Dictionary

vanman en · NOUN

Etymology

From van + -man.

Meanings

1. A person employed to transport goods in a van or wagon.
   • Willie. Agreed unanimously. But how are we going to do it? Do you propose to send for Williamson’s furniture van, to pack them in? […] I’ll drive. Who’ll be the vanmen to lift and carry? 1920, D. H. Lawrence, Touch and Go, Act III, page 90:
   • Packers and sorters, invariably women and girls, had most in common with the staff of receiving offices, who, indeed, sometimes performed a portion of the same work because some laundries had the marking of linen done by receiving office staff while the sorters marked only those items collected by the vanmen. 1986, Patricia E. Malcolmson, English Laundresses: A Social History, 1850-1930, page 140:

Forms