Pointsman

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A man in charge of railroad points (switches). British

    "The signalman, as such, was unknown at first. At junctions, or for shunting, the pointsman was responsible both for setting the points and working the appropriate signals, the two being independent. As a result, accidents were comparatively frequent, and the pointsman's job was, at best, a hazardous one."

  2. 2
    a policeman stationed at an intersection to direct traffic wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
switchman

Example

More examples

"The signalman, as such, was unknown at first. At junctions, or for shunting, the pointsman was responsible both for setting the points and working the appropriate signals, the two being independent. As a result, accidents were comparatively frequent, and the pointsman's job was, at best, a hazardous one."

Etymology

From points + man.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.