linchpin
noun
Did you know?
In his 1857 novel, Tom Brown’s School Days, Thomas Hughes describes the “cowardly” custom of “taking the linch-pins out of the farmers’ and bagmens’ gigs at the fairs.” The linchpin in question held the wheel on the carriage, and removing it made it likely that the wheel would come off as the vehicle moved. Such a pin was called a lynis in Old English; Middle English speakers added pin to form lynspin. By the early 20th century, English speakers were using linchpin for anything as critical to a complex situation as a linchpin is to a wagon, as when Winston Churchill, in 1930, wrote of Canada and the role it played in the relationship between Great Britain and the United States, that “no state, no country, no band of men can more truly be described as the linchpin of peace and world progress.”
Examples of linchpin in a Sentence
Alan Bradley, Space.com, 31 Jan. 2026
Park City was a linchpin of the indie film revolution of the ’90s and early aughts, launching the careers of directors such as Quentin Tarantino and Ryan Coogler and proving that artists didn’t need tens of millions of dollars to create influential cinema.
—Brent Lang, Variety, 27 Jan. 2026
Kim Seong-Ok were linchpins of the Seoul theater community in the late 20th century, with Sook also winning six Baeksang Arts Awards—think Korean Oscars—in her film-and-TV career.
—Victoria Herman, Air Mail, 24 Jan. 2026
Amazon is well positioned for the year of AI nuance, with a focus on using AI as a linchpin to connect customers to its broad infrastructure with security, data connectivity, and storage.
—R. Scott Raynovich, Forbes.com, 22 Jan. 2026
See All Example Sentences for linchpin
Cite this Entry
“Linchpin.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/linchpin. Accessed 3 Feb. 2026.
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linchpin
noun
