puff-puffn.
/ˈpʌfpʌf/, U.S. /ˈpəfˈpəf/ The sound of repeated puffing by a steam engine; (esp. in children's language) a steam locomotive or steam train.
ΘΚΠ
the world > physical sensation > hearing and noise > degree, kind, or quality of sound > engine sound > [noun]
puttering1824
pant1840
puff-puff1856
chug1866
phut1874
teuf-teuf1902
tuff-tuff1902
chuff1914
chuff-chuff1914
phut-phut1916
put-putting1923
put-put1925
pocketa-pocketa1939
putter1942
phut-phutting1954
society > travel > rail travel > rolling stock > [noun] > locomotive > steam locomotive > in nursery language
puff-puff1856
choo-choo1903
1851 Ladies Repository Feb. 62/2 And now a slight ripple is heard under the cabin windows, indicating progress; and the dull puff, puff, away ahead, indicating power.]
1856 J. Payn in Househ. Words 28 June 559/1 The word Puff-puff, which I now apply to a train or a railway, is borrowed from my eldest daughter,..eighteen months of age.
1858 Sci. Amer. 9 Oct. 38/2 Sometimes the engine..breaks into a wrong note, and is too glad to smother its blunder in the puff puff of its steam and the whirr of its wheels.
1885 J. Ruskin Præterita I. iii. 87 In this present age,..people don't give their children toy bricks, but toy puff-puffs.
1889 P. H. Emerson Eng. Idyls 64 The stillness was broken only by the short sharp puff puff of the engines.
1922 J. Joyce Ulysses ii. xiii. [Nausicaa] 341 It was all no use soothering him..telling him about the geegee and where was the puffpuff.
1933 P. Chetwode Let. 6 July in B. Hillier Young Betjeman (1989) xviii. 391 I wanted to woire to you on the puff puff at Paris but thought it would never catch you.
1999 Irish Times (Nexis) 7 June 59 The car park is full and those wishing to park their cars and get on the big puff puff are advised to leave their vehicles down a side alley.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2007; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1856