peckerwood

American  

[pek-er-wood] / ˈpɛk ərˌwʊd /

noun

1. Midland and Southern U.S. woodpecker.

2. Southern U.S. Slang: Disparaging and Offensive. poor white.

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adjective

1. Southern U.S. small or insignificant.

   He makes a living farming and running a peckerwood sawmill.

Etymology

Origin of peckerwood

1825–35, pecker + wood ¹; inversion of woodpecker

Example Sentences

And white supremacist groups like the Rise Above Movement are giving a new voice to the bigotry of the skinheads and peckerwood gangs that long haunted Huntington Beach, Anaheim and working-class parts of the county.

From Los Angeles Times

Miss, I would starve till I was as stiff as a peckerwood peckin' at a hole 'fore I'd sign anything on my deed.

From Project Gutenberg