Antedating of "Racketeer"

[Fred Shapiro]

racketeer (OED 1928)

1924 _Chicago Daily Tribune_ 6 Apr. 3 (ProQuest)  Policemen were in the
crowd -- not as such but as mourners -- and all manner of "racketeers,"
gamblers, bootleggers, beer runners, bosses of the underworld, and
politicians.

Fred Shapiro


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Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE DICTIONARY OF QUOTATIONS
  Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
Yale Law School                             forthcoming
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