[f. TRIM v. + -ER1.]
† 1. app. A canopy. Obs. rare.
1518–9. Rec. St. Mary at Hill, 303. As towchyng the tabernacles, trymmers, is that a wourkman shall se them & he to shew his best advice in it.
a. 1548. Hall, Chron., Hen. VIII., 73. Vnder ye trimmer, anticke images of gold.
1559. Dunmow Churchw. Acc., lf. 42 b (MS.). For making it yrons and iiii staples for the trymmer over the rood, iid.
2. One who trims; one who repairs, adjusts, makes neat or smart, etc.; spec. a. a tailor’s, dressmaker’s, or milliner’s assistant; b. a finisher in coach-making; c. see quots. 1881, 1891. Often as second element, as in hat-trimmer, etc.
1555. W. Watreman, Fardle Facions, II. viii. 167. The yndians are … greate deckers and trimmers of them selues.
1580. Hollyband, Treas. Fr. Tong, Racoustreur, a minder or trimmer of things.
1591. Percivall, Sp. Dict., Afeytador, a barber, a trimmer, a decker, tonsor, fucator, ornator.
1621. T. Williamson, trans. Goulart’s Wise Vieillard, 115. That man a trimmer of a garden of pleasure.
1652. N. Culverwell, Treat., I. xi. (1661), 88. He calls God … the Painter, and Trimmer of the Soul.
1850. Kingsley, Cheap Clothes, 17. If to the trimmer we return an answer that is considered ‘saucy,’ we are fined 6d. or 1s.
1879. Melbourne Argus, 24 Dec., 2/1. Trimmers [coachmaking] get from £2 10s, to £3 10s. per week.
1881. Guide Worcester Porcelain Wks., 8. The trimmer … removes any superfluous glaze.
1891. Labour Commission Gloss., Trimmers, skilled workmen engaged in shaping and pressing hosiery goods.
1902. Sloane, Stand. Electr. Dict., App. s.v. Trimming, The work of a lamp trimmer frequently includes cleaning the feed rod of the upper carbon with a cloth so as to ensure smooth action of the clutch.
3. One who or that which cuts, clips, prunes, etc.; spec. † a barber (obs.); also, an implement or machine for trimming edges in industrial processes.
1583. Stubbes, Anat. Abus., II. (1882), 50. What say you of the barbers and trimmers of men?
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, I. lv. At the going out of the halls … were the perfumers and trimmers, through whose hands the gallants past.
1751. Smollett, Per. Pic. (1779), II. xl. 37. Peregrine mentioned this assassination to his own trimmer.
1810. Sporting Mag., XXXV. 263. The defendant’s witnesses … described as croppers, dockers, nickers and trimmers [of horses].
1876. Spurgeon, Commenting, 4. Calvin … was no trimmer and pruner of texts.
1883. R. Haldane, Workshop Receipts, Ser. II. 99/2. Trimmers paste requires to be smooth … and possessed of great adhesive qualities.
1889. Anthony’s Photogr. Bull., II. 364. With … the straight-edge to guide the knife or trimmer, cut first one side and then … the three others.
4. Arch. A short beam framed across an opening (as a stair-well or hearth) to carry the ends of those joists which cannot be extended across the opening; also, a brick-trimmer (BRICK sb.1 10). Also attrib.
1654. in E. B. Jupp, Carpenters’ Co. (1887), 316. 2 foote 9 inches from the backe of the Chimney to the Trimmer peece or binding Joyst.
1737. Salmon’s Country Build. Estimator (ed. 2), 62. Remember to measure the Trimmers that support the Hearths taking the Length by the Girt of the Arching of them.
1833. Loudon, Encycl. Archit., § 234. Four-inch brick trimmer arches to be turned where required.
5. One who trims between opposing parties in politics, etc.; hence, one who inclines to each of two opposite sides as interest dictates.
Applied orig. in this sense to Lord Halifax and those associated with him (1680–90), but by him accepted in the sense ‘one who keeps even the ship of state’; hence ‘one who changes sides to balance parties’ (J.).
1682. Dryden, Dk. Guise, Epil. 33, 38. We Trimmers are for holding all things even.—Yes—just like him that hung ’twixt Hell and Heaven…. You Trimmers shou’d, to poize it, hang on t’other.
1682. Character of a Trimmer, 2. A Trimmer, one neither Whigg nor Tory, is a Hater of Anti-christ, an Abominator of Enthusiasm.
1685. Evelyn, Mem., 7 May. Those whom (by way of hateful distinction) they call’d Whiggs and Trimmers.
1704. Faction Displ., xiv. The Patriot’s Soul disdains the Trimmer’s Art.
1739. Wesley, Wks. (1872), I. 183. Nor is it possible for all the trimmers between God and the world to elude the consequence.
