Cam(pb)ell

[Donald M. Lance]

Back in 1958 when ZIP Codes first came in, I was living in a town of about 3000 in West
Texas (McCamey).  A friend of mine was named Richmond Campbell, and most of his friends
called him Rich.  An acquaintance in Midland (where W is from, kind of) sent him a note
and on the envelope drew a money bag and a camel and wrote 79752. A day or so later, the
missive was placed in Richmond's PO box.
I think I usually, maybe always, say the -b- in Campbell, and maybe always have, but I
can't think of the religious groups as anything other than "Camelites" because that's the
way Texas members of the group would say the name, though I'd probably say a slight -b-
unless I were consciously imitating the "Camelites."
DMLance

Mark_Mandel at DRAGONSYS.COM wrote:

> Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU> writes:
>
> >>>>>
> extremely item-specific pronunciations are not unknown.  ann
> daingerfield zwicky (and some of the people she grew up with in
> lexington, kentucky) had "Campbell" pronounced the same as "camel",
> while maintaining the [b] in "ramble", "Rambo", etc.  she used this
> pronunciation for everyone named Campbell, whether or not they
> themselves used it.  so it was "Camel's condensed soups", which
> always struck me as perverse.  eventually one of her dearest friends
> married a man named Campbell-with-a-b, and she made an exception
> for bonnie and ed, her only ramble-Campbells.
> <<<<<
>
> PING! Ah HA!
>
> This resolves a puzzle that has haunted me ... well, bubbled around in the
> unconscious and occasionally surfaced, leaving me wondering "Why DID they
> do that?" as well as "Why am I thinking of THAT?" -- since [pause to
> reckon] the summer of 1965. I was in Corbin, Kentucky, and near where I was
> staying there was a motel with a sign "Campbell's Motel"* with a picture of
> a camel. It didn't take me long to realize it was supposed to be a pun on
> the name, but it always seemed awfully far-fetched to me. Now I get it.
>
> * Academic honesty: maybe the wording was something different, like "MOTEL
> -- The Campbell's" [with greengrocer's apostrophe], but the name and the
> picture were there.
>
> Thanks, Arnold.
>
> -- Mark
>
>    Mark A. Mandel : Dragon Systems, a Lernout & Hauspie company
>  Mark_Mandel at dragonsys.com : Sr. Linguist & Mgr. of Acoustic Data
>  320 Nevada St., Newton, MA 02460, USA : http://www.dragonsys.com
>                      (speaking for myself)