I was born in L.A. (Actually Lakewood, which is in L.A. County and is part of Greater L.A.) But I spent my formative years in San Diego, and my teens in Lancaster (also L.A. County). I spent most of my life in Los Angeles proper. So what’s my hometown?
How do you define one’s hometown?
I was born in Blackburn, lived the first 20 years in Accrington, Lived the last 9 in Douglas.
I think of Accrington and Douglas as my hometowns.
I was born in San Francisco and lived there until I was eight. Then we moved to the 'burbs (still in the Bay Area). Where I tell people I’m from or what my hometown is depends on the point I’m trying to make or who I’m talking to.
In the South, your hometown is where you were born, mostly, and where your people are. I haven’t lived in my hometown for 30 years, and only spent the first 17 there, but my hometown it shall always be.
Truth be told, the above doesn’t fit the strict Southern definition; I was born 50 miles from my hometown, and moved to it when I was 3. So I have to be honest and say I’m “from Louisville” though I only spent my infancy there, more or less.
See, I don’t remember Lakewood at all. I was rather young when I was born. I know we lived in Westminster before we moved to Japan when I was three. I can’t really consider Lakewood or Westminster (or Hayama) my hometown. I came a bit late, and by that time my ‘people’ were pretty spread out.
I tell people my hometown is San Diego, Lancaster, or L.A. depending on the context of the conversation. I consider the first two equally valid, and the latter nearly so.
I can’t say that I consider any place I’ve ever lived my home town. I lived 3 months where I was born and haven’t been back since, so I don’t think I can very well call that my home town.
I’ve lived in many places throughout my life, both inside the US and out. I currently live in New Jersey, but that’s only because I’m in the pharmaceutical industry and New Jersey is smack in the middle of what’s known as the pharmaceutical corridor in the US.
My next move will probably be somewhere outside the US, possibly Japan, at least that’s where I’m leaning at this point. The US has never really held any appeal for me, and once I have no financial reason to be here, I’ll be off.
The town I live in now is where I was born, and lived until I was 18. Moved away, moved back at 32, and have lived here ever since. My parents, my grandparents, and all my siblings live here, as well as a good number of aunts, uncles, and cousins. If this isn’t a hometown, I dunno what is.
I lived in Garden Grove 'till I was 11 then in Placentia 'till I was 24. I used to think of them both but recently I think of Placentia only as my ‘hometown’. I think this is because of sentimental reasons. I had friends in Garden Grove (even some that I still see) but all of my best friends I met in Placentia.
Along the same lines as Athena, I’ve lived all but about two of my 52 years in the same town, though technically I was born across the river in the city hospital. My grandfather, my father, my daughter and I all went to the same elementary school, though it closed when my daughter finished second grade and she takes the bus across town to a new school now.
I’m also employed by the town.
My town, by the way is Fairhaven, MA. That’s me in the hat.
I was born in Fresno, moved to south Orange County when I was 5, and moved to Monterey for my last two years of high school (all in California for those of you in other, lesser parts of the world). I like to think of Monterey as my home town because I liked it best, but if I’m asked where I am from I usually just go with “California.”
I go with the town where you spent most of your life so far. The word “native” goes with the town of your birth, in my view.
For example, I’m an Indianapolis native, and my wife is a Muncie native. Anderson, though, is hometown for both of us.
See, I don’t get that last part. If you have no memories of the place and no associations, how can it be your hometown?
I lived for the first 19 years of my life in a small fishing village. I consider that my home town. However, I lived in the neighbouring city (though it barely qualifies as a city really) for another ten years, and refer to there as my home town as often as not, just to make the reference easier to explain. Effectively, the wider region is what I consider my home town.
I now live in what is comparatively a metropolis, in a different country, and want to stay here for the rest of my life, so this is, in my mind, my new home. But it’s not my home town.
I guess I unofficially define it as where you grew up, by which I mean where you went to elementary school. The town where your earliest memories happened and where your childhood friends were. For me, “native” and “home” towns are one and the same, but I can’t see calling a place my hometown just because I was born there, if I didn’t spend any of my formative years there and don’t have any memories of it.
It doesn’t make sense. I’m merely pointing out that traditionally in the South where you were born is your hometown, where you’re from, whether you remember living there or not.
Your hometown is wherever you say it is.
I sympathize with several earlier comments. I was born near an army base while my dad was being moved about over the South during the early years of WWII. We eventually returned to central Alabama to the town where both their families lived. I went to elementary school there and most of my childhood memories are from there.
Later we moved to a larger town for my high school years where I spent the next six years. Then I moved to where I am now for my college years. I’ve been here for 51 years.
“Hometown” depends on context. My first thought is for the early years and the next stronger pull is to where I am now. High school years come in third and where I was born is last. I went back to my birthplace for the first time when I was in my 40’s and didn’t have any sense of “home” at all.
Most of us are. 
I moved around so much that I just say my hometown is where I currently live at a given time. I never really felt any particular place as “home”.
Although about half of my childhood was spent in a small conservative redneck village in Michigan. It makes me so glad I’m in Seattle now away from all that.
I think your hometown is the one that you feel the most connected to. I lived for 18 years in one place, but then moved to where I am now more than 30 years ago. My parents and siblings have moved and I am no longer in contact with my old friends, so I consider my present town, where my husband and kids and current friends live, as my hometown.