cheap-jack
Americannoun
adjective
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of or suitable for a cheap-jack; cheap or inferior.
-
without scruples or principles; underhanded.
using cheap-jack methods to evict tenants.
noun
adjective
Etymology
Origin of cheap-jack
First recorded in 1850–55
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.
Then again, it might be another cheap-jack moment waiting to take you down.
From New York Times ● Sep. 8, 2012
He saw a whole street of Florence, including the quarters of Donatello and Bronzino, torn down to make room for a cheap-jack row of shops devoted to "bijouterie and parfumerie."
From Time Magazine Archive
But at least the cheap-jack does advertise his wares, whereas the don or dear-jack advertises nothing except himself.
From George Bernard Shaw by G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton
The nightmare of modern cheap-jack life was all explained; unjustified, of course, as he had always dimly felt, symptom of deep disorder; all due, this feverish, external business, to an odd misunderstanding with the Earth.
From The Centaur by Algernon Blackwood
It was reported that he had followed up his former misconduct by calling his father-in-law a liar, and that he had ordered a common tombstone from some cheap-jack at the East-end.
From An Unsocial Socialist by Bernard Shaw
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.
