Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. an invitation.

1853

G.J. Whyte-Melville Digby Grand (1890) 69: Nor was a card for Apsley House the least coveted invitation amongst the gaieties of the season. Such was the ‘pasteboard’ that greeted my eyes.

2. a visiting card; thus as v., to leave one’s card; also lodge one’s pasteboard.

1837		T. Hook Jack Brag I 9: They lodge their pasteboard and away they go .
1849		Thackeray Pendennis I 365: We shall only have to leave our pasteboards.
1861		T. Hughes Tom Brown at Oxford (1880) 271: I shall just leave a pasteboard.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict. 196: PASTEBOARD, a visiting card; ‘to pasteboard a person,’ to drop a card at an absent person’s house.
1886		M.E. Kennard Girl in the Brown Habit I 187: I told my missus to drop a card on you to-day. You see [...] we hunting men have not much time for that sort of thing; and paste-board leaving, is quite out of my line.
1889		B. Mitford Fire Trumpet I 17: ‘Boss engaged,’ said the sharp boy who appeared. ‘Of course he is. Take that pasteboard in at once.’.
1906		S. Ford Shorty McCabe 10: He hands out a pasteboard that read: LEONIDAS MACKLIN DODGE Commissioner-at-Large.
1913		Day Book (Chicago) 23 Aug. 28/1: Well, just slip me your moniker pasteboard and [...] I’ll put you jo.

3. a playing card.

1854		F. St. Clair Six Days in the Metropolis 18: He was well educated, espeially in the arts of rolling ten pins [...] dealing fancy paste-board.
1856		‘Q.K. Philander Doesticks’ Plu-ri-bus-tah 180: Murphy held the painted pasteboards; / One by one he slowly dealt them.
1863		Leeds Times 12 Dec. 6/2: A Jew card-vendor sold his exceedingly well-made pasteboards so ridiculously low that every house [...] laid in a season’s stock.
1866		Border Watch (Mt Gambier, SA) 31 Oct. 3/2: THE LATEST SLANG CREATION IN NEW YORK [...] when [‘a fast young man’] gambles he ‘slings the pasteboards’.
1874		Chicago Trib. 7 Aug. in A. Pinkerton Reminiscences (1879) 205: I wager thee, / That I can pick the Trey from out / The shuffled paste-boards there.
1888		A. Trumble Mott Street Poker Club 10: That gentleman handled the pasteboards with a dexterity that savored of recent rehearsal.
1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 28 June 2/4: Seated one day with the pasteboards, / I was nervous and ill at ease.
1896		B.L. Farjeon Betrayal of John Fordham 281: You’re clever with the pasteboards.
1900		Nat Tribune (DC) 15 Mar. 4/5: I feel ter-day as if i kin jest git away with any man who shuffles pasteboards.
1905		Sun. Times (Perth) 9 Apr. 4/5: His friends asked him if he had introduced the pasteboards to to the Home Ruler.
1911		Day Book (Chicago) 15 Dec. 22/2: A friend with whom he passes much of the time [...] shuffling the pasteboards.
1917		R. Lardner ‘Carmen’ in Gullible’s Travels 21: A couple o’ the girls is monkeyin’ with the pasteboards and tellin’ their fortunes.
1920		Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang Oct. 6: The greatest indoor sport of the military man is to riffle the ‘pasteboards,’ while his outdoor pastime consists of blowing on a pair of galloping dominoes.
1927		C. Woofter ‘Dialect Words and Phrases from West-Central West Virginia’ in AS II:8 361: He is quite handy with the pasteboards.
1939		Howsley Argot: Dict. of Und. Sl.
1943		‘Whitman College Sl.’ in AS XVIII:2 Apr. 154/2: shuffle the pasteboards. To play cards.
1953		T. Runyon In For Life 132: I [...] left the pasteboards to those more interested in them.
1953		F. Brown Madball (2019) 87: [of tarot cards as used in fortune telling] [H]e’d been giving a mark a cold reading with the pasteboards.
1963		A.S. Fleischman Venetian Blonde (2006) 142: I [...] bought a pack of cards. I hadn’t touched the pasteboards in months.
1969		J. Crumley One to Count Cadence (1987) 188: David suggested that we [...] should run the pasteboards together. He wanted to play poker.

4. a railway ticket.

1856		‘Q.K. Philander Doesticks’ Elephant Club 29: I took the dollar from my pocket, and passed it to the ticket-seller ... and putting his physiognomy before the seven by nine aperture through which the money goes in and the pasteboard comes out.
1882		Nat. Police Gaz. 21 Oct. 2/4: ‘Ticket!’ said the conductor [...] The fellow addressed handed over the required pasteboard.
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 333: The hike between San Francisco and Chicago is liable to be one of ennui [...] for the man who hasn’t got the pasteboard.
1914		Day Book (Chicago) 14 Oct. 17/2: ‘Tickets,’ said the collector as he opened the door of the car [...] The man handed over the pasteboard.

5. a betting ticket, issued by a bookmaker.

1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 98: Six halves, Brechin, was Joseph’s meal [...] and the number of the paste-board was five seven seven two six.
1917		Van Loan ‘Levelling with Elisha’ in Old Man Curry 22: Their riders jogged blithely to the post with Broadsword tickets in their bootlegs and riding orders of a sort to make those pasteboards valuable.

6. a ticket to the theatre, cinema etc.

1879		Cincinnati Enquirer 7 Sept. 10/7: Pasteboards—Tickets.
1901		‘Hugh McHugh’ John Henry 14: I patter away for the pasteboards.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 17 Jan. 1/1: He booked season tickets [and] has to part for the pasteboards.
1910		Goodwin’s Wkly (Salt Lake City) 2 Apr. 10/1: Mr and Mrs Hanford and their company [...] descended on the Theatre Monday evening at one dollar and a half per pasteboard.
1917		R. Lardner ‘Three Kings and a Pair’ in Gullible’s Travels 60: I give him the two tickets and a bonus o’ ten bucks and he give me back four pasteboards and throwed in a envelope free for nothin’.
1937		Duckett & Staple ‘Double Feature’ in N.Y. Age 10 July 7/2: St A’s excursion to Bear Mountain [...] Get in line and get those precious pasteboards.
1944		J. Archibald ‘It Could Only Happen to Willie’ in Popular Detective Apr. 🌐 ‘I come to git them two tickets.’ [...] ‘Fork over four-forty for the pasteboards.’.