodoo Location in a Comatose Neighbourhood and pull down real Velvet, it was a Cinch that he had a sure-fire Commodity.
1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 70: He is now pulling down $5,000 as an Osteo-vitalic Physician.
1941		Pittsburgh Courier (PA) 11 Jan. 7/1: Jay C. Higginbotham [...] is now [...] pulling down less than fifty.
1947		G. Marx in Groucho Letters (1967) 183: I have never pulled down any dough that has ever remotely touched this figure.
1955		B. Schulberg On the Waterfront (1964) 49: A lot of young bums were getting away with murder to pull down the $4,000 television money.
1959		P. Marshall Brown Girl, Brownstones (1960) 39: You can know all the accounting there is, these people still not gon have you up in their fancy office and pulling down the same money as them.
1965		(con. 1930s) R. Wright Lawd Today 154: She had a damn good job and was pulling down fifteen bucks a week.
1976		N. Thornburg Cutter and Bone (2001) 21: He himself in his mid-twenties had been pulling down twenty-five thousand a year.
1985		T. Wolff ‘Missing Person’ in Back in the World 32: If she’d had her way he’d still be in the navy, pulling down a hundred and forty dollars a month.
1995		J. Stahl Permanent Midnight 72: A succession of Armani’d mooks who pulled down all kinds of money.
1999		Observer 18 July 23: He is now [...] pulling down a salary bigger than his previous one.
2000		C. Cook Robbers (2001) 239: Nuthin like a good mystery, pardner. Why we pull down the big bucks.
2004		C. Brookmyre Be My Enemy 127: I’m not sure what the fuck I do either, but I’m pulling down six figures, so it must be pretty important.
2012		M. Lacher On the Bro’d 2023: ‘Think about the mad cash you could pull down’.

4. to win money.

1896		H. Blossom Checkers 43: I’m a goat if it did n’t win, and I pulled down a thousand.
1961		J. Scarne Complete Guide to Gambling 688: Pull Down – to take down or pocket all or part of a wager just won.