wire-worker
(ˈwaɪəˌwɜːkə(r))
1. An artisan who works in wire.
| 1670 [Charter of Wire-workers of London]. 1792 New Bath Directory 24 Painter, Glazier, & Wire-worker. 1814 W. Johnston Beckmann's Invent. (ed. 2) IV. 309 Wire-workers, and other artists who use wire. 1846 M{supc}Culloch Acc. Brit. Empire (1854) I. 748 The paper manufacture creates a considerable demand for the labour of..wire-workers. |
2. a. One who pulls the wires of a puppet-show. In quot. fig.
| a 1843 Southey Comm.-Pl. Bk. (1851) IV. 260 Milton has not used machinery—for the supernatural powers are the characters of his poems, the agents themselves, not the wire-workers. |
b. U.S. An earlier synonym of wire-puller.
| 1835 Col. Crockett's Tour (Phila.) 172 He is the wire⁓worker, the very mover and organ of all those high-handed and lawless measures. 1842 Congressional Globe App. 319/1 Should this be a party move,..I tell the ‘wire-workers’ of that party that they are raising a storm of indignation. 1883 C. F. Wilder Sister Ridnour's Sacrifice 130 The politician grasps the hand of his wire-worker and tool. |
3. = wire-walker s.v. wire n. 16 a.
| 1970 M. Kelly Spinifex v. 91 She was one of the Flying Volantes, a bloody good wire worker. |
So ˈwire-ˌworking vbl. n. (a) the making of wire; (b) wire-pulling; also as ppl. a.; hence also as back-formation) wire-work v. trans., to influence by pulling wires.
| 1831 American (Harrodsburg, Ky.) 28 Jan. 3/2 One of the wire-working writers in the Union, seems disposed to consider it a little less than treason. 1835 Ure Philos. Manuf. 62 Rope-making and wire⁓working. 1843 J. Q. Adams Diary 23 Mar. (1876) XI. xxii. 343 James Monroe was recalled by President Washington through Thomas Pickering, wireworked by Alexander Hamilton. 1857 B. Hayes Diary 11 Sept. (1929) v. 167, I have kept aloof from the wire-working as well as from the more stormy scenes of politics. 1909 Westm. Gaz. 23 Feb. 2/2 Reducing to a minimum the..wire-working that would follow, if details as to the schedules were permitted to leak out piecemeal. |