Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a tarpaulin.

1906		Out West Apr. 319: The men had unrolled their ‘tarps’ and spread their beds for the night on the ground in front of the little shack [DA].
1907		S.E. White Arizona Nights 18: Except for the very edges, which did not much matter, our blankets and ‘so-guns,’ protected by the canvas ‘tarp,’ were reasonably dry.
1912		R.A. Wason Friar Tuck 233: The Friar’s tarp was next to mine.
1922		P.A. Rollins Cowboy 197: Any custodian of a ‘tarpoleon’ or ‘tarp,’ [...] was very popular after nightfall.
1939		L. Short Raiders of the Rimrock 106: The yard [...] was spotted with tarp-covered goods.
1949		A.I. Bezzerides Thieves’ Market 115: He reached under the tarp and got an apple.
1954		J.D. MacDonald All These Condemned (2001) 13: I saw her foot [...] projecting from under the edge of a greasy tarp.
1965		W. Dick Bunch of Ratbags 28: There are hundreds of tarps rolled up lying all over the joint in the truckies.
1975		J. Roe The Same Old Grind 214: Grady dragged a painter’s tarp from the utility closet.
1977		K. Gilbert Living Black 24: The tarps were an interim thing before they got houses.
1983		S. King Christine 10: All summer long they’d show you pictures of cars under hoods and cars under tarps.
1992		G. Disher Paydirt [ebook] ‘The tarp [...] I misjudged the size’.
1995		C. Hiaasen Stormy Weather 27: Augustine drove out to fasten tarps [...] on the cages and pens.
2006		F.X. Toole Pound for Pound 66: Some of the equipment was covered with frayed tarps.
2012		D. Whish-Wilson ‘In Savage Freedom’ in Crime Factory: Hard Labour [ebook] Wank mags, a blue tarp and two shovels.
2019		C.D. Rosales Word Is Bone [ebook] The chicken shacks hidden beneath blue tarps in the barrio.
2020		G. Disher Consolation 69: ‘Just help me put a tarp over her’.
2021		T. Pluck Boy from County Hell 236: She pulled a tarp and revealed a bulbous, rocket-nosed fastback.