Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A nonmotorized vehicle designed to be pulled behind a motor vehicle, especially.
  • noun A large transport vehicle designed to be hauled by a truck or tractor.
  • noun A furnished vehicle drawn by a truck or automobile and used when parked as a dwelling or office.
  • noun A short filmed advertisement for a movie; a preview.
  • noun A short, blank strip of film at the end of a reel.
  • intransitive verb To transport by a trailer.
  • intransitive verb To travel or live in a trailer.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun One who or that which trails.
  • noun On a vehicle, a short pointed bar sometimes suspended from the rear axle, and serving as a stop or brake in going up steep hills; a stopper.
  • noun A flexible or hinged contact piece pulled over a series of terminal plates so as to distribute electric currents.
  • noun An old style of vessel employed in mackerel-fishing about 1800.
  • noun A trail-car.
  • noun A dog that follows or tracks by scent.
  • noun plural Several logging-sleds hitched one behind another and pulled by from 4 to 8 horses, driven by one man, thus saving teamsters’ wages.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun One who, or that which, trails.
  • noun a wheeled vehicle without a motor, designed to be drawn by a motor vehicle in front of it
  • noun such a vehicle used on street railroads. Called also trail car.
  • noun the large wheeled wagon or van pulled by a tractor in a tractor-trailer combination.
  • noun a vehicle equipped as a mobile dwelling unit, pulled by an automobile or other mtor vehicle, and used as a dwelling when parked; -- also called a mobile home.
  • noun A wheeled motorless open wagon designed to carry a heavy object, such as a boat trailer.
  • noun (Movies) A short blank segment of movie film attached to the end; -- used for convenient insertion of the film in a projector.
  • noun (Movies) A short film consisting primarily of one or more short portions of a film, used in promotions or advertisements shortly before initial release of a film.
  • noun A part of an object which extends some distance beyond the main body of the object.
  • noun An area equipped to accommodate trailers{2}, often with outlets supplying electrical power and water. Called also trailer camp, trailer court.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun Someone who or something that trails.
  • noun An unpowered wheeled vehicle, not a caravan or camper, that is towed behind another, and used to carry equipment, etc, that cannot be carried in the leading vehicle.
  • noun US A furnished vehicle towed behind another, and used as a dwelling when stationary; a caravan; a camper.
  • noun US A prefabricated home that could be towed to a new destination, but typically is permanently left in an area designated for such homes.
  • noun media A preview of a film, video game or TV show.
  • noun computing The final record of a list of data items, often identified by a key field with an otherwise invalid value that sorts last alphabetically (e.g., “ZZZZZ”) or numerically (“99999”); especially common in the context of punched cards, where the final card is called a trailer card.
  • noun networking The last part of a packet, often containing a check sequence.
  • verb To load on a trailer or to transport by trailer.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun someone who takes more time than necessary; someone who lags behind
  • noun an advertisement consisting of short scenes from a motion picture that will appear in the near future
  • noun a wheeled vehicle that can be pulled by a car or truck and is equipped for occupancy
  • noun a large transport conveyance designed to be pulled by a truck or tractor

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From trail +‎ -er.

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Examples

Comments

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  • Yes, WeirdNet nailed this definition.

    November 25, 2007

  • That's exactly why FEMA's been doing such a good job with trailers. This is the kind they must be looking for.

    November 25, 2007

  • Do do do do

    Do do do dooo...

    Won't you take me to...

    FEMAtown?

    November 26, 2007

  • ???

    November 26, 2007

  • It's an American thing, bilby. ;-) FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, tasked with responding to disasters and the like. My personal commentary (and apparently c_b's as well) is that they are woefully bureaucratic and inept, as seen in their miserable handling of the Hurricane Katrina debacle. FEMA builds little relief towns of mobile homes (trailers) for victims to live in, and it's these towns that my old roommate inappropriately referred to as FEMAtown. And I'm just as guilty for singing along. Gotta love humor centered around horrible tragedies.

    Of course, it's not as funny when you have to explain the joke... ;-)

    November 26, 2007

  • Ah, but at least I understand now! I was struggling to follow this at any level. I should have looked up FEMA but it didn't occur to me; actually I figured it was the nick of someone who hasn't posted recently!

    Thanks u :-)

    November 26, 2007

  • It also helps to know about the song "Funkytown." :-)

    November 26, 2007

  • Do do do do is such a profound lyric it brings to mind SO many songs.

    November 26, 2007

  • Agreed, and this page has been tagged appropriately. :-P

    November 26, 2007

  • Movie trailers (previews) used to come at the end of the film (hence the name) but that practice was abandoned because nobody stuck around to watch 'em! This, according to NPR's Says You.

    March 19, 2011