Passenger Trains > Never too old to learn................

My brother and SIL are visiting the east coast for the month of February.  Currently staying at a campground near my house.  They transited from Pasco, WA, via Vancouver, WA on EB and CL during the first few days of the month.  Will be heading back west in another 2 weeks.  Will be relocating to Harve, MT as their final arrival point on WB EB.  (She is a mobile Physician's Assistant, and her next assignment is a small hamlet about a 1/2 hour south of Harve, he is retired from the US Coast Guard).  Anyway, we were chatting about the current status of Amtrak travel in general and the discussion turned to checked baggage service during the Service Stop in Harve, MT.  I have always pronounced the term as it is spelled, rhyming with Farve as in Brett Farve.  Found out I had been mispronouncing it all these years.  Never realized it is pronounced as 'Hav`er'.

SANSR Wrote:
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> My brother and SIL are visiting the east coast for
> the month of February.  Currently staying at a
> campground near my house.  They transited from
> Pasco, WA, via Vancouver, WA on EB and CL during
> the first few days of the month.  Will be heading
> back west in another 2 weeks.  Will be relocating
> to Harve, MT as their final arrival point on WB
> EB.  (She is a mobile Physician's Assistant, and
> her next assignment is a small hamlet about a 1/2
> hour south of Harve, he is retired from the US
> Coast Guard).  Anyway, we were chatting about the
> current status of Amtrak travel in general and the
> discussion turned to checked baggage service
> during the Service Stop in Harve, MT.  I have
> always pronounced the term as it is spelled,
> rhyming with Farve as in Brett Farve.  Found out
> I had been mispronouncing it all these years. 
> Never realized it is pronounced as 'Hav`er'.

Bret Favre.  When asked why he pronounces it "Farve" when it's spelled "Favre", he replied, "We're from Mississippi."

It's spelled "Havre."  H-a-v-r-e. And pronounced as it is spelled. 

SANSR Wrote:
>> Found out I had been mispronouncing it all these years. Never realized it is pronounced as 'Hav`er'.>>

Yes, as in " she ain't pretty, but you can have her".

Dave in Polson, MT

I believe the city was name for Le Havre, France. The French pronunciation would be HAVR (no e sound), with the "r" being a sound that we don't really have in English. 

Of course, here in America foreign words get an idiomatic pronunciation. Versailles, OH, is "Versales,"  for example. The Purgatoire River became "Picketwire," and La Virgen became "La Virken" (Utah). And so on. 

 

colehour Wrote:
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>
> Of course, here in America foreign words get an
> idiomatic pronunciation. Versailles, OH, is
> "Versales,"  for example. The Purgatoire River
> became "Picketwire," and La Virgen became "La
> Virken" (Utah). And so on. 
>
>  
Aerican pronunciations, especially but not exclusively from French roots, are often distinct. 

The words pronounced in French as "duh-PLAHN," comes out as "Dez-PLANES" (Des Plaines) in American English.  I lived in Binghamton, N.Y. where the old Delaware and Hudson Yard was on ""buh-VEER' (Bevier) Street, where a French person would pronounce it "beeve-YAY."   "CAL-US" (Calais) , Maine is "cah-LAY"in Franch. BURR-wick (Berwick) Pennsylvania, in England is  "Berrick," and so on.

I've always been fascinated by local pronunciations.

Art House

 



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 02/22/21 05:49 by aehouse.

It is next to Kaybeck

Funny replies.  Thanks to all.  I not be stupid anymore......................lol.

And from one who went to school in Southwest Virginia, don't even TRY to phonetically pronounce out the county named for Lord Botetourt.  Hailing from inside the Beltway in Northern VA, enroute to Radford University, early on, we stopped somewhere off of I-81 in Botetourt County for a break from driving.  Happened to strike up a conversation with one of the locals at a convenience store.  Made the mistake of stating 'this was my first time in Bo-Te-Tort county......he was rather quick to correct me that it is pronounced 'Bought-Ta-Taught'.
Who knew?
LOL

Good advice.
When in a new town it doesn't hurt to ask a Local how the name is pronounced.

James R.(Jim) Baker
Whittier, CA

Cairo, IL was misspoken by myself for years, still can't pronounce the Marias des Cygnes River in Kansas properly...

colehour Wrote:
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> I believe the city was name for Le Havre, France.
> The French pronunciation would be HAVR (no e
> sound), with the "r" being a sound that we don't
> really have in English. 
>
> Of course, here in America foreign words get an
> idiomatic pronunciation. Versailles, OH, is
> "Versales,"  for example. The Purgatoire River
> became "Picketwire," and La Virgen became "La
> Virken" (Utah). And so on. 
>
>  

Or you change the spelling so folks pronounce the "foreign" word properly.   A town in Indiana was to be called the French name "Norbonne" but it ended up being named "Gnaw Bone". At least it SOUNDS correct...

And it find it interesting that Des Plaines and Des Moines are pronounced totally differently, despite both being in the great midwest.

- Norm