Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US) an unpleasantly conceited, ‘clever’ person; also, one who is ‘too smart to work’ and lives by his wits (prob. illegally).

1843		Boston Satirist (Boston, MA) Mar. n.p.: Framingham Wants to Know [...] If some of our smarties are not very sure they know who writes the Framingham ‘wants’.
1861		Calif. Mag. Aug. 39/2: ‘Juvenile smartys’ are interesting, even to a vagabond [DA].
1876		(con. c.1840) ‘Mark Twain’ Tom Sawyer 156: That Saint Louis smarty that thinks he dresses so fine and is aristocracy!
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Sept. 6/1: Never mind, Doctor; you don’t spell ‘cart’ with a k, like some of the Market-street smarties.
1889		Barber Co. Index (Medicine Lodge, KS) 1 May 4/3: ‘The jays always like to see the village smarties downed by a fly fakir’ .
1896		‘Frederick Benton Williams’ (H.E. Hamblen) On Many Seas 247: [I] didn’t want a jeering, snickering lot of smarties passing remarks on my dexterity.
1898		W.T. Goodge ‘Australia’s Pride’ Bulletin 3 Sept. 32: But bushmen’s games are not the games / That Sydney spielers play; / A country smarty’s ‘just their dart,’ / The city sharpers say.
1901		Times (Phila., PA) 21 Apr. 35/7: Now, Mr Smarty knows all about the stalemate racket.
1903		‘Dads Wayback’ in Sun. Times (Sydney) 4 Jan. 9/3: An’ all them wot grafts seems, fools ter yer, an’ all them wot’s honest. In yer own mind yer sorts up ther world inter mugs an' smarties. An' yer don't believe in goodness no more.
1908		‘O. Henry’ ‘Innocents of Broadway’ in Gentle Grafter (1915) 120: Village smarties who know just where the little pea is.
1911		E.B. Morris Freshman in College Comedies 32: Violet. Now then, Mr Smarty Bricklayer, you have got yourself in a nice fix, ain’t you?
1923		Smith’s Wkly (Sydney) 2 June 21/2: [T]here was a lantern-jawed bloke gassing about how the townies reckoned themselves smarties.
1929		W.R. Burnett Little Caesar (1932) 54: Look at that smarty over there. He thinks he’s cute.
1932		Don Redmond ‘Doin’ What I Please’ 🎵 I outsmart all these other smarties, / Because I do just what I please.
1939		Williamstown Chron. (Vic.) 1 July 3/4: The Jew picking up his hand saw four kings, but immediately threw them into the pack, much to the disgust of the ‘smartie’.
1940		S. McBarron ‘Coffin Custodian’ Ten Detective Aces Apr. 🌐 Why don’t you stop trying to be a smartie, mister? Now I gotta give you a lesson in manners.
1947		A. Baer in Waterloo (IA) Daily Courier 19 Jan. 35/1: I was a waitress in a railroad lunchroom I would see that smarty got the abstrigger gravy down the back of his neck.
1959		Mad mag. Sept. 31: If you think the tigers is a baseball team, you ain’t such a smartie about baseball.
1965		F.J. Hardy Yarns of Billy Borker 59: So the smarties have got you on the mugs’ list.
1984		B. Ellem Doing Time 197: smartie: someone who brashly bucks authority, gives cheek, a know-all or loud-mouth.
1986		R.G. Barrett Real Thing 170: The owner looked like a half-baked smarty.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 49: When he took over, the racecourse smarties and villains all around the country reacted with concerted glee.
2000		P. Temple Dead Point (2008) [ebook] The Sydney smarties put together this consortium to tender. It’s full of funny money.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 193: smarty Impertinent person, usually a child ANZ early C20.
2007		N. Ragen Sat. Wife 240: So don’t be a smarty, come to my party.
2052		T. Pluck ‘Little Howl on the Prairie’ in Life During Wartime (2018) 229: ‘Little smarty, I’ll taste your blood’.

2. a fashionable person.

1899		A. Binstead Houndsditch Day by Day 82: Two o’ these young Yiddisher smartys, an’ two young wimmin.
1942		‘Marienne’ ‘Solid Meddlin’’ in People’s Voice (NY) 4 Aprr. 30/1: [S]marties are asking Daddy for some of those foldin’ bills to frock their brown-skinned frames.
1959		I. & P. Opie Lore and Lang. of Schoolchildren (1977) 75: In Iowa (1958) children have a longer verse: ‘Smarty, smarty, smarty, thought she’d have a party, / Nobody came but a big fat darkie.’.

3. a general, usu. negative form of address.

1845		G.W. Harris ‘The Knob Dance’ Spirit of the Times (NY) XV July in Inge (1967) 48: My back aint nuffin to you, Mister Smarty!
1884		(con. c.1840) ‘Mark Twain’ Huckleberry Finn 40: I’ll lay for you, my smarty; and if I catch you about that school I’ll tan you good.
1892		S. Crane in N.-Y. Trib. 10 July in Stallman (1966) 4: A barber from a ten-cent shop said ‘Ah! there!’ and she answered ‘smarty!’ with withering scorn.
1900		Ade More Fables in Sl. (1960) 151: I’ll have you know, Smarty, my name ain’t Kit.
1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 20: Oh, you do, Mr. Smarty! [Ibid.] 102: There now, do you see, smarty!
1925		Dos Passos Manhattan Transfer 106: ‘I wouldn’t play [those games] either except on account of you.’ ‘Oh wouldn’t you, Mr. Smarty.’.
1935		C. Odets Awake and Sing! I i: You also mean something when you studied the drum, Mr. Smartie!
1936		J.T. Farrell World I Never Made 422: I will then, smarty!
1939		‘Flann O’Brien’ At Swim-Two-Birds 197: Aren’t they bogberries, mister smarty, asked Shorty, aren’t they though, you little pimp!
1940		N. Davis ‘You’ll Die Laughing’ in Penzler Pulp Fiction (2007) 250: O.K. smarty. He’ll throw you right out of there on your can.
1945		A. Kober Parm Me 78: What else can you tell from that remark, Mr. Smarty?
1951		D. Stivens Jimmy Brockett 53: ‘He’s gone to America,’ Tom said. ‘Don’t give us that one.’ ‘Has he now, smarty? You watch the papers.’.
1956		A. Childress Like One of the Family 40: I know all that, but there’s others wiser than you, Mr. Smarty.
1960		B. Crump A Good Keen Man 161: All right, smarty.
1975		Spradley & Mann Cocktail Waitress 35: Just give me my check, smartie.
1986		H.B. Gilmour Pretty in Pink 15: Okay, smartie, you better give me all your money or else.

4. an aristocrat.

1959

A. Sinclair My Friend Judas (1963) 161: A couple of smarties did talk to me.

5. (US campus) a hard worker; an intellectual success.

1967–8

Baker et al. CUSS.