Two dumb questions about New Hampshire (Manchester, Nashua: homes, transfer, construction)

[MoonBeam33]

I have never been to New England, but I have two seemingly dumb questions about New Hampshire

1. Why does New Hampshire have almost twice the population of Vermont? The state seem to be about equal in size, and I imagine have similar climates. Any particular reason?

2. What does the New Hampshire accent sound like? Is it similar to the Maine accent?

Please don't rake me over the coals, I really am curious! Thanks!

[ogre]

Hi Annie. Nothing wrong with being curious and craving knowledge about all kinds of things. I live in the Boston area, and usually post on the MA board, as well as occasionally on the Maine board. Not a regular at NH, though I have posted here a few times. Just happened to be cruising through looking for a particular thread, saw this thread, and thought I could provide some answers.

I'm sure there will be people who live in NH who are much more familiar with the state's accents than I am, but I have spent time in NH, and have heard different accents in different parts of the state. If I get this wrong, let's hope someone more familiar with New Hampshire will step in and set things straight. I can say only which accents I've heard in different parts of the state. I've been mostly in northern and southeastern NH, seldom in the southwest. In the north, I've heard an accent that does sound a bit Maine-like. The accent I've heard in the southeast seems to have some similarity to the accents of Boston and eastern MA, with maybe the occasional hint of Maine mixed in, and generally not as pronounced as either a Boston or a Maine accent.

Regarding a population comparison with VT, there are several possible reasons I can think of for the disparity in these states' populations:

1) Much of New Hampshire's population is in the southern part of the state. Some of this has to do with past history. Historically, this area may have had greater population density than either northern NH or any part of VT.

One reason for this is that the land in southeastern and south-central NH is fairly flat, unlike the mountainous or hilly terrain in northern NH and much of VT. This means there is room for towns to grow and spread out, while in much of VT, the small towns are confined to narrow lowlands between mountains and hills, making growth more difficult.

2) Historically, the towns along the Merrimack River in southern NH (Nashua, Manchester, Concord) were important centers of early American industrialization. These small cities were part of a string of industrial towns which used the Merrimack to draw power for the factories and mills, a group of cities of which the most famous as an early center of industry is Lowell, MA.

3) Another factor in making southern NH a population center historically is that NH has a seacoast. Though it's true that the state has a very short coastline, it does have a seaport in Portsmouth. This was significant in the area's development in the past, because historically, New England's economy was based heavily on maritime activities, and the region's population was concentrated along and near the coast. Even today, most of New England's heaviest population density is along the coast of southern CT, around Naragansett Bay in RI, along the coast of eastern MA centering on Boston, and up the coast of NH and Maine up to just a bit north of Portland, ME. Basically, the population of New England was centered heavily along the coast and throughout inland locations in southern and eastern New Eng. which were still within easy reach of coastal towns. As you moved inland to the north and west, you got into some wild, sparsely populated hinterland. Vermont is located entirely in that hinterland, while southern New Hampshire is right in the thick of the coastal and near-coastal zones that historically held most of New England's population.

4) In the past several decades, the population of southern NH has had additional growth because the suburbs of Boston have extended into this part of the state.

In summary, all the other New England states besides VT got a head start on VT because they all had areas--in NH, the southeastern and south-central parts of the state--which lay in the coastal and near-coastal zones which were early centers of population and prosperity. Then several cities in southern NH grew further, as industrial centers, when the banks of the Merrimack River were found to be an especially suitable location for industry. Further growth of the towns in southern NH was easy, because of the relatively flat landscape. Finally, in recent decades, the expansion of Boston's metro area population into southern NH has further contributed to growth in this part of the state. Just as VT was well out of reach of the growth along the New England coastline in the past, it now lies beyond the reach of Boston's local influence. All told, a number of factors not present anywhere in Vermont have caused southern New Hampshire to be a population center over many years.

[Verseau]

There's no such thing as a dumb question.

Originally Posted by Annie3

1. Why does New Hampshire have almost twice the population of Vermont? The state seem to be about equal in size, and I imagine have similar climates. Any particular reason?

It has to do with historical settlement patterns. Much of NH's population resides in the southeastern corner of the state, which was settled as early as the 1630s. It stands to reason that these towns and cities near the coast have had a longer time to grow in population.

Remember that Vermont wasn't even one of the original 13 colonies -- the territory was claimed by both New York and New Hampshire. Even in the mid-1700s, Vermont was still a largely unsettled "frontier," suitable only for the likes of the Green Mountain Boys.

In the 1800s and early 1900s, NH's coastal ports and easy road access to Boston also allowed an influx of European immigrants. The American Industrial Revolution essentially began in eastern Massachusetts, and then spread to neighboring parts of New Hampshire -- the cities of Manchester, Concord, Nashua, etc. began to boom after the construction of the mills.

Immigrants went to work in the mill cities. Vermont never became as industrialized as eastern New England, so fewer immigrants went to work there. Even today, agriculture is a much more visible facet of Vermont's lifestyle than New Hampshire's -- in NH, many farmers went to work in the mills to earn more money and abandoned their farms.

Another hugely important factor in the population difference is southern NH's proximity to the Boston metro area. As the metro area has expanded over the past few decades, more and more people who work in or near Boston have moved to NH.

Originally Posted by Annie3

2. What does the New Hampshire accent sound like? Is it similar to the Maine accent?

As if I haven't talked your ear off enough already, I happened to write my college thesis on the New Hampshire accent. But I won't give you *all* the details of it.

