/wh/ - /w/

[FRITZ JUENGLING]

Marsha,
might I ask where in Oregon you live?  American settlement of Oregon really began in the mid-19th cenutry, with most of the pioneers coming from the Mississippi-Ohio Valleys.  Someone suggested that the Mormons should move to the Old Oregon Country-- no good-- a plurality of pioneers were from Missour and Brigham Young wisely avoided his erstwhile neighbors.   Although Oregon sided with the Union during the Civil War, there were many people who sided with or at least sympathised with the South.  A small town west of Salem, Rickreall, was actually called 'Dixie' for years after the war becasue of its southern sympathy.  There are many places in Oregon that were 'southern' settled, so it comes as no surprise that they remind you of home.
Fritz

I now live in rural Oregon and find many people here sound a lot like my old relatives but without the hard twang, but many of them say [ahnt].  No idea why.

I sometimes wonder if it's rurality more than regionality that influences how we sound.  I'm just now beginning to study all of this and am fascinated.

Marsha Alley marshaalley at msn.com<mailto:marshaalley at msn.com>
/a little red-faced over the sux conversation, but I'll get over it, LOL