[QUOTE=Fear Itself]
Sounds like Brooklyn, or the Bronx. You know, at the corner of Toidy-Toid and Toid.
[/QUOTE]
My 83 year-old father still speaks like this. His nickname when he served in WWII was “Brooklyn”.
To this day he still flushes the terlit, gets the erl changed in his car (after asking the mechanic to woik on it), and went to the doctor when he had a berl on his back.
I don’t know anyone else in Brooklyn who uses this accent today (I live here as well). Not sure exactly when it died out - perhaps with the advent of television bringing more standardized speech to the masses?
[QUOTE=elmwood]
I’ve always been fascinated not by the use of the old Brooklyn/Bronx accent in the movies of the time, but a nasal, clipped inflection that seemed to be the norm in movies, television shows, and radio programming up until the early 1960s, and occasionally encountered into the 1970s. Imagine a newsreel announcer saying “FLASH! FLASH! JAPS BOMB PEARL HARBOR!” I’ve heard people credit the “newsreel accent” to voice coaches of the era, but I’ve heard it from interviewees in “man on the street”-type interviews of the era, too. I’ve heard others attribute it to the recording technology of the time, but find it impossible to believe that audio recording equipment impart an accent that wouldn’t otherwise be there.
[/QUOTE]
Newscasters were strongly influenced by Walter Winchell, and H.V. Kaltenborn (see Harry Truman’s impersonation of him about 30 seconds in), two of the early and most successful of them.
[QUOTE=DSYoungEsq]
Hoidy and Goidy sat on the coib, readin’ the New Yoik Woild…
[/QUOTE]
I guess we should be glad that Donovan (the singer) was not from Brooklyn:
‘Cause dat’s when da Hoidy Goidy Man
Came singing dem songs o’ love.
Hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, goidy he sang.
Hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, goidy he sang.
Hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, hoidy goidy, goidy he sang.
> ‘For’ is a different vowel than the one I was talking about. I was talking about
> the vowel in “thirty” or “third” or “work,” though ‘for’ does have a similar vowel
> when spoken rapidly. Sorry if that was confusing. You’re right that the OP was
> wrong about ‘for,’ but otherwise it was right on.
Then why did your post start with “No, the ‘er’ being pronounced as ‘oy’ was a very stereotypical New York City pronunciation that has fallen out of favor”? Were you disagreeing with me or not? I only was talking about the word “for” (and later the word “after”). I said nothing about the words “thirty,” “third,” or “work.” If you’re not disagreeing with the specific points I was making, don’t phrase your post as if you were more generally disagreeing with me.
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner]
Then why did your post start with “No, the ‘er’ being pronounced as ‘oy’ was a very stereotypical New York City pronunciation that has fallen out of favor”? Were you disagreeing with me or not? I only was talking about the word “for” (and later the word “after”). I said nothing about the words “thirty,” “third,” or “work.” If you’re not disagreeing with the specific points I was making, don’t phrase your post as if you were more generally disagreeing with me.
[/QUOTE]
I’m sorry, I thought your post was more general than just about ‘for.’ I didn’t mean to start a fight or anything. I thought you were saying that pronouncing ‘work’ as ‘woik’ and ‘thirdy-third’ as ‘toity-toid’ was not common when it was. I did not know you were just talking about ‘for,’ in which case I agree with you.
The second one sounds like actor Joseph Cotten. The first one is what I’d call a little adenoidal, although with many subtle accent differences from a typical middle-aged person of today (whomever that may be).
[QUOTE=CookingWithGas]
In another thread I asked why three farm hands from Kansas in the 1930’s would talk with Brooklyn (or Bronx, I dunno) accents. Listen next time you watch “The Wizard of Oz.”
[/QUOTE]
It is believeable that the farmhands were from New York. What I mean is, people not only traveled on a circuit with threshing/harvesting machines, people would travel far and wide to find a job. It was the Depression, jobs were scarce and many men left home and traveled all over to find a job.
[QUOTE=Wendell Wagner]
The three farmhands were permanent workers on the farm, not travelling ones.
[/QUOTE]
And they could have moved to Kansas as young adults to find a place to make their own life, right? It is jarring in a way, I agree. But it is possible.
