jalopy

Unknown. Perhaps from Jalapa, Mexico (now Xalapa), to whose scrapyards used cars were often sent from New Orleans starting in the 1920s. First recorded written use in 1924.

• IPA^(key): /d͡ʒəˈlɒ.pi/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

jalopy (plural jalopies)

1. (US, dated) An old, dilapidated or unpretentious automobile.

   Synonyms: banger, beater; see also Thesaurus:old car

   • 1957, Jack Kerouac, chapter 1, in On the Road, Viking Press, →OCLC:

     Dean is the perfect guy for the road because he was actually born on the road, when his parents were passing through Salt Lake City in 1926, in a jalopy, on their way to Los Angeles.

   • 2003, Terrance Dicks, Barry Letts, chapter 22, in Deadly Reunion:

     There's only a rough track and I doubt if that jalopy of yours will make it.

   • 2009 November 20, Stephen King, “Raymond Carver’s Life and Stories”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN:

     Through most of those early years of restless travel, he dragged his two children and his long-suffering wife, Maryann behind him like tin cans tied to the bumper of a jalopy that no car dealer in his right mind would take in trade.

2. (US, dated, slang) A hip, cool, groovy automobile.

• jalapeño (possibly)

• “jalopy”, in Collins English Dictionary.
• “jalopy”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “jalopy”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “jalopy”, in Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Cambridge University Press, 1999–present.