plugger
(ˈplʌgə(r))
[f. plug v. + -er1.]
a. One who or that which plugs; spec. in Dentistry, an instrument for driving in and consolidating the filling material in the cavity of a carious tooth.
| 1867 C. A. Harris Dict. Med. Terminol. 86/1 Automatic plugger, a dental instrument which is operated by pressing the point upon the gold in the cavity, in the manner of an ordinary hand-plugger. 1872 L. P. Meredith Teeth (1887) 109 A sidelong blow on the end of the plugger may throw the point to one side..and break off or crack a portion of the tooth. 1905 Daily Chron. 1 July 4/4 The boat-club captain's eye has been upon those valiant pluggers in the ‘fours’. |
b. See quot.
| 1897 Westm. Gaz. 1 Dec. 2/3 Elaborate precautions were taken against ‘pluggers’, as impersonators are called in Canada. The Conservatives, in their anxiety to prevent ‘plugging’ (or personation), armed their scrutineers with the kodak. |
c. One who extols or publicizes. Cf. plug v. 7 b. orig. U.S.
| 1913 Writer's Bulletin Oct. 127/2 Publishers spend thousands..in order to attract the attention of out-of-town performers with whom, neither they nor their ‘pluggers’ ever come in contact. 1921 Cleveland (Ohio) Enterprise 4 June 1/3 Everybody out here is a booster and plugger for one common purpose. 1927 [see plug v. 7 b]. 1958 [see A. and R. (A III)]. 1972 P. Black Biggest Aspidistra i. iii. 29 The pluggers kept the initiative by inventing the request item. This was..almost impossible to identify as a proven plug. |
d. Angling. One who fishes with a plug (sense 10).
| 1967 Daily Tel. 21 Oct. 14/7 Many successful bass pluggers work on the principle that it is a fish with an easily aroused temper. So they use a ‘teaser’. |