linthead
n.— «Almost always it features early on the fact that his mother’s family worked in Revolution Mill in Greensboro, that because of his grandmother’s asthma his family moved into the McAdoo Heights neighborhood and his mother switched from the mill school to the city school system. There, he recounts, she was teased as a “linthead,” a derogatory term for mill workers.» —“Neal takes campaign one voter at a time” by Mark Binker News & Record (Greensboro, North Carolina) Mar. 30, 2008. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
Deb in Lombard, Illinois, shared an expression her grandmother used when irritated with someone: Hey, buddy, walk east till your hat floats! In other words, it’s the same ill-willed advice as go play in traffic! This is part of a complete episode...
Melissa in Greensboro, North Carolina, has been sparring with the Gen Z members of her family over the shifting meanings of words. Her kids use aesthetic as an adjective to mean “aesthetically pleasing,” as in That’s so aesthetic. They also refer to...
I grew up in nearby Burlington, NC and mill workers were called “lint dodgers”. Depending on who said it to whom, it was either an inside joke type of thing or a derogarty thing.
I grew up and still live in Kannapolis, NC, a former mill town. I heard the term “linthead” from my father and other former mill workers, and it was mostly considered a derogatory term – or, as Jeff mentions above, an inside sort of joke.