Gloucester, the cheese.
m-w says gloster, as in foster. Is that right?
This is important. 
Thanks.
BTW; is there a better pronunciation guide than m-w available?
That’s how I’ve always heard it.
Thanks. That’s all I needed to know.
Peace,
mangeorge
Are you in a cheese limerick competition?
No. I had to say “gloster” to someone.
U.K. person here - yes, your M-W is right.
Of course when I was very young, it took the little nursery rhyme to teach me the pronunciation. Or at least to send me to ask my parents why it “didn’t rhyme”
Ah, inspired literature.
Just please don’t tell me that “puddle” and “middle” are supposed to rhyme!
Only in New Zealand.
This is the received pronunciation but some of the locals in my vicinity articulate the word as ‘Glahster’.
If you ever visit this wonderful county that’s worth remembering. In the meantime you can impress your friends with your mastery of our local dialect. 
Ah, from the horses mouth.
So, how does one add the “shire” part?
Or if he’s ever in Massachusetts.
Well, it’s normally either ‘Glostersher’ or ‘Glahstershur’ but the final ‘r’ tends not to be pronounced in the case of the former.
Incidentally I’ve been campaigning for ‘Glosterchez’ for years but my arguments in favour have thus far failed to persuade.
Where the final syllable in Gloucester rhymes with the last of Worcester.
If you ask for directions to Peabody and someone tells you it is next to Sherman, you pronounced something wrong. There’s more, but that’s it for now.
Before it was bowdlerised by the Victorians they did: “He stepped in some piddle, right up to his middle.”
Pibiddy, right?
Ah, Sherman and I go way back.
I think you mean WABAC, don’t you?
Yeah, but if Worcester is “Wooster”, why isn’t Goucester “Glooster”? The mysteries of life.
They aren’t misspelled the same, why would they be mispronounced the same?