Lockjaw: Locust Valley (1970), Long Island (1977), Larchmont (1986)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

Digging up a couple of Safire's "On Language" columns...

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Dec. 21, 1986:
Larchmont lockjaw is a mysterious message left for me, with no further
explanation, by my colleague Russell Baker. This alliterative geographic
slur may refer to a type of speech by yuppies, but since neither Mr. Baker
nor I am young or upwardly mobile, I must assume it has something to do
with the accent of upper-class lowerclassmen returning to suburbia from
ritzy finishing schools; obviously, more research is needed on this
locution.
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Jan. 18, 1987:
It began in a New York minute after a piece about geographical
derogations, the use of place names as modifiers to sneer at a trait or an
occupation. My colleague Russell Baker passed along a cryptic message -
"Larchmont lockjaw" - which I took to mean the pronunciation affected by
yuppies. I then passed it along to the Philadelphia lawyers who read this
column as the speech affected by "upper-class lowerclassmen returning to
suburbia."
Came the deluge. "The correct phrase is Locust Valley lockjaw," insists
Arthur Knapp Jr. of Larchmont, N.Y., where the famed Larchmont Yacht Club
faces Locust Valley, L.I., across the Long Island Sound barrier. He claims
that locution denotes the speech of "the yacht-racing members of the
highly social Seawanhaka Corinthian Yacht Club located on Oyster Bay, many
of whom live in or around Locust Valley." Mr. Knapp, a prominent
yachtsman, says, "You cannot pin that way of talking on Larchmont. We are
too close to the 'Bronnix' for that to happen."
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Safire quotes Willard Espy, who recalls "Larchmont lockjaw" from the early
'30s.  I can't find any cites for it before the '86 "On Language" column.
It's preceded in the databases by "Locust Valley lockjaw" and "Long Island
lockjaw", but I haven't found anything before the '70s.

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1970 _New York Times Magazine_ 13 Sep. 83 She spoke, as many of the women
did, in a tongue called Locust Valley Lockjaw, a passionless manner of
speaking that can flatten a superlative against the roof of the mouth
until it comes out sounding like understatement.
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1977 _Washington Post_ 1 May M1 (Nexis) Her voice, her accent are
expected, the slightly British tones that reflect the proper Boston
upbringing with the slightly clenched teeth, known in some quarters as
"Long Island lockjaw," that reflect the Old Westbury residence.
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--Ben Zimmer