cinder dick

American  

[sin-der dik] / ˈsɪn dər ˌdɪk /

noun

Slang: Older Use.

1. a railroad police detective.

   I knew that cinder dick was tailing me, so I ducked between two trains and hopped on the next freight car leaving the yard.

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Etymology

Origin of cinder dick

First recorded in 1920–25; so called from cinders of coal-burning locomotives + dick ( def. ) (in the sense “detective”)

Example Sentences

In literature and in the popular imagination, the all-seeing private eye—the gumshoe, the cinder dick, the sleuthhound, the shadow—displaced the crusading sheriff as the archetype of rough justice.

From "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann