Original Los Angeles

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Stuart in Minneapolis.

Hey, Stuart. Welcome to the show.

What’s up?

Thank you.

Thanks to streaming Wisconsin Public Radio, I listen to your program every Sunday morning. I listen with someone who I refer to as the DC, and it’s mutual.

What’s the DC?

The Dear…

Darling Companion from the Loving Spoonful song.

Gotcha. Okay.

Ultimately, the L.I., the love interest. And your S.L. We listen to you on Sunday morning, but Saturday night and Sunday nights, Wisconsin Public Radio has three hours streaming for us of old-time radio.

Nice.

And the God’s honest truth that a lot of the old-time radio for me once was new-time radio. A lot of these stories are based in the largest city in California. And the time frame, these broadcasts come from late 30s to like early 50s. And that city is more often than not almost always pronounced as Los Angeles.

Los Angeles.

And we just started wondering when it started becoming Los Angeles. You make it sound so simple with your short question, but it’s a really long answer, and I’m going to lay it out for you in about 30 seconds. Can you take it?

Yes.

Okay, here it is. Los Angeles was founded by Spanish speakers, but somewhere along the way it lost its kind of Hispanic heritage and became very, very Anglo. And most of the Hispanic stuff happening in Los Angeles today is actually new, relatively new. There’s this whole kind of middle period where even people with Latino last names spoke English and no Spanish whatsoever. And you find this throughout the city and actually throughout much of Southern California.

Many, many, many, many place names are not pronounced as they would be in Spanish because that pronunciation was lost. Los Angeles is a great example of that. Where you had Anglophones coming in from all over the country, pouring into California, reinforcing kind of this loss of this, bringing their own pronunciations with them and overlaying on top of what was already there kind of misunderstandings of how these place names should be pronounced.

Los Angeles, I think I counted 17 different pronunciations in one source.

Wow.

Yeah.

And is it Los? Is it Los? Is it Los? Is it Angles? Angles? Angelis? Is it Angles? Or is it Angelese? Angelus?

Yeah, I’ve heard those.

Yeah, on the radio.

Definitely.

So I’m going to point you to a resource that really lays this out perfectly. He did a better job in print than I can do on the air. There was a writer by the name of Steve Harvey, not the Steve Harvey, who wrote a story in 2011 for the Los Angeles Times. It’s called Devil of a Time with City of Angels Name.

Okay?

So look for that. Steve Harvey in the Los Angeles Times. And he talks about this whole history where they convened committees, and they had public campaigns, and they had marketing, and they’re like, how are we going to pronounce this? And they took a vote and they talked to their most respected experts and their most famous citizens. And all for naught. People still pronounce it any way they want.

And so right now, I think there are three major pronunciations of Los Angeles. And the best thing ever, the reason L.A. is the most common name for the city is because the pronunciation problem with the name. I mean, this is the theory. That people sought something really simple because the other alternative was too difficult. And they just say L.A. instead.

Claro. Muy bueno. Talk.

So anyway, look for that article in the Los Angeles Times. He’s really done a good job. There’s a lot of history in there, some funny moments, even mayors getting it wrong, you know, or politicians who show up into town and they’re like, you know, they’re trying to seem like a local and they just mess it up.

Well, thank you, and I’ll be listening next week, and I will be listening for the variations on the theme on the radio.

Outstanding. Thank you so much for your call, Stuart. Hi to your D.C.

Bye-bye.

Bye.

I remember moving to San Diego about five or six years ago. And places that seem perfectly, like, V-I-S-T-A.

Yeah.

Looks like it should be Vista, you know?

Oh.

But it’s Vista.

Well, see, I’m always thinking of the Latvian word for chicken, which is Vista. We have talked about this on the show. And La Jolla is the famous one, though.

Oh, right.

But that one I knew from afar. That one’s so well-known. It’s nationally known as a weird pronunciation.

It’s a mess, isn’t it?

Take the El Camino Real. It’s not San Diego. It’s San Diego.

No, you would never do that.

San Diego.

San Diego, 877-929-9673. Email words@waywordradio.org. And talk to us on Twitter, W-A-Y-W-O-R-D.