brakeman
Americannoun
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brakemen
plural
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a railroad worker who assists the conductor in the operation of a train.
noun
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a crew member of a goods or passenger train. His duties include controlling auxiliary braking power and inspecting the train
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the person at the back of a two- or four-man bobsleigh, who operates the brake
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of brakeman
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
His father was a brakeman for the Central of Georgia rail company, and when his parents separated when he was 10, Nate moved with his mother and brothers to Elizabeth, N.J., where his grandmother lived.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 7, 2025
His father, who worked as a brakeman to supplement the family income, froze to death in a local railyard when Frank was 13.
From New York Times ● May 2, 2024
Teaming with brakeman Kaysha Love, Humphries is fifth at the midway point in 2:03.38 — nearly six-tenths of a second away from what currently is the bronze position.
From Fox News ● Feb. 18, 2022
The sled, being driven by Brad Hall with Nick Gleeson as brakeman, turned over after corner 13 at the Yanqing Sliding Centre.
From BBC ● Feb. 15, 2022
But every time my eyes closed, I saw the phantom brakeman with hamburger meat for a face, swinging a ghostly lantern through tree branches like skeletons.
From "A Long Way from Chicago" by Richard Peck
He is considered one of Great Britain's best bobsleigh brakemen, having won 15 World Cup medals - including three golds - as part of the two-man and four-man teams.
From BBC ● Oct. 23, 2024
“To continue to fight for greater and greater participation among women and get those brakemen get more medal opportunities too.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 11, 2022
The technology would end the days of brakemen running on top of train cars to individually apply the brakes, a system that often required miles for a train to stop.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 23, 2018
Adigun, 31, soon convinced fellow former runners Ngozi Onwumere and Akuoma Omeoga to join the team as brakemen.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 29, 2018
In the little apartment known as the "dog house," a dozen men chatted, snoozed, or were playing checkers--firemen, engineers and brakemen, waiting for their run, or off duty and killing time.
From Ralph of the Roundhouse by Allen Chapman
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
