Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) energy, spirit.

c.1849		Paige Dow’s Sermons I 260: It flats right down, and stays there, like a junk of dough — no get up to it [DA].
1863		Ladies’ Repository (N.Y.) XXIII Aug. 477: In vain I tried to convince him that there was some ‘get-up’ in the animal.
1875		M. Thompson Hoosier Mosaics 174: The latter, a dapper Yankee, full of ‘get-up-and-snap,’ and alert to make way for his paper, measured the pedagogue at a glance.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 23 May 16/2: The polka is lively and enticing enough to make even Beach himself dance, and the general ‘get up’ is very creditable.
1908		Dly Press (Newport News, VA) 29 Apr. 5/4: ‘They [i.e. a selection of hats] look great to me. there’s swing, dash, git-up to them’.
1912		R.W. Brown ‘Word-List From Western Indiana’ in DN III:viii 576: git-up, n. Ambition; aggressiveness. ‘He doesn’t seem to have any git-up’.
1928		M. Bodenheim Georgie May 234: Ah don’ seem to have no get-up this aftahnoon.
1935		J. Conroy World to Win 232: They [...] look like they’re full o’ git-up and vinegar, too.
1942		N. Algren Never Come Morning (1988) 198: Some dames got too much get-up in ’em ’n some ain’t got enough.
1954		(con. 1920s–30s) J.O. Killens Youngblood (1956) 134: I hope he got some git-up about him.
1962		(con. WWII) J.O. Killens And Then We Heard The Thunder (1964) 157: He’s got more get-up about him than all these trifling spoiled pantywaisted colored fraternity boys put together.
1964		L. Hansberry Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window in Three Negro Plays (1969) I i: You oughta be glad I at least salvaged something out of it – that I had the get-up to go over there and get something out of there before they audit.