Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US) a clerk, a white-collar worker.

1881		Harvard Lampoon 20 Apr. 42/2: After various chilling repulses, our pencil-pusher discovered a man smaller than himself [OED].
1890		Stock Grower and Farmer 28 June 3/4: The pencil pusher gazed reverently after him [DA].
1895		Eve. Herald (Shenandoah, PA) 12 Mar. 1/4: Paragraphs on Different Subjects Framed by the Pen and Pencil Pushers.
1907		Daily Arizona Silver Belt (Gola Co., AZ) 17 Sept. 5/4: I guess them pencil-pushers / Have never played the game.
1917		‘A-No. 1’ From Coast to Coast with Jack London 7: A pencil pusher was assigned to take notes of my story.
1934		R. Sale ‘A Nose for News’ in Goulart (1967) 197: Which one of you pencil-pushers is Joe Dill?
1964		H. Selby Jr Last Exit to Brooklyn 192: I hate pencil pushers. Me, Im a machinist. 1st class journeyman.
1981		J. Ellroy Brown’s Requiem 215: The investigators, who are really just pencil pushers, pass them.
1992		P. Earley Hot House 89: ‘Some college-educated pencil-pusher making five times my salary in some big corporation fucks up and the only thing that happens is that the company loses some money’.
2008		M. Herron Reconstruction: (2019) 159: ‘You’re wanted back at the office.’ [...] ‘Bloody pencil pushers’.
2019		G. Disher Peace 146: Front-line police against the pencil pushers.

2. a journalist; a hack writer.

1879		Dodge City Times 2 Aug. 2/1: Nilsson said to a reporter: ‘I am, as you hear, a peasant born, and I am proud of it,’ and then, added the admiring pencil-pusher: ‘the fair hair was flung back’ [etc.].
1886		Louisiana Democrat (Alexandria, LA) 27 Jan. 2/1: Bro. McMeans of the Morehouse Clarion, is after the Minden Democrat pencil-pusher and uses some very severe words towards him.
1894		F. Remington letter in Splete Sel. Letters (1988) 249: The great house of Harper [...] play on the credulity of the pencil-pusher like a state legislator does on his followers.
1901		J. London ‘Local Color’ Complete Short Stories (1993) I 693: ‘Where do you work, you pencil-pusher?’ he asked.
1914		Anderson Daily Intelligencer (SC) 2 Dec. 5/3: The young adventuress was considerably frustrated by the swooping down of the newspaper men [...] the pencil pushers were wise to the game.
1921		Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang Mar. 11: The editor met a farmer reader on the street who was considerably in arrears with his subscription [...] ‘Well,’ continued the pencil pusher, ‘you might bring in some cobs’.
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 83: He happened to say this in the presence of some newspaper men. They were friends of my sweetheart, also a pencil pusher.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 69: For a pencil-pusher he sure could flash plenty of Uncle Sam’s I.O.U.’s.
1950		Pittsburgh Courier (PA) 18 Mar. 20/1: The columnist figured he should tag-out the photog [...] The lensman resented the pencil pusher’s caveman tactics.

3. (Irish) one who is seen as studying excessively.

1998

A. Warner Sopranos 76: ‘Ah don’t know what yous call it in America but she’s a real swot.’ [...] ‘A damned pencil pusher’.