skid row

[ roh ]
See synonyms for skid row on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. an area of cheap barrooms and run-down hotels, frequented by alcoholics and vagrants.

Origin of skid row

1
1930–35, Americanism; earlier skid road an area of a town frequented by loggers, originally a skidway
  • Also called Skid Road .

Words Nearby skid row

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use skid row in a sentence

  • One morning, he wakes up on skid row without a nickel in his jeans and the great-granddaddy of all hangovers.

    See? | Edward G. Robles
  • One nostalgic hood from Seattle said it reminded him of skid row there.

    Mars Confidential | Jack Lait

British Dictionary definitions for skid row

skid row

skid road

/ (rəʊ) /


noun
  1. slang, mainly US and Canadian a dilapidated section of a city inhabited by vagrants, etc

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with skid row

skid row

A squalid district inhabited by derelicts and vagrants; also, a life of impoverished dissipation. For example, That part of town is our skid row, or His drinking was getting so bad we thought he was headed for skid row. This expression originated in the lumber industry, where it signified a road or track made of logs laid crosswise over which logs were slid. Around 1900 the name Skid Road was used for the part of a town frequented by loggers, which had many bars and brothels, and by the 1930s the variant skid row, with its current meaning, came into use.

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.