[BC] Local pronunciations

[Sid Schweiger]

>>>It is always amusing when an air personality enters a market and 
>mis-pronounces local place-names. At X-Star's station in Rogers City,

>Michigan, with many Polish and Indigenous place names, there was a 
>pronunciation guide, and it was absolutely necessary.

 And sometimes it is just SO glaringly obvious to the locals that it
boarders
 on insulting.
 Medina may be pronounced med-EE-na everywhere in the world, except
 in med-EYE-na Ohio, so that's a mistake that stands out.

 The correct pronunciation of the Cuyahoga River is understandable,
though.
 k-eye-ah-HOG-ah is an old local indian word that roughly translates
to
 crooked river. ( that burns with real fire in downtown Cleveland )<<

Here in Massachusetts, you can always tell the out-of-towners.  We have
a raft of place names that are pronounced nowhere near what they look
like.  A few examples:

Peabody (PEE-buh-dee)
Woburn (WOO-burn)
Dedham (DED-hm) (similarly, Needham, Raynham, Wenham, Stoneham and a
few other "hams," except for:)
Framingham (FRA-ming-ham), Petersham (PEE-ters-ham), Waltham (WAL-tham)
and Wareham (WARE-ham)
Gloucester (GLOS-ter)
Stoughton (STOW-ton)
Worcester (WUSS-ter, or as the locals call it, WUSS-tah)
Martha's Vineyard (second word is pronounced VIN-yid)

and our grand prize winner, the one every greenhorn gets wrong:

Leominster (LEM-ins-ter).

We also have a few which can be used in jokes, as in:

"Where are you from?"  "Athol."  "What did you call me?"
"What two Massachusetts cities were named after a governor of the
1960's?"  "Peabody and Marblehead."



Sid Schweiger
IT Manager, Entercom Boston LLC
WAAF - WEEI AM/FM - WMKK - WRKO - WVEI
20 Guest St / 3d Floor
Boston MA  02135-2040
Phone: 617-779-5369
Fax: 617-779-5379
E-Mail: sid at wrko.com