oilcan

[ oil-kan ]

noun

1. a can having a long spout through which oil is poured or squirted to lubricate machinery or the like.

oilcan

/ ˈɔɪlˌkæn /

noun

1. a container with a long nozzle for applying lubricating oil to machinery

Word History and Origins

Origin of oilcan¹

First recorded in 1830–40; oil + can ²

Example Sentences

Pompey drives off with a friend and returns 10 minutes later with a circa-1960 red Hohner Erica squeezebox and leans into polka tunes and waltzes while a boy of about 6 plays irrelevantly on an oilcan goatskin drum.

From Washington Post

It might have been thought that the deluge had given him the opportunity to sit and reflect and that the business of the pliers and the oilcan had awakened in him the tardy yearning of so many useful trades that he might have followed in his life and did not; but neither case was true, because the temptation of a sedentary domesticity that was besieging him was not the result of any rediscovery or moral lesson.

From Literature

Vittorio in his Oilcan Harry mustache, the elegant Luisa, the perverted Finn, the tattooed Riccardo: possible geniuses.

From The New Yorker

In an April 4 “Culturebox,” J. Bryan Lowder misidentified the extremely serious, sombrero-wearing, gloved gentleman in an early shot from the telecast of the 2012 Olympics opening ceremony as a “farmer pouring from an oilcan into a doghouse.” He is, more likely and with equal absurdity, a beekeeper pouring smoke into a beehive, which we’re told calms the beasts therein.

From Slate

Later, there’s a quick cut to a farmer pouring from an oilcan into a doghouse with such purpose on his face that you don’t ask questions.

From Slate