(railroads, pejorative) A branch line train, using light equipment
1918, Charmian London, Jack London and Hawaii, page 19The mail was brought by a tiny "jerk-water" bobtail dummy and coach run by one, Tony, from Pearl City, a mile away, to a station near the end of the peninsula.
Adjective
jerk-water
(US, colloquial, pejorative) Of an inhabited place, small, isolated, backward.
1907, Charles Stelzle, Christianity's Storm Centre: A Study of the Modern City, page 103That seems to disappoint them, for every sociologist likes to go back to some jerk-water college and tell those who are in the sociological class how they had to get their information by pantomime."
(US, colloquial, pejorative, railroads) Railroads with low traffic.
1915, Daniel Jacob Hauer, The Economics of Contracting: A Treatise for Contractors, Engineers …, vol. II, page 212He had risen to the head of the greatest street car system in the world from the position of brakeman on a jerk-water railroad.
1922, Edward Hungerford, Our Railroads To-morrow, page 297Can the keen-minded Mr. Willard at Baltimore be more anxious than the keen-minded Mr. Rea at Philadelphia to undertake the management of jerk-water branches in Connecticut or in Rhode Island or down on Cape Cod ?
