poor boy
Americannoun
Regionalisms
See hero sandwich.
Etymology
Origin of poor boy
An Americanism dating back to 1875–80
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.
A po' boy, which comes from "poor boy", is a New Orleans street food sandwich that celebrates Louisiana's seafood.
From BBC ● Jun. 27, 2025
In his campaign announcement, Santos didn’t mention any of that and instead highlighted his zeal in fighting for conservative principles in Washington and his background as “a poor boy of immigrant parents in Queens.”
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 17, 2023
There’s no quiz show in “Age of Vice,” but there is a poor boy who slides through a backdoor into a demimonde of degraded sophisticates.
From New York Times ● Jan. 5, 2023
Vladimir Putin learned his brutal code of war in the “sandpit streets” of Leningrad when he was a poor boy of perhaps 7 and got into his first fight with a neighborhood gang.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 5, 2022
“You’ve already seen him, Ginny, and the poor boy isn’t something you goggle at in a zoo. Is he really, Fred? How do you know?”
From "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" by J.K. Rowling
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.
