Mispronounced City and State names (to live in, best, place)

[Juan Hau-Lee]

You can always tell a visitor by the way they pronounce local place names.

Time to set people straight, give your best phonetic spelling of the RIGHT way to say your city or state name.

I'll start, tourists say "Hah na lu lu", it's "HO-NO lulu". (Honolulu Hi.)

[Nafster]

Tucson, Arizona

Schenectady, New York

Terra Haute, Indiana

Lafayette Louisiana and Indiana,

Shreveport, Louisiana

Helena, Montana (I used to call it He-lay-na!)

That's all I can think of as of right now. I don't know how to correctly pronounce them probably but I know they're always mispronounced.

[coldwine]

Illinoi.


Illinoy!

[skatealoneskatetogether]

Oregon its pronounced "ore-gin" but people from ****cago always say ore-i-gawn.

[Drover]

People who pronounce Illinois "Ellanoy." There's no "e" or "a" anywhere in the name.

And it seems everyone outside the northern Midwest pronounces Wisconsin WES-CON-sin, with an "e" instead of an "i" in the first syllable, and with equal emphasis on both syllables. There's no "e" in Wisconsin, and the emphasis goes on the second syllable only.

[deerislesmile]

Maine is pretty easy...

But Bangor, Maine.... is not Banger. (the -gor is pronounced like the word gore, not like gerrr).

We have many others that are constantly mispronounced (Calais, Machias, Aroostook, etc), but understandable because they are not very intuitive pronounciations (Cal-iss, Muh-CHY-is).

[hdwell]

Originally Posted by Nafster

Tucson, Arizona

Schenectady, New York

Terra Haute, Indiana

Lafayette Louisiana and Indiana,

Shreveport, Louisiana

Helena, Montana (I used to call it He-lay-na!)

That's all I can think of as of right now. I don't know how to correctly pronounce them probably but I know they're always mispronounced.

This is true. Shreveport has no "s" before the p. Not a possessive. And down the road is a town called Natchitoches. Pronounced "nackatish" Only 3 syllables not 4. French spelling of the Spanish Nacogdoches which is pronounced "nackadochess" a small town in Texas. Both are named for an Indian tribe which lived in the region.

[ScranBarre]

Wilkes-Barre, PA

It's pronounced "Wilkes-Barry" NOT "Wilkes-Bar", "Wilkes-Bear", or "Wilkes-Bear-Uh."


Scranton, PA

It's pronounced "Scran-tin" NOT "Scran-nin."


Exeter, PA

It's pronounced "Exit-er" NOT "Egg-sitter."

[j33]

Leominster, Gloucester, and Wooster, MA

[normie]

LOL, I've always wondered about Wilkes-Barre!

People often mangle towns or other geographic names that are Spanish words that have been "Americanized."

For example, in Houston, the correct way to pronounce San Jacinto is with the hard J. You can almost hear the Houston forefathers saying "This is America, dammit, Spanish be damned!"

I used to live in Palos Verdes (south of Los Angeles). The correct way to say Palos Verdes is so that it rhymes with "Palace Birdies." Don't roll the R and don't say "Pay-los" or "Vair-dez."