jackleg

Alternative forms

 * (adjective)

Etymology
Compare blackleg (a person who replaces striking workers; a cheater) and such expressions as jack of all trades, every man jack.

Adjective

 * 1)  Amateur, untrained; incompetent.
 * 2) * 1841, Letter to the editor, The Southern Planter, Volume I, No. 1, January 1841, p.12,
 * The next year I had a projecting kind of jack leg carpenter, from Hanover, living with me in the capacity of overseer
 * 1) * 1941, Martha Colquitt, Interview published in Slave Narratives, Library of Congress Project, Volume 4: Georgia Narratives, Part 1,
 * Grandma didn’t think chillun ought to see funerals, so de first one I ever seed, wuz when ma died two years atter de War wuz done over. A jackleg colored preacher talked, but he didn’t have sense ’nuff to preach a sho’ ’nuff sermon.
 * 1) * 1957, and, Wolfbane, Chapter11, in ,
 * He was a doer, not a thinker; his skills were the skills of an artisan, a tinkerer, a jackleg mechanic.
 * 1)  Dishonest, unscrupulous.
 * 2)  Ineptly built or operated; makeshift.
 * 3) * 2005,, Lies, Montgomery, Alabama: River City Publishing, Chapter 23, p.226,
 * Driving the secondhand Chevy pickup, he visits not only major car dealerships but also every jackleg garage he happens upon in dusty sun-blasted towns of the Deep South.
 * 1)  Ineptly built or operated; makeshift.
 * 2) * 2005,, Lies, Montgomery, Alabama: River City Publishing, Chapter 23, p.226,
 * Driving the secondhand Chevy pickup, he visits not only major car dealerships but also every jackleg garage he happens upon in dusty sun-blasted towns of the Deep South.
 * 1) * 2005,, Lies, Montgomery, Alabama: River City Publishing, Chapter 23, p.226,
 * Driving the secondhand Chevy pickup, he visits not only major car dealerships but also every jackleg garage he happens upon in dusty sun-blasted towns of the Deep South.
 * Driving the secondhand Chevy pickup, he visits not only major car dealerships but also every jackleg garage he happens upon in dusty sun-blasted towns of the Deep South.

Noun

 * 1) A type of drill operated by means of compressed air.
 * 2)  An amateur; an untrained or incompetent person.
 * 3) * 1999, David Horsley, Into the Wind, Houston, Texas: Winedale Publishing, “Tops for Trees,” p.180,
 * If it were up to me, we’d have a city ordinance against incompetent pruning of trees. You need a permit to unclog a sewer or fix a light switch, but any jackleg with a chainsaw can climb up a ladder and undo in five minutes what Mother Nature took decades to accomplish.
 * 1)  A shyster or con artist; a gambler who cheats; a generally dishonest or reprehensible person.
 * 1) * 1999, David Horsley, Into the Wind, Houston, Texas: Winedale Publishing, “Tops for Trees,” p.180,
 * If it were up to me, we’d have a city ordinance against incompetent pruning of trees. You need a permit to unclog a sewer or fix a light switch, but any jackleg with a chainsaw can climb up a ladder and undo in five minutes what Mother Nature took decades to accomplish.
 * 1)  A shyster or con artist; a gambler who cheats; a generally dishonest or reprehensible person.

Usage notes
Although the term most often carries negative connotations (inept, dishonest), it may also have positive ones (self-taught expert, hands-on learner). Occasionally it is used as a generic pejorative intensifier, equivalent to damn, out-and-out, etc., e.g. a jackleg crook, a jackleg bastard.