Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) the New Jersey state militia, raised in 1755.

1830

J.B. Skillman N.Y. Police Reports 84: A gentleman of the names of William Wilson and Robert Rogers [...] was considered in New-Jersey, by the ‘Jersey blues,’ an odd sort of a traveller.

(US) a mosquito.

1908		Eve. World (NY) 30 July 14/2: [heading] Mosquitoes Jar Man Off Perch on Windowsill. Swarm of ‘Jersey Eagles’ Hit Cleaner, Who Topples to Sidewalk.
1909		T.A. Dorgan in Zwilling TAD Lex. (1993) 50: (When The Home Team Wins) [caption] [Man with a swarm of mosquitoes buzzing around his head:] Jersey eagles.
1914		New Ulm Rev. (Brown Co., Minn) 15 July n.p.: The size of thoe Jersey ‘birds’ was proverbial [...] But numbers, not size, mde the Jersey ’skeeter ti pest and plague it was.
1931		Atlantic City Press 3 Aug. n.p.: Has the mosquito Commission gone on strike, or are the ‘Jersey birds’ breeding so fast they can’t cope with them? [DA].

(US black) cow’s milk.

1947		M.H. Boulware Jive and Sl.
1947		Argus (Melbourne) 15 Nov. 7/1: Last week [...] I ventured forth in search of the slang of contemporary students. As you might expect, there is a strong American influence, shown in such slick and well turned phrases as ‘jersey-high-ball’ (a glass of milk), ‘Flea male’ (a girl who jumps from one male to another), and ‘Steeplechaser’ (one who goes for tall people) .

(US) a strong kind of apple-jack, peach brandy or illicitly distilled whisky.

1837		N.Y. Dly Herald 16 Oct. 4/1: An atomosphere tained with the effluvia of Jersey lightning and tobacco smoke.
1844		Jonesborough Whig (TN) 3 July 3/3: The all true-hearted locos come, / Ye who love good old Yankee rum, / Our hopes are high — our sky is bright’ning, / Lit up by streaks of ‘Jersey lightning’.
1848		Spirit of the South (Eufaula, AL) 9 Feb. 1/4: ‘I’ll bet you a gallon of Mongahely against a pint of Jersey lightning’.
1858		Broadway Belle (NY) 6 Nov. n.p.: He eats raw Buffalo beef, drinks Jersey lightning warranted to kill at fifty paves.
1863		J. Horrocks letter in My Dear Parents 16 Sept. 29: A great many of them sell whiskey of their own make which has got the name of ‘Jersey Lightning’.
1872		G.P. Burnham Memoirs of the US Secret Service 131: He had plainly been indulging in more than one draught of ‘Jersey Lightning’.
1883		Fort Worth Daily Gaz. (TX) 13 Dec. 3/3: An old man named Hoag [...] got full of ‘Jersey Lightning’ and making disturbance got arrested.
1889–90		Barrère & Leland Dict. of Sl., Jargon and Cant.
1892		Boston Journal 14 Apr. 8/1: Jersey lightning will still be distilled and sold to the honest, unsuspecting public as fine old French brandy [DA].
1902		Commonet (Lincoln, NE) 31 Jan. 7/2: The barrels contain [...] Jersey lightning and apple-jack.
1909		Blue-Grass Blade (Lexington, KY) 11 Apr. 13/3: The may have been imbibing too freely of Jersey lightning or corn bug-juice.
1918		Maui News (H.I.) 18 Jan. 4/1: A man can get [...] crazy runk on it as on the fiercest Jersey lightning.
1945		H.C. Beck Jersey Genesis (1983) 101: ‘How much cider makes how much “Jersey Lightning”?’ I asked.
1951		(con. 1920) S. Longstreet Pedlocks (1971) 273: Tinker Evans could always beg a swig of the private stock of Jersey lightning.
1969		O’Hara & Erskine O’Hara Generation 86: You can be sure Stratton would have had the best [liquor], not just Jersey Lightning.
1976		R. Thomsen Bill W. (1999) 166: It was something special, the men insisted; this was real applejack, Jersey Lightning.
1998		C.A. Stansfield Jr A Geography of New Jersey 187: New Jersey [...] applejack, or ‘Jersey lightning,’ was famous throughout America.

1. the reverse side, e.g. of a closed door.

1942

D. Burley N.Y. Amsterdam Star-News 7 Feb. 16: The stud on the Jersey side laid his gim on the pecker [...] then split the slammer.

2. the wrong side, the inferior type etc.

1944

D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 30: Ole Man Mose, who / Can’t get back from the Jersey Side.

(US) a deliberately repellent drink, often inflicted on the loser of a bet, whereby the bartender pours whatever liquid is found in the drip tray into the victim’s glass; often accompanied by a squeeze of a bar rag.

2011		Urban Dict. 20 Aug. 🌐 Jersey Turnpike Shot When the bartender wipes down the bar and squeezes the rag into a shotglass.
2021		Twitter 25 Dec. 🌐 A Jersey Turnpike, which is when the bartender drains the splash mat into a glass. I think my buddies bet me $50 [to drink it].

(US black) over 38 years old.

1944

D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 105: I’ve already booted these clucks that I’m on the Jersey Side of the Snatch Play.