usherette

usher +‎ -ette

usherette (plural usherettes)

1. (dated) A female usher.
   • 1905, Alan Dale, “Dramatic Flashes from London and Paris,” Ainslee’s Magazine, Volume 16, September 1905, p. 152,

     It is such a tiny little place that at first I thought I had gone wrong, and was in an antechamber. Plain papered walls, ascetic chairs, a moldy piano, and a couple of usherettes seemed extremely bare.

   • 1954, Louis Trimble, “Probability” in If: Worlds of Science Fiction, April, 1954,

     He says, “Mike, let's do the town.” Can you refuse a guy who just gives you a thirty thousand dollar property? We do the town. We do the girl shows, and he yells at all the dames and tries to date the usherettes until we finally get pitched out. […] ”

   • 1960, Muriel Spark, The Ballad of Peckham Rye, London: Macmillan, Chapter 7,

     […] I won’t even see her again till next Saturday night on account of her doing week-nights as an usherette at the Regal […]

   • 1994, Glenn Collins, “Making it work. Sentinels of Broadway,” The New York Times, 24 April, 1994,

     But please don’t call them usherettes. […] “Usherette makes us sound as if we’re miniature ushers or something. It’s an old term that we’re trying to get rid of.”