Word.ws English Dictionary

make someone hard to catch

make someone hard to catch verb: to get rid of someone, especially in an unpleasant way.

Verb

make someone hard to catch (third-person singular simple present makes someone hard to catch, present participle making someone hard to catch, simple past and past participle made someone hard to catch)

  1. (colloquial, dated) To get rid of someone, especially in an unpleasant way.
    • I hope that we have no such men in Local No. 163. If we have, we will make them hard to catch when we find them out.1906, Coopers International Journal, volumes 15-16, page 156
    • Then the boss stuck up a sign that said: / Public Water-hole. Water Free. / "Now you old skin," says he to Texas Pete, "charge all you want to on your own property. But if I ever hear of your layin' claim to this other hole, I'll sure make you hard to catch."1906, McClure's Magazine, volume 26, page 419
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see make, someone, hard, to, catch.
    • For quotations using this term, see Citations:make someone hard to catch.

Forms of make someone hard to catch

third-person singular presentmakes someone hard to catch
present participlemaking someone hard to catch
past participlemade someone hard to catch
pastmade someone hard to catch

Questions about make someone hard to catch

What does make someone hard to catch mean?
Make someone hard to catch means to get rid of someone, especially in an unpleasant way.
What part of speech is make someone hard to catch?
Make someone hard to catch is a verb.
What is the past tense of make someone hard to catch?
The past tense of make someone hard to catch is made someone hard to catch.

Words near make someone hard to catch in the dictionary

  1. make shit of
  2. make shit shake
  3. make short work of
  4. make since
  5. make some noise
  6. make someone hard to catch
  7. make someone's acquaintance
  8. make someone's blood boil
  9. make someone's day
  10. make someone's ears sad
  11. make someone's flesh crawl

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: make someone hard to catch (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.

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