Word.ws English Dictionary

John Henry

John Henry noun: one's signature.

Noun

John Henry (plural John Henrys)

  1. (idiomatic) One's signature.
    • They stepped forward. Bury held a pen at them. “So if you fellows will just put your John Henrys on this document, it's all legal.” The two privates signed it.1986, L. Ron Hubbard, Villainy Victorious: Mission Earth
  2. A character from American folklore.

Forms of John Henry

pluralJohn Henrys

Origin of John Henry

Believed to be a Western United States cowboy variation (dating from the late 1700s or early 1800s) of John Hancock, the first person to sign the United States Declaration of Independence and whose name later became a synonym for a signature. This usage predates the American folklore hero John Henry from the 1870s.

Words formed from John Henry

Questions about John Henry

What does John Henry mean?
John Henry means one's signature.
What part of speech is John Henry?
John Henry is a noun.
What is the plural of John Henry?
The plural of John Henry is John Henrys.

Words near John Henry in the dictionary

  1. John Frum
  2. John Hancock
  3. John Hancocked
  4. John Hancocking
  5. John Hancocks
  6. John Henry
  7. John Henryism
  8. John Henrys
  9. John Hop
  10. John Hops
  11. John Innes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: John Henry (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-John Henry.ogg.

Cite this entry: “John Henry.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/john_henry. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.