As seen in the idioms “butter up” or “grease one’s palm.”
Good find. That prompted me to look earlier and I found something.
Back on November 20, 1903, a front page article in the [Covington] Kentucky Post about another Jim O’Dowd party also mentioned the “whole schmear”.
Everyone was there, from the Schnapps Band down. Und vat getrinken there vas! The whole schmear was feeling “sehr gut.”
No question that schmear was taken from the German rather than the Yiddish. Schmear kase was an Amish term for a kind of cream cheese, used both as a spread and a base for cheesecake.
The phrase “whole schmear” or “whole darn schmear” also pops up in the Norfolk [NE] Press on Dec. 24, 1909, The Kansas City Post on July 12, 1911 and October 26, 1916, and the [Mandan, ND] Morning Pioneer on April 21, 1921. Interesting that all are midwestern papers, since “schmear kase” was used across the country.
Ah, cool!
The first appearance of the “schmear” that I could find given a cursory look was in 1842 in the context of “schmear case/kase.” Surely many older, though.
Outside of that I found a reference to “schmear people,” which also seems to be “spread” related.
Creamery men are after [US Rep. from Kansas] Chester I. Long’s scalp. He made them promises two years ago that he would fight the oleomargarine people, and got about 8000 votes of patrons in this district on the strength of these promises. But when the oleo bill was up in Congress, instead of opposing the packing house schmear people, he favored them, not only in his vote, but in his speeches.
–Barton County Democrat, August 31, 1900