clapboard

¹

[ klab-erd, klap-bawrd, ‑-bohrd ]

noun

1. Chiefly Northeastern U.S. a long, thin board, thicker along one edge than the other, used in covering the outer walls of buildings, being laid horizontally, the thick edge of each board overlapping the thin edge of the board below it.
2. British. a size of oak board used for making barrel staves and for wainscoting.

adjective

1. of or made of clapboard:

   a clapboard house.

clapboard

²

[ klap-bawrd, -bohrd ]

noun

, Movies.

1. a small board with a hinged stick attached that is clapped clap down at the beginning of the filming of a shot for use later in synchronizing sound and image in the editing of the film.

clapboard

/ ˈklæbəd; ˈklæpˌbɔːd /

noun

1. 1. a long thin timber board with one edge thicker than the other, used esp in the US and Canada in wood-frame construction by lapping each board over the one below
   2. ( as modifier )

      a clapboard house

verb

1. tr to cover with such boards

Word History and Origins

Origin of clapboard¹

1510–20; earlier clap bord, alteration of obsolete clapholt < Low German klappholt (cognate with Dutch klaphout ) split wood used for barrel staves; clap ¹, holt

Origin of clapboard²

clap ¹ + board

Word History and Origins

Origin of clapboard¹

C16: partial translation of Low German klappholt, from klappen to crack + holt wood; related to Dutch claphout; see board

Example Sentences

They stride back and forth across the hot pavement, past barns and clapboard houses, dressed in bike helmets, running shorts, and nordic ski boots.

From Outside Online

To learn the history of the Wampanoags and what happened to them after the first Thanksgiving, a visitor has to drive 30 miles south of Plymouth to the town of Mashpee, where a modest, clapboard museum sits along a two-lane road.

From Washington Post

The old church was clapboard, and the shooter shot through its walls.

From FiveThirtyEight

Even the little yellow bus that picks them up for school, tootling past neat clapboard suburban houses as well as farmland, seems somehow dispiriting, a symbol of a home-towny way of life that means them no harm even as it hems them in.

From Time

The taxi trundles away from the train station passing rows of gray houses with clapboard shutters into the French countryside.

From The Daily Beast

A clapboard-covered porch extended across the entire front of the house, which faced westward toward Blue.

From Project Gutenberg

There he built a log cabin covered with a clapboard roof and the chimney was built on the outside of the primitive dwelling.

From Project Gutenberg

Their first home in this section was a log cabin with a slab floor and a clapboard roof.

From Project Gutenberg

Iron fire-shovels were a rarity among pioneers; they used, instead a broad, thin clapboard with one end narrowed to a handle.

From Project Gutenberg

It was a lost fragment of clapboard about four feet long, and with no house to it.

From Project Gutenberg