crowbar

[kroh-bahr] /ˈkroʊˌbɑr/
noun
1.
Also called crow. a steel bar, usually flattened and slightly bent at one or both ends, used as a lever.
verb (used with object), crowbarred, crowbarring.
2.
to pry open, loosen, etc., with a crowbar:
We had to crowbar a window to get in.
Origin
1740-50, Americanism; crow1 + bar1; so called because one end was beak-shaped
Examples from the web for crowbar
  • While bullets ricocheted around them, a gunner improvised a second tourniquet using a crowbar and field dressing.
  • The blaze out, the firemen threw aside their hose and pried open the door with a crowbar.
  • He drops the crowbar that he had slipped from his pants and holds his palms out empty.
  • If the crowbar is easily handled, without feeling heat or discomfort, the hay in that area has not heated yet.
  • The argument escalated to an altercation outside the store when one of the owners struck and killed the deceased with a crowbar.
  • The brake is a bent crowbar, the accelerator handle an old tent pin.
  • The first thing they have the students do is move a two-ton cement block with a six-foot crowbar and a team of five people.
  • When the diverting path is a crowbar-type device, little energy is dissipated in the crowbar, as noted earlier.
  • If your door is stuck down you will have to pry it up with a crowbar.
  • The brothers went to the store, broke in using a crowbar, and stole two to three thousand dollars.
British Dictionary definitions for crowbar

crowbar

/ˈkrəʊˌbɑː/
noun
1.
a heavy iron lever with one pointed end, and one forged into a wedge shape
Word Origin and History for crowbar
n.

1748, with bar (n.1), earlier simply crow (c.1400); so called from its "beak" or from resemblance to a crow's foot; or possibly it is from crows, from Old French cros, plural of croc "hook."