flasher
(ˈflæʃə(r))
[f. flash v.1 + -er.]
One who or that which flashes.
† 1. One who splashes water. Obs.
| 1611 Cotgr., Gascheur..also, a flasher or dasher of water. 1736 Ainsworth, A flasher of water, aspersor. |
2. a. Something which emits flashes of light.
| 1686 Goad Celest. Bodies ii. iv. 198 They were Spit-Fires, Thunderers and Flashers. |
b. An automatic device for alternately lighting and extinguishing incandescent lamps, as in advertising and warning signs; such a sign or signal itself.
| 1909 Install. News III. 127 The effectiveness of the fixed pattern is greatly enhanced by the addition of a ‘flasher’. 1928 Publisher's Weekly 30 June, Inset, Electric flashers 7 × 11{pp} (loaned for special displays). 1932 Flight 1 July 613/2 A flasher is incorporated in the L.T. circuit and the beacon is usually operated on a flashing code sequence. 1944 Times 23 Aug. 5/4 A new technical term..comes from the Underground, where there are to be more thermal flashers..[i.e.] illuminated signs urging passengers to pass along the platform. 1958 Observer 17 Aug. 15/6 Triggers under the steering-wheel work the self-cancelling indicators and the headlamp flasher. 1966 T. Wisdom High-Performance Driving ix. 97 Never take for granted..that the car..with turn-indicator flashing left is actually proposing to turn left. The driver may well have left his ‘flasher’ on many corners ago. 1971 Gloss. Electrotechnical, Power Terms (B.S.I.) i. iii. 16 Flasher relay, relay in which the contact units make and break with a self-determined periodicity. 1971 K. Royce Concrete Boot iii. 36 The police closed in. They did it well. Plain cars and vans; no sirens or flashers. |
† 3. One of the attendants on a gaming table (see quot.). Obs.
| 1731 in Malcolm Manners & Cust. Lond. (1808) 166 A Flasher, to swear how often the bank has been stripped. 1756 W. Toldervy Hist. Two Orphans I. 68 [He] had often sate a flasher at M..d..g..n's. 1797 Sporting Mag. X. 312. |
† 4. A person of brilliant appearance or accomplishment.
| 1755 Johnson (citing Dict.), Flasher, a man of more appearance of wit than reality. 1779 F. Burney Diary Oct. I. 260 They are reckoned the flashers of the place, yet everybody laughs at them for their airs. 1780 Ibid. May I. 333 Sir John Harrington..one of the gayest writers and flashers of her reign. |
5. The workman who ‘flashes’ glass (see quot.).
| 1839 Ure Dict. Arts 582 s.v. Glass-making He next hands it to the flasher, who..wheels it rapidly round opposite to a powerful flame, till it assumes..finally [the figure] of a flat circular table. |
6. (See quot.)
| 1874 Knight Dict. Mech. I. 876/2 Flasher..a form of steam-boiler in which small bodies of water are injected into a heated boiler and flashed into steam. |
7. a. ‘A name of the lesser butcher-bird: see Flusher’ (Ogilvie 1882).
b. A fish (Lobotes surinamensis).
| 1882 Jordan & Gilbert Fishes N. Amer. 555. |
8. Cricket. (See quot. 1936.)
| 1936 Daily Herald 24 Dec. 15/6 The latter is a left⁓hand batsman, but is inclined to be a ‘flasher’ (one apt to chase balls outside the off-stump). 1956 R. Alston Test Commentary 14 If the regular opening batsmen fail, I'd try Benaud, he's no more of a ‘flasher’ than Trumper. |
9. slang. One who ‘flashes’ or exposes himself indecently. See flash v.1 13 c.
| [1896 Farmer & Henley Slang IV. 297/2 Meat-flashing,..exposure of the person. Hence meat-flasher = a public offender in this line.] 1974 Kingston (Ontario) News 10 Jan. 2/6 A middle aged man indecently exposed himself to a female student... There were several reports of a so-called ‘phantom flasher’ in the University..area. 1976 A. Powell To keep Ball Rolling I. iii. 44 He was apparently a ‘flasher’, who had just exposed himself. |