legman

1. (originally US) A person hired to carry out errands or (often) menial tasks, frequently requiring travel from place to place; an errand boy or errand girl, a runner.Examples: "During the nine-month Great Lakes shipping season, the ore hogs—shovelers, "larry" car weighers, bulldozer operators, car pushers and "leg" men—unite in this miracle of supply that stock-piles enough iron ore to last through the winter. The leg man on a Hulett iron-ore unloader must possess a special blend of brawn, brains and a "go for broke" attitude. He must also be conscious of the safety of fellow workers below him as he deftly maneuvers a 75-ton vertical ramrod and iron-jawed grab bucket."; "[W]ell, anyway, he sent a chap who acts as his confidential ‘leg-man’ and ‘Man Friday’."; "Guillam was boss and legman, and twice a day he dropped the tapes on the Berne residency, using a parked car as a letter-box."Synonyms: gofer

2. (originally US, journalism) A reporter who frequently travels to conduct research, interview witnesses, etc., and then conveys the information to a rewriteman who writes up the story.Examples: "[page 136] This was my abrupt introduction to the system by which most of the live news is handled for the New York evening newspapers [...] Its continued use has bred up two distinct and separate types of news-specialists—the leg man, who gets the story, but rarely writes it; and the rewrite man, who writes the story but rarely gets it. [...] [page 140] City editors rail against these news combines, but it was the instinct of self-preservation that long ago drove the leg men into tight and fast organizations."; "Morris Cramm was night legman for a columnist and worked from seven in the evening to five in the morning."; "The guy looked and acted like a cheap hood when he was the head legman for one of the biggest of the syndicated columnists."