> Westlake further suggested that "dick," as a slang
expression for
> detectives, came from Canadians who smuggled hooch
into the US during
> Prohibition. Put 'em together and you've got
"hard-boiled dicks."
>
Another possibility, from THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF MYSTERY AND
DETECTION by Bruce F. Murphy, is that it came either from an
abbreviation of detective or from the verb "to dick" meaning
to watch (common in the 19th century) from the Hindu dekhna.
- http://www.overbooked.org/brucemurphy.html
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