Dictionary

Townie en · NOUN

Etymology

From (Charles)town + -ie.

Meanings

1. A person from Charlestown, Massachusetts, (especially) a working-class person of Irish American heritage.
   • There were also a few black families in the projects and some Italians who spilled over from the North End, but otherwise Charlestown was a homogeneous hill of working-class Micks and their families living in tight rows of colonial and triple-decker houses. The Townies. And every Townie knew everyone in Town. 2015, Lisa Genova, Inside the O'Briens, page 12:
   • Racial isolation is so strong that in the early 1970s there were only 388 blacks among the 38,488 residents of South Boston, and only 76 among the 15,353 “Townies” of Charlestown. 1981, Laurence R. Marcus, Benjamin D. Stickney, Race and Education: The Unending Controversy, page 110:
   • By fall 1974, however, new impulses broke through and on September 25, three hundred Townies organized the Charlestown branch of ROAR 2004, Ronald P. Formisano, Boston Against Bussing, page 123:

Forms