[f. TRAM sb.2]
1. intr. To travel by a tramway or on a tram-car (also to tram it). colloq. Also (U.S.), to drive or operate a tram-car (Cent. Dict., 1891).
1826. in Northumbld. Gloss., s.v., Liddell, why he from Durham came,… But home again he’d better tram.
1896. Westm. Gaz., 9 April, 7/2. The Walworthian has to tram to Greenwich.
1904. E. Nesbit, Phœnix & Carpet, x. They can tram it home.
2. trans. Mining. To convey (coal, ore, etc.) by a tram or trams.
1874. J. H. Collins, Metal Mining (1875), 11. One sees … the ore and rubbish allowed to accumulate behind the men to a height of several feet before it is trammed back to the shaft.
1887. Raymond, Statist. Mines & Mining, 8. Tramming.
1889. Eng. Illustr. Mag., May, 572/2. To ‘tram’ the coal from the working face … to the sidings where the horses take the waggons.
1893. Pall Mall G., 14 Jan., 1/3. In the level below … only one man was saved, who had been tramming to the shaft the ore which he excavated on previous days.
b. To push (a tram or wagon) to and from the shaft in a mine.
1883. Le Neve Foster, in Encycl. Brit., XVI. 455/2. (Mining) This trolley (which is merely a small platform upon wheels) is pushed (trammed) to the shaft; the full kibble is hooked on to the winding-rope and drawn up, whilst an empty kibble is placed upon the trolley and trammed back along the level … where it is again loaded. Ibid. The motive power for tramming wagons along the levels of metal mines is generally supplied by men or boys.
