sockdolager

Unknown, 1827 US,[1] presumably fanciful variant of sock (“to hit”); compare contemporary fanciful American coinages.[1][2][3]

Various speculative etymologies have been suggested,[3] such as corruption of doxology, due to this occurring at the end of church worship, hence “finality”.[2][4]

sockdolager (plural sockdolagers)

1. (US, slang, dated) a hard hit, a knockout or finishing blow, or conclusive argument.
   • 1831, James Kirke Paulding, Lion of the West:

     He’ll come off as badly as a feller I once hit a sledge hammer lick over the head—a real sogdolloger.

   • 1838, James Fenimore Cooper, Home as Found:

     There is but one ‘sogdollager’ in the universe, and that is in Lake Oswego.

   • 1859, Bartlett's Dictionary of Americanisms

     "I gave the fellow a socdolager over his head with the barrel of my gun,"

   • 1884, Mark Twain, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Chapter 20.

     The thunder would go rumbling and grumbling away, and quit—and then rip comes another flash and another sockdologer.

2. (US, slang, dated) Something large or otherwise exceptional; a whopper.
   • 1953, Ray Bradbury, The Murderer:

     Hey, Al, thought I'd call you from the locker room out here at Green Hills. Just made a sockdolager hole in one! A hole in one, Al! (etc.)

3. (US, fishing) A combination of two hooks which close upon each other, by means of a spring, as soon as the fish bites.

• sockdologer
• sogdolloger

• sockdologizing

• Appendix:Fanciful 19th century American coinages