stevedore
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
verb (used without object)
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
stevedoresimple
-
stevedoressimple
-
have stevedoredperfect
-
has stevedoredperfect
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am stevedoringprogressive
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are stevedoringprogressive
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is stevedoringprogressive
-
have been stevedoringperfect progressive
-
has been stevedoringperfect progressive
Past
-
stevedoredsimple
-
had stevedoredperfect
-
was stevedoringprogressive
-
were stevedoringprogressive
-
had been stevedoringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of stevedore
1780–90, < Spanish estibador, equivalent to estib ( ar ) to pack, stow ( see steeve 1) + -ador -ator
Explanation
You can call a dock worker who loads cargo onto boats a stevedore. You don't have to be named Steve to be one (the word means docker or longshoreman), but the spelling of the English given name probably influenced the modern appearance of this word, from the Spanish estivar, "to stow cargo." The ultimate root is the Latin word stipare, "pack down or press," and the archaic English verb steeve, or stow, is a relative.
Vocabulary lists containing stevedore
"A Walk to the Jetty," Vocabulary from a novel excerpt
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The Mysterious Benedict Society
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"A Walk to the Jetty" by Jamaica Kincaid
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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:
After spotting the breach on Friday, DP World, one of a handful of stevedore industry players in Australia, disconnected internet, significantly impacting freight movements.
From Reuters ● Nov. 13, 2023
The son of a stevedore, Moreno scavenged for leftover food from restaurants as a child and collected scrap bottles and newspapers for money, according to the mayor’s website.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 21, 2021
Attucks was a stevedore, or dock worker, killed by British soldiers at the Boston Massacre in 1770.
From Salon ● Jun. 28, 2020
It didn’t matter that I ached like a stevedore at the end of a double shift.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 17, 2020
Though not as tall or physically commanding as Bull’s, Captain Brannon’s body was stacked together with the knotted muscles of a stevedore, and an implied menace shadowed his whole appearance.
From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy
Striking workers include crane drivers, machine operators and stevedores, who load and unload ships.
From BBC ● Aug. 22, 2022
In time, entrepreneurs set up bigger tents, brought in pianos for merry-making and “good, clean, cheap fun, even on Saturday nights, when the stevedores, oil drillers, and sailors wandered in from Santa Monica …”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 17, 2022
Where those dollars go: The cruise economy web extends further than you might think — restaurateurs, stevedores, shuttle drivers, private security firms, farmers who sell vast quantities of produce to provision ships, etc.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 17, 2021
Director-choreographer Drew McOnie’s staging tends to clutter the production numbers—too many seamen and stevedores turning too many Newsies moves—and the unimaginative theater-rock songs tend to be titled for the plot points they dramatize.
From Slate ● Nov. 8, 2018
Most were attached to labor battalions, as cooks and stevedores, laborers and gravediggers.
From "Hidden Figures" by Margot Lee Shetterly
For a month or more the lonesome husband "stevedored," wrestling freight on the lighters, then he disappeared.
From Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories by Beach, Rex Ellingwood
She also said GT improperly used information obtained from Murphy Marine during the lawsuit to negotiate its own stevedoring contract with Dole Fresh Fruit Company.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 19, 2022
The judge said the definition of stevedoring in the 2018 tariff plainly did not apply to Buckeye, and that the definition in the 2020 tariff, which redefined the term, was ambiguous.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 29, 2022
After taking over the port, GT imposed a new tariff structure, which includes a new volume-based “terminal usage fee” on stevedoring, which is the physical handling of containers and cargo from vessels.
From Washington Times ● May 12, 2020
He was a lawyer with the Federal Maritime Commission and for several stevedoring associations before 1973 when he joined the newly reconstituted National Association of Stevedores, which later became the National Association of Waterfront Employers.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 12, 2018
In the window of a hotel dining room a gentleman sat eating his lunch, stevedoring a buttered roll with such gusto that one felt tempted to applaud.
From Pipefuls by Morley, Christopher
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.
