DCHP-1 Online

remittance man Esp. West

• 1 Derog., Hist. a person living in Canada on money remitted from his family in the Old Country, usually to insure that he did not return home to become a source of embarrassment.

  • 1896  There is a lass of men who are called . . . "Remittance-men" . . . always expecting a remittance in a few posts from the old country.
  • 1911  About two miles from Poplar Grove was the preemption of Mr. Guy Pierce, another Englishman, but one who belonged to that class rather contemptuously regarded by their neighbors as "remittance men."
  • 1957  "In the '80s," a Western pioneer recalled, "remittance men were as plentiful as gophers and just as unpopular."
  • 1964  Contrary to popular belief, there were actually few remittance men on the [N.W.M.P.] force. . .

• 2 Figurative uses.

  • 1912  "The timber wolf I trimmed out because he wasted around like a remittance man."
  • 1963  Although the fairy shrimp is a fascinating creature to biologists, he is a sort of a remittance man of the animal world performing no very useful function in nature's scheme of things.