American Accents in the Golden Era

[bil_maxx]

This thread really stuck a chord with me. I like to listen to old radio programs, and, as has been mentioned by other posters, the NOO YAWK tough guy accent is very prevalent. This accent is evident in a wide range of roles, 'good' and 'bad' guys and even children. When I first started to listen to them, I was convinced that these shows were all made in New York, but many were made in California. Also, some golden age actors like Jack Palance and Don Ameche who did many of these radio shows, had the accent, but did not when they spoke to the public in general. I wonder if it was the style of radio shows to sound like that.

I'm not complaining, as many of these shows are mysteries or cop serials with grit so the accent fits perfectly.

 

[Mr Vim]

I love the old radio tone news announcer voice. So far the best versions I have seen recreated has to be Billy Crudup as J.E. Hoover in Public Enemies, and perhaps William Macy in Seabiscuit (although I think that is just how he sounds)

People say that I have a midwestern accent, but I disagree with them.
"It's not the accent, " I say "It's the verbage."

Say, wasn't there a thread going on about vintage slang use? We need to dig that up again.

 

[LizzieMaine]

There was actually a pretty wide variation in the sorts of voices you heard doing news in the radio era -- probably the "Radio News Announcer" voice most people think of as typical is that of Lowell Thomas, who became ubiquitous not only from his nightly broadcasts but also from his newsreel narrations. But there were plenty of unusual newscaster voices as well -- you had H. V. Kaltenborn, with his clipped, staccato style, or Elmer Davis who sounded like a midwestern hayseed with a Harvard degree, or Boake Carter, who tried very hard to sound more British than he actually was, or Gabriel Heatter, who had a terrible voice but made himself sound a lot better than he was by developing a very stylized manner.

The thing all these voices had in common was that they had a formal edge -- Davis sounded like he stepped out of a Grant Wood painting, but he made up for it by being very precise in his word choice and pronunciation.

My favorite "radio announcer voice" emanated from Bill Hay, the announcer for Amos 'n' Andy for fifteen years. He was a native of Scotland, with a distinct burr, but he sounded thoroughly American/Midwestern except when he said something like "serious," which came out "sedddrius." He could also make Campbell's Pork and Beans sound positively delicious, which is no small feat.

 

[Yeps]

My grandma on my mother's side (first generation Baltimore-Italian) has a really interesting accent. Among some fantastic Marylandisms (water pronounced worter, worshing machine and such) there are also some vestiges of Italian in the speech patterns, despite the fact that she never spoke more than a few words of Italian. Among these is that she refers to "the Italy" (th'itly) instead of just Italy, which is how it is referred to in Italian (l'italia). I find the indirect effects of outside languages, the grammar and syntax, almost as fascinating as the words which borrowed.

 

[Land-O-LakesGal]

Minnesotans can have pretty strong accents as witnessed in the movie Fargo though like the New York accent they are not as strong as they once were but if you were to hear me talk I bet you could tell where I was from. Also if you get the chance to see the movie Sweetland you can even see where the accents come from. I don't usually think i have an accent until I visit other places and get asked to preform "say that word again its so funny how you say it". We usually all have that Scandinavian influence whether your ancestors were from their or not (mine were German and French Canadian immigrants).

 

[John in Covina]

There was actually a pretty wide variation in the sorts of voices you heard doing news in the radio era -- probably the "Radio News Announcer" voice most people think of as typical is that of Lowell Thomas, who became ubiquitous not only from his nightly broadcasts but also from his newsreel narrations. But there were plenty of unusual newscaster voices as well -- you had H. V. Kaltenborn, with his clipped, staccato style, or Elmer Davis who sounded like a midwestern hayseed with a Harvard degree, or Boake Carter, who tried very hard to sound more British than he actually was, or Gabriel Heatter, who had a terrible voice but made himself sound a lot better than he was by developing a very stylized manner.

The thing all these voices had in common was that they had a formal edge -- Davis sounded like he stepped out of a Grant Wood painting, but he made up for it by being very precise in his word choice and pronunciation.

My favorite "radio announcer voice" emanated from Bill Hay, the announcer for Amos 'n' Andy for fifteen years. He was a native of Scotland, with a distinct burr, but he sounded thoroughly American/Midwestern except when he said something like "serious," which came out "sedddrius." He could also make Campbell's Pork and Beans sound positively delicious, which is no small feat.

Radio announcers were just so amazing back then. One thing I love to hear is the radio MC announcing a live music program with an introduction like:
"From the Mogambo Room high atop the Atlas Hotel in Union City, we bring you the Magical Sounds of Lawrence Kelly and the Bluebird Orchestra!" I just find those so enchanting.

