pinhead
Pronunciation
  • IPA: /ˈpɪn.hɛd/
Noun

pinhead (plural pinheads)

  1. The head of a pin. (Frequently used in size comparisons.)
    • 1810, Thomas Thomson, A System of Chemistry, Vol. 4, Bell & Bradfute, page [http://books.google.com/books?id=0hsJAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA602&dq=pinhead+date:1801-1820&lr=&num=20&as_brr=0 602]:
      The moment the nitre was red hot, the coal, previously reduced to small pieces of the size of a pinhead, was projected in portions of one or two grains at a time…
  2. (slang) An ignorant, naive, foolish, or stupid person.
    • 1990, Kindergarten Cop:
      My daddy repairs cars driven by women who are pinheads.
  3. (slang) A telemark skier.
  4. (slang, medicine) A human head that is unusually tapered or small, often due to microcephaly, or a person with that trait. Often promoted in freak shows as "human pinheads".
    • 1939, Amram Scheinfeld and Morton David Schweitzer, You and Heredity, Frederick A. Stokes Co., page [http://books.google.com/books?id=gU0GAAAAMAAJ&q=pinhead+microcephaly+date:1901-1940&dq=pinhead+microcephaly+date:1901-1940&lr=&num=20&as_brr=0&pgis=1 155]:
      The microcephalic idiot is an unfortunate with a "pinhead," sometimes exhibited as a "what's-it" in circus side-shows, whose mental age never goes beyond that of an imbecile.
    • 1943, Oliver Ramsay Pilat, Sodom by the Sea: An Affectionate History of Coney Island, Garden City Publishing, page 187 ↗:
      Zip the What-Is-It was simply a Negro idiot. […] For half an hour at a time, David Belasco used to watch Zip at Coney Island. The producer insisted he saw signs of intelligence in the pinhead […]
  5. (slang, pet stores) A newborn cricket used as food for pets.
    • 1994, Raymond E. Hunziker, Leopard Geckos, Publisher, ISBN 079380258X, page 16 ↗:
      A newly hatched gecko will need pretty small crickets, but you will not have to go all the way down to pinheads.
    • 2000, Manny Rubio, Scorpions: Everything About Purchase, Care, Feeding, and Housing, Barron's Educational Series, ISBN 0764112244, page [http://books.google.com/books?id=XjUwzS7emXQC&pg=PA70&dq=Rubio+newborns-(%22pinheads%22)&lr=&num=20&as_brr=0&sig=rDludfhNOKOBL5uKvEDX_Asvj4Y 70]:
      Crickets can be purchased in many sizes from newborns ("pinheads") to adults.
  6. (mycoculture) The immature juvenile fruiting body of a mushroom prior to its gills opening.
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