squeegee

Etymology

Probably from squeege, an intensified form of squeeze. Compare earlier squill-gee, squillgee.

noun

1. A tool consisting of a rubber or similar blade attached at a right angle to a handle, particularly
   1. (nautical) A long-handled tool used on ships for swabbing the decks and spreading protective coatings.
      Holy-stoning the decks... is the worst description of nervous torture of which I ever heard, excepting perhaps, the infliction of the squee gee. 1844, Matilda Charlotte Fraser Houstoun, Texas & the Gulf of Mexico, volume I, page 39
   2. Similar long-handled tools used for drying or leveling surfaces such as paths and roadways.
   3. A short-handled tool, especially as used on car windshields and home windows.
2. A roller used to similar effect, particularly
   1. (photography) A tool used to remove excess moisture from a print.
   2. (historical) A street-cleaning machine consisting of a roller made of squeegee blades pulled by a horse.
   3. (printing) A tool used to force the ink through the stencil in silk-screen printing.
3. (slang) A person who uses a squeegee, especially one who "cleans" the windshield of a car stopped at a traffic light and then demands payment.

verb

1. (transitive, intransitive) To use a squeegee.
   It is then ‘squeegeed’ down on the glass and developed. 1883, J.T. Taylor, Hardwich's Manual of Photographic Chemistry, 9th edition, page 347
   ...a piece of American cloth to protect the print while squeegeeing... 1885, Charles George Warnford Lock, Workshop Receipts, 4th Ser., p. 411
   The decks were persistently holystoned, scrubbed, ‘squeegéed’, and swabbed. September 4 1886, All Year Round, page 104