Why is "Missouri" pronounced with -z-

[Jonathan Lighter]

As Carl Sandburg noted in 1927 from his memory of 1898, the name as it appeared in the sea shanty now usually called "Shenandoah" was very frequently pronounced as "Mizzou-rye."  Other writers confirm this.

  Three different pronunciations of one state name. Shall I alert Guinness ?

  ("Shenandoah," according to most, usually came out as "Shanna[n]do[re]."  The accepted geographical spelling appears to have been "Shannondore" until well into the 19th C.)

  JL

sagehen <sagehen at WESTELCOM.COM> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: sagehen
Subject: Re: Why is "Missouri" pronounced with -z-
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>Gerald,
>
>As a graduate student working for Don Lance in the 80s, I did some
>research on the history of the pronunciation of Missouri. In the 19th
>century, in fact, [mIsuri] was the preferred pronunciation. The
>pronunciation [mIzuri] was scorned. An explanation for the shift from s
>to z in "Missouri" and "possess" in contrast with "Mississippi" is a
>variant of Verner's Law--stress on the following syllable.
>
>I believe Don covered this in one of his articles on the pronunciation
>of Missouri ((1985, Missouri Folklore Society Journal or 1999 Names) but
>I am not certain.
>
>Virtually, Terry
~~~~~~~~~~
What makes the "Mizzouree" / "Mizzourah" distinction? My mother, b. St.
Louis 1905, always said "Mizzouree."
A. Murie




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