 

[Puzzicato]

So now we have a pretty homogenous set of Aussie accents, with very little regional variation. There are three variants - working class (broad), middle Australian (neutral) and a very small sprinkling of "cultivated" accents (almost British). If you watch old Australian news reels the commentary is almost always delivered in a cultivated Australian accent - but then, as now, very few people actually spoke like that day to day. I suppose to the audience of the day it just sounded more appropriate that way - more BBC-like.

But surely you can tell an Adelaide accent from a Sydney accent? There are a few shibboleths, but to my ear the Adelaide accent sounds much more English.

 

[Guttersnipe]

There was a very distinctive but now all-but-forgotten San Francisco accent in The Era (I've mentioned this before, I know). My paternal grandparents both had very pronounced San Francisco accents. With the influx of folks from other in the 1960s and '70s, the accent all but disappeared. Here's some examples from a 1971 Herb Caen column:

"I dig old-time San Franciscans who pronounce Kearny [St.] 'Carney' and Greenwich [St.] 'Greenwitch,' but those who pronounce Sutter [St.] 'Sooter,' as the Swiss pioneer did, may be overdoing it a little. Besides, his name was originally Suter."

And of course the classic example, is pronouncing San Francisco "Samancisco" (all one word, no "F" and certainly never, ever 'Frisco or San Fran).

 

[LizzieMaine]

The real Maine accent is dying out. It's still spoken, but mostly by people over fifty, and it's fast losing its distinctiveness, blending into a more generic "New England" accent that's heavily influenced by Boston English.

A proper Maine accent sounds the broad "A" for such words as "half" and "last", elides the post-vowel "R" in words like "car" or "bar," but does *not* add an R, in the Boston English manner to words like "Cuba." It pronounces the "ir" sound in such words as "fur" or "burr" as something best approximated as an umlauted "uhhh." And it uses a very distinctive vocabulary -- words like "dooryard" (pronounced "doy-ahd") "puckerbrush" (pronounced "puckabrush,") and "gommy" ("That big gommy kid"), along with distinctive phrases like "all stove to hell" for something damaged beyond repair or "hahd tellin'" for something which puzzles the speaker.

In Maine a powerful storm is a "No'theastah," *NOT AND NEVER* a "nor'easter."

And, the true, authentic Maine accent is *very* profane. Not obscene. *Profane." There is a difference.

 

[Horace Debussy Jones]

I think like others have said here, that television and modern movies have had the effect of homogenizing our speech. The odd inflection I hear in the speech of those generally under the age of 35 or so.
Many say everything, even what should be a definite statement, as if it were a question. [huh]
I think it might have come from the TV show "Friends"? Not sure on that though??

 

[Nobert]

A proper Maine accent sounds the broad "A" for such words as "half" and "last", elides the post-vowel "R" in words like "car" or "bar," but does *not* add an R, in the Boston English manner to words like "Cuba."

That may be true on the coast, listening to folks further inland one might get a different ideahr.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That's that Augusta accent. Bunch of foriegnahs.

 

[sheeplady]

I think like others have said here, that television and modern movies have had the effect of homogenizing our speech.

I'd say media, higher education, and more people moving around are to blame. For instance, most people tone down their accents when they around people of different accents. I reckon that is likely first to occur in college and then be reinforced if people move to a different area.

 

[Nobert]

I'd say media, higher education, and more people moving around are to blame. For instance, most people tone down their accents when they around people of different accents. I reckon that is likely first to occur in college and then be reinforced if people move to a different area.

I'd disagree somewhat, in that there are factors that happen earlier. I'd say class figures into it as much as regionalism. That's a broad generalization, and there are enough exceptions that you couldn't call it a rule. But I think it has more than a little bearing. Media, probably yes. But I'd say it happens earlier than college. My mother usually has no trace of an Oklahoma accent, but she can slide into it perfectly if she wants to. She recalls as a youngster hearing her own voice on a recording and not being able to believe she sounded like that. So she sort of had some consciousness that she didn't want to sound like an 'Okie.' I have numerous friends who were born and bred in Maine, who don't have the distinctive arhodic pronunciation.

That said, when I first read about a service where people could 'deprogram' their accents because it was likely to help them get ahead in the business world/job market, it made me heartsick. What a world.

 

[LizzieMaine]

That said, when I first read about a service where people could 'deprogram' their accents because it was likely to help them get ahead in the business world/job market, it made me heartsick. What a world.

This was actually quite common in the Era -- "elecution teachers" of the back-pages-of-Popular Mechanics variety promised to help working-class people and immigrants shed their dialects in order to get ahead socially.

