Yardbird

A yardbird is post-Second World War African American slang for "prisoner", from the notion of prison yards. During the Second World War, in the armed forces it meant "basic trainee", as they spent most of their time in the yards.

In the Deep South of the United States, the word also means chicken. In one explanation for American saxophonist Charlie Parker's nickname being "Yardbird", jazz trombonist and blues singer Clyde E. B. Berhardt in his autobiography I Remember: Eighty Years of Black Entertainment, Big Bands, states: