nellie

listen to the pronunciation of nellie
English - English
A diminutive of the female given names Eleanor and Helen. Popular as a formal given name at the turn of the 20th century

Eleanor, that's kind of an old lady name. I like Nellie better. Nellie Kincaid, that's got a nice ring to it. It sounds like you're a singer or something.

Bly Nellie McClung Nellie Nellie Mooney Melba Dame Nellie
diminutive of Eleanor or Helen

Related Terms

Nellie Bly
orig. Elizabeth Cochrane born May 5, 1867?, Cochran's Mills, Pa., U.S. died Jan. 27, 1922, New York, N.Y. U.S. newspaper writer. Bly started writing for The Pittsburgh Dispatch at age 18, producing feature articles on such subjects as divorce and slum life. After joining the New York World, she feigned insanity to get into an asylum and wrote an exposé that brought about needed reforms. Beginning in 1889, in an attempt to beat the fictional record in Jules Verne's Around the World in Eighty Days, she circled the globe in about 72 days, 6 hours. The much-publicized trip made her byname a celebrated synonym for a female star reporter
Nellie McClung
orig. Nellie Mooney born Oct. 20, 1873, Chatsworth, Ont., Can. died Sept. 1, 1951, Victoria, B.C. Canadian writer and reformer. After marrying in 1896, she became prominent in the temperance movement. Her Sowing Seeds in Danny (1908), a novel about life in a small western town, became a national best-seller. She lectured widely on woman suffrage and other reforms in Canada and the U.S. and served in the Alberta legislature (1921-26)
nervous Nellie
A person whose personality and usual behavior are characterized by worry, insecurity, and timidity

The captain is a nervous Nellie who can't make a decision without the approval of his protective aide-de-camp.

nervous nellie
Alternative spelling of nervous Nellie
nervous-Nellie
Characterized by worry or anxiety; having a weak, insecure personality

Woody Allen plays his most frazzled variation on the Woody we know best: a nervous-Nellie urban neurotic kvetching his way through life as a means of avoiding it.

Dame Nellie Melba
orig. Helen Porter Mitchell born May 19, 1861, Richmond, near Melbourne, Austl. died Feb. 23, 1931, Sydney Australian soprano. After study with Mathilde Marchesi (1821-1913) in Paris, she debuted in Brussels in Rigoletto (1887), and in the next six years she sang in all the major opera houses of the world. One of the most celebrated coloraturas in the years preceding World War I, she sang mostly at Covent Garden after 1902. Concentrating on a few Italian and French operas, she possessed abundant technique and vocal beauty. Two foods, Melba toast and peach Melba, were named for her
wet nellie
feeble-minded person (Derogatory Slang); Liverpudlian sweet dish made of stale bread and crusts
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