I learned to speak without my accent for radio, but I viewed that as just another acting role, not as a permanent personality change. It's the climbers and strivers who lose their accents and deny where they came from who I want to kick in the teeth. I sometimes adopt a deliberately-exaggerated Maine accent when dealing with such people to let them know they aren't fooling me. The dead giveaway is that they over-emphasize their "R's" and final "g's"

 

[sheeplady]

I'd disagree somewhat, in that there are factors that happen earlier. I'd say class figures into it as much as regionalism. That's a broad generalization, and there are enough exceptions that you couldn't call it a rule. But I think it has more than a little bearing. Media, probably yes. But I'd say it happens earlier than college. My mother usually has no trace of an Oklahoma accent, but she can slide into it perfectly if she wants to. She recalls as a youngster hearing her own voice on a recording and not being able to believe she sounded like that. So she sort of had some consciousness that she didn't want to sound like an 'Okie.' I have numerous friends who were born and bred in Maine, who don't have the distinctive arhodic pronunciation.

That said, when I first read about a service where people could 'deprogram' their accents because it was likely to help them get ahead in the business world/job market, it made me heartsick. What a world.

That's interesting. I have a distinctive accent from where I am from, but it only comes out full force when I am back where I grew up. I have a few tells- most notably my pronunciation of the word "milk" that always are there no matter what. But for me it was definitely college that beat it back. I don't even notice when I slip in and out of it, but people around me do. And I grew up with two parents that weren't from the immediate area, but I still picked up the accent. But then all of us "kids" spoke the same, so class might have something to do with it too. Those that stayed put sound exactly like they did growing up now.

The other thing that really brings out my accent is traveling across country. Especially in the upper midwest (like North Dakota) and the south (like Georgia). I'm not sure what it is, but both myself and my husband's accents got stronger when we hit those areas. Whereas in an international environment it tends to really disappear and become more "generic."

Perhaps K-12 education plays a part too?

I teach and often have international students. Removing colloquialisms has become important because of that and I imagine tamed the accent too. One of my largest tells (besides "milk") that I am an upstater is my use of the term "anyways" rather than "anyway."

 

[Sloan1874]

In the UK, research has shown speaking with a high-rising terminal, or Australian Question Intonation, can damage someone's job-prospects and earning potential. Apparently, it makes somebody look weak and insecure - not hard a conclusion to reach if every time somebody opens their mouth, they sound like they're asking a question. It's been attributed in part to the popularity of Aussie soap operas in the UK, which makes a certain sense, but I'm sure telly's to blame in general.

 

[Guttersnipe]

I think like others have said here, that television and modern movies have had the effect of homogenizing our speech.

More specifically, syndicated T.V. and radio programs. Unlike today, for both mediums, programming was fairly regional for a long time. Of course, as others have also noted, increased population migration as well as class and regional (self-)consciousness are also major factors.

As I mentioned, my grandparents had pronounced San Francisco accents, as did my Dad. From listening to recordings of my Father, made in the 1970s, it is obvious that over the years his accent has softened considerably. When he was in the Army in the early '60s all the farm boy from "Iowhoma" thought he was from New York.

 

[Nobert]

In the UK, research has shown speaking with a high-rising terminal, or Australian Question Intonation, can damage someone's job-prospects and earning potential. Apparently, it makes somebody look weak and insecure - not hard a conclusion to reach if every time somebody opens their mouth, they sound like they're asking a question. It's been attributed in part to the popularity of Aussie soap operas in the UK, which makes a certain sense, but I'm sure telly's to blame in general.

It isn't just prejudice against Australians? Seriously though, the range and subtleties of accents and dialects in the U.K. fascinates me. I've heard that even people from Edinburgh claim to not be able to make out what you Glasgwegians are saying (and we Yanks have trouble with a lot more than that), and the varieties from Cockney, to Yorkshire, to whatever the various Geordie accents are, etc., further divided along, again, class boundaries, it just seems a dizzying array for an area that would fit into New England and upstate New York. I could tell the difference between, say someone from London and someone from Manchester, but that's about the extent of my understanding.

 

[Nobert]

It's the climbers and strivers who lose their accents and deny where they came from who I want to kick in the teeth.

For whatever reason, it doesn't make me angry with the people who do it, just immensely sad. That selling off of a portion of yourself, who you are and where you come from. There are so many advisories, methods and programs to teach people how not to alienate potential employers. Are there classes, training or caveats geared towards hiring managers to not base their decisions on who they take into their company on superficial first impressions?

I guess part of the reason this all interests me is that my parents were both southern midwesterners. My Dad's parents were Massachusites, but he was raised in Missouri. I was born in Missouri, but was raised in Montreal, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Maine. I have no idea how I talk.

Here's one thing I'm curious about, because it was never anything I heard, the term "winda" (that is, window). I first heard this in Limelite, when Buster Keaton says to Charlie Chaplin, "If one more person says 'It's like old times,' I'm gonna jump out the winda." Does anyone still pronounce 'window' that way?