Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) used derisively by US troops, prisoners and other isolated men, the man who takes the ‘girl you’ve left behind’.

c.1941		US Army chant 🎵 Ain’t no use in going home, / Jody’s got your girl and gone. / Gonna get a three-day pass, / Just to kick old Jody’s ass.
1944		D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 107: Said Fool Number One: ‘I’m having fun — Playing Jodie with these chicks’.
1944		D. Burley N.Y. Amsterdam News 14 Oct. 14A: Our next war will be with Joe De, the knave.
1964		R.D. Abrahams Deep Down in the Jungle 170: Now in nineteen hundred and forty-four / The World War Two was over for sure. / Now a two-timing bitch with an old-man overseas, / Said, ‘Wake up, Jodie. Wake up, please. / This shit is over, Japan is fell’.
1976		(con. 1969) C.R. Anderson Grunts xiv: Jody was a guy who stole a grunt’s girlfriend back in the World. [Ibid.] 87: Let’s see if Jody’s been snooping around that stuff.
1982		(con. 1970) J.M. Del Vecchio 13th Valley (1983) 228: I bet old Jody gettin a piece of that action.
1993		(con. 1969) N.L. Russell Suicide Charlie 27: Ain’t no use in looking down, / ain’t no discharge on the ground. / Ain’t no use in going home, / Jody’s got your gal and gone.
1996		Eble Sl. and Sociability 55: The proper name Jody has come to be ‘the generic male that a husband or boyfriend accuses a female of cheating with’, as in ‘Why are you running to answer the phone – are you worried it’s Jody?’.
2005		Jarhead [film script] swofford: Suggested techniques for the marine to use in the avoidance of boredom and loneliness [...] Imagining what a marine’s girlfriend and her man Jody are doing in the alley or in a hotel bed.

2. (US) used derog. by soldiers, a male civilian; thus jody clothes, men’s civilian clothes; also attrib.

1944		D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 108: But still the Jodies – But the chicks ‘sodies’ [...] as soldier boys frown.
1945		Pittsbrgh Courier (PA) 31 Mar. 14/1: After thirty-three years of service in the attire regulated by the U.S. Army, Sgt [...] Wells [...] stepped out recently in Jody clothes.
1965		H. Rhodes Chosen Few (1966) 66: Those jodies are too close to home not to be able to run in th’ house, grab a gun, and come right back ready for open season on dark meat. [Ibid.] 162: All we gotta do is wear jody clothes.
2003		squalor.blogspot.com 28 May 🌐 No actual complaints on that front, just the typical Jody observations.

3. (US gay/prison) a homosexual prisoner’s younger lover.

1972

B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 156: If he needs money, he can sell his jodie (fr Army sl = man deferred from the draft, ’40s; also cf black sl jodie = the back street lover who takes over while the former sweetheart is overseas) to the highest bidder.