The short and long of it is -- yes, it is very similar to the Maine accent. The NH accent belongs to a family of dialects called "Northeastern New England," which includes Maine, NH, and eastern Massachusetts. Even though it's pretty easy to tell a Bostonian from a Maineiac and so on, we all share a lot of common speech features.

I made a lot of recordings of local New Hampshire people speaking for my thesis -- here's a good little sample of a typical NH accent. Some of the characteristic features are:

1. Dropping "r"s after vowels, as in "North," "warm," "weather," and "whenever"

2. The so-called "broad a" in words like "palm," "aunt," and "laugh"

3. The pronunciation of words like "Florida" and "foreign" as flah-ri-da and fah-rin instead of flore-i-da or fore-in.

Some other features that you can't hear in the recording:

4. "Horse" being pronounced like "hoss," not "hoarse"; "morning" being pronounced like "monning," not "mourning"

5. 'Raising' the "a" sound before "n" or "m," so that "man" sounds almost like "mee-an" for some speakers

6. Adding "r"s at the end of words or between words where they don't belong; common examples are "idear," "pizzar," and "I sawr it"

7. Pronouncing words like "cot" and "caught" or "don" and "dawn" the same way. If you're from Illinois, I imagine the way you say "caught" and "dawn" is closer to the way we pronounce both words.

With the exception of #7, all of these features are becoming increasingly rare in New Hampshire. Most natives over age 70 or 80 have all of them, but most natives under age 20 only have #7. It's kind of sad that we've lost a lot of what makes our accent unique.

[Verseau]

Darnit, ogre, while I was busy typing my novel of a reply, you already covered all my points about population differences. Great minds think alike?

As to your observations on different accents in different parts of the state -- there is some truth to that. However, most of these differences are pretty subtle and difficult to describe to someone who hasn't heard them firsthand.

In many ways, the accents north of the White Mountains are the most "conservative," meaning they haven't changed as much and still retain a lot of that old Yankee drawl that a lot of people associate with Maine.

Southern NH obviously has influences from eastern Massachusetts, picking up some of the more "urban" Bostonisms while losing the old "ayuh" intonation and slow speaking.

At the same time, a lot of people in southern NH (especially young people) try to distance themselves from the negative stigma associated with Boston accent, and tend to speak a more standard accent. There was a UNH linguistics study on this phenomenon a few years ago. That's why the accents don't seem as "pronounced" in this part of the state.

The western part of the state, along the Connecticut River, shows some similarities to the accents on the other side of the Green Mountains, where people are more likely to pronounce their "r"s.

For those who are interested, NHPR had a great segment (http://www.nhpr.org/audio/audio/ex-2006-03-09.m3u - broken link) on New England accents a few years ago. Give it a listen.

It's hard to find good examples of NH accents online, although you can search for videos of Fritz Wetherbee -- but he does speak with a slightly "affected" accents (he tries hard to pronounce all his "r"s!).

This video shows people from Maine, but a lot of NHites still talk this way. I love it:


YouTube - The Fair

[ogre]

Verseau, if we're prepared to be so brash as to consider our minds great, then in this case it appears that great minds do think alike. Right down to the fact that we both started out be reassuring her that no question is dumb, and a thirst for knowledge is good.

Interesting that we have some areas of expertise that complement each other well, given these two questions. Your background in linguistics enabled you to go into a lot of detail about the accent question. I happen to have a degree in geography, which doesn't hurt when answering the population question. Add in your knowledge of New Hampshire's history, and I think we've got all the bases covered with these questions.

Just wondering whether you attended UNH, and wrote the thesis on accents there. I'm wondering since I know that linguistics is a strength of the English department at UNH.

Addendum: Just checked out the video. Great stuff. I once read a post on a City Data board where someone said he couldn't stand the Maine accent. To each his own, but I don't relate to that sentiment. I find the accent very pleasant. Got a laugh out of the old dude with the wild beard in the video, talking about hard work being the best birth control. ("You're so tired [at the end of the day] you just go right to bed, fall asleep, and that's it.") Also great to see people still doing hard work close to the land for a living. Just up the road from the crowded Northeast Corridor as well. Interesting. Good stuff.

[Verseau]

Originally Posted by ogre

Just wondering whether you attended UNH, and wrote the thesis on accents there. I'm wondering since I know that linguistics is a strength of the English department at UNH.

Nope, I attended USC out in Los Angeles, but I did receive some initial guidance on my thesis from Naomi Nagy, the former UNH professor who has conducted a number of studies on New England dialects. She has since transferred to the University of Toronto, and I will be studying under her come this fall.

Sadly, it seems that Linguistics is downsizing at UNH...

[steveusaf]

That video makes me homesick, ayuh. I hope I regain my accent when I return to NH to live...

[MoonBeam33]

Thanks Verseau and Ogre for your very helpful responses. Makes a lot of sense. My speakers are down right now so I haven't looked at the video, but I am looking forward to it. I, too, find the Maine/New England accent very pleasant, especially contrasting to the lack of accents (except for Chicaaaaaaaaaago) in my neck of Illinois. I'm looking forward to visiting New England, and New Hampshire especially, some day!

[GregW]

In the late 1700's and through the 1800's the mills in NH demands so much "cheap" labor that first the "mill girls" and then entire families were imported from Quebec. The result is that some places in NH are strongly Catholic and bilingual, Quebecois and Yankee. Makes for an interesting culture.

[Jennymcb]

Great responses!
Funny thing about that NH accent, after living here for over 20 years, I can't get rid of my Boston accent. Students used to think that I made the commute up here to substitute.