1809. W. Irving, Knickerb., V. i. (1849), 262. He who wavers in seeking to do what is right gets stigmatized as a trimmer.
1888. T. Hardy, Wessex T. (1889), 201. One of the trimmers who went to church and chapel both.
6. One who or that which trims or trounces (see TRIM v. 10); a stiff competitor, fighter, etc.; a slasher; a stiff letter, article, bout, run, blow, throw of the ball, etc. colloq.
1776. Foote, Bankrupt, III. Wks. 1799, II. 126. Pep. Don’t you think the public would bear one skirmish more…? I have a trimmer here in my hand. Plast. To which I have as tart a retort.
1804. Nelson, in Nicolas, Disp. (1846), VI. 163. I shall write the Dey of Algiers a trimmer.
1816. Scott, Antiq., xi. I will show you his last epistle, and the scroll of my answer—egad, it is a trimmer!
1827. Sporting Mag., XXI. 141. Amongst the young hounds I noticed some trimmers. Ibid. (1828), XXII. 117. We found in Man Wood, and killed him [the fox] after a trimmer of fifty minutes.
1882. Daily Tel., 17 May. Mr. H. was clean bowled by a trimmer from Barnes.
7. One whose business is to stow the cargo or coal in loading a ship, or to shift it from one place to another in the hold; also, a mechanical contrivance for doing this; also, one who arranges the coal in loading trucks.
1836. Sir G. Head, Home Tour, 331. These men called trimmers, whose business it is to level the cargo as it comes tumbling below.
1890. Sci. Amer., 7 June, 360/1. It [the coal handling plant] may be resolved into three parts: The elevators, which discharge the boats, emptying them of their cargo; the trimmers, which take the coal from the elevators and deposit it upon the heaps; and finally the reloaders, which transfer coal from the heaps to the holds of outgoing barges or other vessels.
1891. Labour Commission Gloss., Trimmers, men on board ship whose duty is to go into the coal bunkers of a vessel and to place the coals within reach of the fireman…. When a ship is loading grain in bulk, the trimmers move the grain from the point under the hatchway to the ends of the ship.
† 8. pl. Ropes and yards for trimming the sails of a ship: see TRIM v. 14. Obs. rare–1
1630. trans. Camden’s Hist. Eliz., IV. 32. Their Masts and Trimmers ouerthrowne, their Cables cut.
9. Angling. (a) A float of cork, wood, etc., to which a line, with baited hook, is attached; used on lakes and ponds for taking pike; (b) a peg surmounted by a reel on which the line is wound, driven into the bank of a stream for the same purpose; a bank-runner.
1799–1815. [implied in trimmer-angling, -fishing: see b.].
1840. Blaine, Encycl. Rur. Sport, § 3638. The bank trimmer is much in use on the lakes of England, the lochs of Scotland, [etc.].
1845. Lubbock, Fauna Norfolk, ii. 90. He launched his fleet of trimmers, pike finding a ready sale at his own door.
1854. L. Lloyd, Scandinav. Adv., I. 189. Trimmers, or night-lines, were also much used in my vicinity.
1873. G. C. Davies, Mount. & Mere, iii. 18. The trimmers are baited with dead roach, and, luckily for the pike and the fair sportsman the eels get the largest share of the bait.
b. attrib. and Comb., as trimmer-angling, -bait, -cork, -fishing, -hook, -line.
1799. G. Smith, Laboratory, II. 264. An approved Method of Trolling, and Trimmer-fishing.
1815. T. F. Salter, Angler’s Guide (title-p.), Trolling, Bottom and Float-Fishing, Fly-Fishing, and Trimmer-Angling.
1840. Blaine, Encycl. Rur. Sport, § 3638. A large hooked arrow armed with strong twine might be shot over the trimmer line…. The cord [should be wound] on round the groove in the flat trimmer cork. Ibid., § 3639. Let the trimmer-hook be sufficiently large.
1863. Atkinson, Stanton Grange (1864), 194. The trimmer-bait had been taken by a nice half-pound trout.
1867. F. Francis, Angling, iv. (1880), 133, note. It is trimmer-fishing in disguise.
Hence Trimmering vbl. sb., trimmer-fishing.
1836. Jackson’s Oxford Jrnl., 20 Aug., 3/4. Mr. J. Seymour, of Thame, and a party, were on Thursday timmering near Shabbington, when a gudgeon was taken by a perch of half a pound, which was afterwards taken by a pike of four pounds.
1870. Observer, 9 Oct. Trimmering, trolling, live bait fishing, spinning, fly fishing.
attrib. 1888. Fenn, Dick o’ the Fens, x. chap. title, A trimmering expedition.
