subs. (American).—1. A big haul; an advantage: spec. (journalists’) news secured in advance of a rival, a series of BEATS (q.v.). Also (2) on ’Change, a sudden breaking down of prices, enabling operators to buy cheaply, followed by a rise. As verb. = (1) to make a big haul: and (2) to get the better of a rival.
1882. J. D. MCCABE, New York by Sunlight and Gaslight, 160. He runs seventy ’busses on this line and SCOOPS in three’r four hundred a day, clean money.
1888. Detroit Free Press, 22 Sept. Mr. Terada, the editor, is in jail for fourteen months for getting a SCOOP on the government.
1889. Referee, 6 Jan. He is SCOOPING IN the shekels.
1890. Answers, 25 Dec. Last night he slept in his bed when we walked the streets…. To think that he should SCOOP us!
1896. LILLARD, Poker Stories, 26. As a rule he SCOOPED the pot.
3. (common).—To fetch, to fit.
1888. Sporting Life, 7 Dec. It would better SCOOP the situation if it were described as ‘goloptious.”
Verb. (whalers’).—1. See quot.
1891. The Century Dictionary, s.v. SCOOPING. The action of the right whale when feeding. When it gets into a patch of food or brit (which resembles sawdust on the surface of the water), it goes through it with only the head out and mouth wide open. As soon as a mouthful of water is obtained, the whale closes its lips and ejects the water through the layers of baleen, the feed being left in the mouth and throat [Sailors’ slang].
ON THE SCOOP, phr. (common).—On the drink, or a round of dissipation.
1893. MILLIKEN, ’Arry Ballads, 47, ‘At the Paris Exhibition.’ And an English Milord ON THE SCOOP carn’t be equalled at blueing a quid.
