Folk Awareness oif Dialect

[Frank Abate]

In Connecticut, the river that flows past New London (and Groton) and into
Long Island Sound is the Thames.  The name goes back to the colonial times,
an honorific bestowed by the English settlers of the area, as after all they
named the town New London.  However, the pronunciation is always, locally at
least, a spelling pronunciation -- "THAYMZ", with "long a" and unvoiced
initial th- fricative.  I do not know how far back this American
pronunciation can be traced, but the English settlers were certainly aware
of the pronunciation of the river in London, England.

Then again, I don't know (are there rhymed poems that can help here?) how
the name of the River Thames of London, England was pronounced at the time
of American colonization.

Frank Abate