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whomper

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Etymology

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From whomp +‎ -er. Compare with whopper.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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whomper (plural whompers)

  1. (slang) One who or that which whomps. [from 20th c.]
    • 1952 August, William Barbour, “They Want Him Bad”, in Modern Screen, volume 45, number 3, page 42:
      A magazine columnist found proof of this some time ago when he printed an item stating that Richard Widmark was not at all a hard guy, but a gentle, scholarly chap who wouldn’t hurt a fly, let alone an old lady. […] Fans wrote in by the hundreds calling the columnist a liar, demanding retraction, and vowing that they had actual proof that Richard was ‘by nature a woman-whomper and tougher than Mike Mazurki.
    • 1962, Bruce Palmer, John Clifford Giles, Horseshoe Bend, New York: Simon and Schuster, page 197:
      “I see a quick light in many a eye here. And well you might look smart, for these two beauties is bear killers, wolf whompers and gut rippers made with my own hands. […] ”
    • 1993, Phyllis Reynolds Naylor, The Girls Get Even, Yearling Books, →ISBN, page 15:
      “A whomper, a weirdo, and a crazie,” Wally answered, reciting the nicknames they’d given Eddie, Beth, and Caroline—Eddie, for the way she could hit a ball; Beth, for the kind of books she read; and Caroline, for turning everything that ever happened to her into a movie.
    • 2005 August, David Eddings, Leigh Eddings, Crystal Gorge, Warner Books, →ISBN, page 227:
      “Why don’t I have Ox sharpen his axe?” Sorgan suggested. “It sort of sounds to me like maybe it’s ‘whomp’ time again.”
      “It probably would solve some problems, Dahlaine,” Zelana agreed, “and Ox is probably one of the best whompers available to us.”
    • 2009, Katherine Hannigan, Emmaline and the Bunny, Greenwillow Books, →ISBN, page 83:
      (Orson Oliphant landed in a town full of whap-whompers and stamp-stompers. They whomped and stomped one another every day. It was a hard place to be happy, mostly.)
    • 2009, Jason Stark, “One Win Away”, in Worth the Wait: Tales of the 2008 Phillies, Chicago, Illinois: Triumph Books, →ISBN, page 186:
      I can't decide. Did Ryan Howard have the greatest year any 199-strikeout whiff machine ever had? Or did he have the roughest year any 48-homer whomper ever had? Hey, you've got me. You figure it out.
  2. (colloquial) A whopper; something remarkably large or intense. [from 20th c.]
    • 1973, Mark McGarrity, Lucky Shuffles, Grossman Publishers, →ISBN, page 96:
      They stretched her between them so that it all hung out, and then, swinging her chest over the faces of the unconscious, they tried to tit everybody awake. She had hogans, two turgid glands of them. Real whompers. Her tits cascaded all over their faces like soft, brown punching bags.
    • 1975, Peter Matthiessen, Far Tortuga, Random House, →ISBN, page 239:
      De only modern convenience dat dey got is dem old strips of auto tire dat dey wears for shoes when dey comes up to Georgetown, what dey calls "whompers." Dat right, Wodie?
    • 1989 January, Bernard Schopen, The Big Silence, The Mysterious Press, →ISBN, page 184:
      "Not much. All she has to do is sing and flop those big old whompers of hers around and she gets everything she ever wanted — money, recording contracts, TV, the works. Maybe even me for a while, if she plays her cards right."
    • 2011, Sarah Feldbloom, “At the Klondike Bar”, in Helen Walsh, editor, Tok: Book 6, Zephyr Press, →ISBN, page 132:
      You are drinking a frosty bear
      and wearing big furry whompers on your feet
    • 2012, Michael Perry, Visiting Tom: A Man, a Highway, and the Road to Roughneck Grace, Harper, →ISBN, page 171:
      It is the second week of December, and we are about to get a whomper. “Blizzard of the decade,” said ok Jay Moore in the Morning on Moose Country 106.7, […]
    • 2013, Risa Stephanie Bear, Starvation Ridge, Stony Run Press, →ISBN, page 169:
      "Oh! Well, I was thinking, on the whole, I prefer the rain to the snow."
      "Ah. We do have a lot of rain in winter here, and usually not much snow, though two years ago there was a whomper."
    • 2015 July, Janey Mack, Time's Up, Kensington Books, →ISBN, page 345:
      Dozen held out a hand and my clutch to me. I took them both, and he pulled me to my feet. “Car bomb,” I said. “A whomper.”

Adjective

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whomper (not comparable)

  1. (colloquial, somewhat uncommon) Large or intense; great; bumper.
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