Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US campus) a party, a celebration.

1852		C.A. Bristed Five Years in an Eng. University 80: I remember the date from the Fourth of July occurring just afterwards, which I celebrated by a ‘hang-out’.
1856		B.H. Hall College Words (rev. edn) 247: hang-out. An entertainment.

2. a lodging, a place of residence.

1857		‘Ducange Anglicus’ Vulgar Tongue.
1901		J. Flynt World of Graft 91: I’ve knocked about all over, but York has always been my hang-out.
1917		‘A-No. 1’ From Coast to Coast with Jack London 78: Other districts scattered over the city held the hangouts of the local vagrant elements and the various subdivisions of the underworld.
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 142: Then there was Chang’s hang-out, in Limehouse Causeway, London. His wife, an English woman, ran the little tea store in the front.
1937		P. Cheyney Dames Don’t Care (1960) 8: I pass plenty places, roadhouses, an’ hangouts an’ a dude ranch or two.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1955		Q. Reynolds Police Headquarters (1956) 276: ‘What kind of pad was it?’ Phillips might ask. ‘It was a pusher hangout,’ Terranova would say.
1998		G. Burn Happy Like Murderers 188: The drop-outs looking for somewhere to use as a hangout free of charge.

3. a place where a group tends to meet.

1867		Sporting Gaz. (London) 25 May 15/1: The principle ‘hang out’ (if I may use a slang expression) of anglers on the Earn is Crieff [which] is every summer filled with crowds of visitors [...] anxious to ply their line on the neighbouring stream.
1896		S. Crane George’s Mother (2001) 75: This is th’ hang-out fer a great gang [...] They’re a great crowd, I tell yeh.
1899		Salt lake Herald (UT) 24 Dec. 10/5: Outside of nearly all towns [...] tramps have little camps or ‘hangouts’.
1910		‘O. Henry’ ‘Past One at Rooney’s’ in Strictly Business (1915) 258: He had heard of the place as a tough ‘hang-out’.
1916		‘A-No. 1’ Snare of the Road 87: Young Davis found most of his comrades at the ‘hangout’.
1925		R. McAlmon Distinguished Air (1963) 23: I know darn few of the hangouts there.
1933		‘Goat’ Laven Rough Stuff 23: We was in a poolroom on State Street, a notorious hang-out for thieves.
1940		H. Asbury Gangs of Chicago (2002) 169: Sime Tuckhorn, who ran one of the toughest places on Whisky Row, the hangout of thieves and hoodlums of the lowest type.
1953		W. Brown Monkey On My Back (1954) 3: She was huddled in a telephone booth in a drugstore just off Times Square, one of the spots in the district notorious as a hangout for narcotics addicts.
1969		B. Jackson Thief’s Primer 22: The main thing that kept us out of trouble [...] was we never went back to any old hangout.
1977		E. Bunker Animal Factory 40: At count time it became a hangout for sergeants and lieutenants.
1989		(con. 1982–6) T. Williams Cocaine Kids (1990) 105: For Kitty, it can be a business location; for Max and the boys, an after-work hangout.
1993		L. Rodríguez Always Running (1996) 186: The gray house had been known as a bikers’ hangout for years.
1999		N. Cohn Yes We have No 216: Full of clubs and galleries, hip hang-outs.
2000		Guardian Guide 8–14 Jan. 27: Beery student hang-out.
2010		K. Richards Life 68: There was this little hangout-cloakroom, where we sat around and played guitar.
2023		A. Parks To Die in June 165: ‘[T]railing round every down-and-outs’ hangout in Glasgow’.