What is a "gandy-dancer"?

Answer 1

The term gandy-dancer is a railroad slang word for a person who works as a track maintenance person. It also refers to a certain piece of equipment used by railway crews long ago which had 4 wheels, a platform, and a "t" shaped handle that is pumped up and down to get it moving.

Answer 2

[Q] From Peter Piecuch: “Help settle a family argument about gandy dancer. Most dictionaries define it as a railroad worker, but state that the origin is unknown. Most encyclopaedias don’t list it at all. I seem to have once read that the origin relates to the first automated track-laying machine manufactured by the Gandy Corporation of Chicago.”

[A] There’s much doubt and confusion about this wonderful expression for a member of a track-laying or maintenance crew. It is first recorded in 1918. Since then it has had various slang meanings, including a petty crook or tramp, an Italian, a jitterbug, or a womaniser or active socialite. But the original sense referred to a worker who tamped down the ballast between the ties using a special tool. This involved vigorous stamping on the tool while turning in a circle, an action which might be taken to resemble dancing.

The tool was seemingly called a gandy, but where the name came from is a mystery. It would seem it was based on some bit of railway slang now lost to us. The idea that it referred to a Chicago business named the Gandy Manufacturing Company—which supposedly supplied a variety of tools to railway workers—seems to rest on a reference in a book called Railroad Avenue by Freeman H Hubbard, published in 1945. Several people have searched for this business, but have failed to find any trace of it in railway trade journals or Chicago city directories of the period. However, a number of otherwise reputable works continue to give this as the source.

Some writers have suggested that gandy may be a corrupted form of gander, from the nodding heads of the workers using the tool, implying that the tool was actually named after the gandy dancer who used it. But this is no more than guesswork, I’m afraid.

Answer 3

Gandy dancer is an old term used for the Rail Road...

They had Chineese or Blacks along the rails and they "danced" them into place, using bars, until they were in the "right position" then they would secure them with the long sledge hammers (sorry, dont know what they are called), and steel spikes to the plates that held them securely in place.

They would have huge rows of them, 20+ on each rail at a time with thier pry bars...

I watched a video of this, and it was like poetry in motion...

I wish you well..

Jesse

Answer 4

A railroad worker whose job it is to replace the track ties and reset rails.

Answer 5

a laborer whose job description is to repair railroad tracks.

Answer 6

it's a restaurant lol