American Language Supplement 2 (93 page)

4
Tonics and Sedatives,
Journal of the American Medical Association
, Dec. 16, 1939.

5
This was the form used by the defendant in a smuggling case in New York in 1938.

6
Engagement notice, New York
Times
, Aug. 30, 1946. Johannes Hoops, in Shakespeare’s Name and Origin, Studies for William A. Read; University (La.), 1940, p. 70, lists
Chacsper
as one of the early variants of
Shakespeare
.

7
Billboard
, Dec. 29, 1934, p. 99. The French form is
Gougenheim
.

8
A death notice in the New York
Times
, Feb. 23, 1946, recorded the change of
Rosebush
to
DesRosiers
, but
Rosebush
may not have been a Jewish name.

9
The Sephardic Jews, who are relatively few in number, usually stick to their original names,
e.g
., the Spanish
Acosta
, the Portuguese
de Silva
and the French
de Casseres
. I am indebted here to Dr. L. L. Barrett, of the University of North Carolina.

1
In the NBC Handbook of Pronunciation, compiled by James F. Bender; New York, 1944, p. 119, both
lne-stine
and the German form
lne-shtine
are given.

2
But I have heard even
Gorfine
turned into
Gorfeen
, and likewise
Durstine
into
Dursteen
.

3
Rabbi Jacob Tarlau, of Flushing, L. I. (private communication, April 30, 1937), tells me that
Katz
has nothing to do, as it is sometimes assumed, with the identical German word, signifying a cat. It is a characteristic Hebrew abbreviation of two words,
kohen tzedek
, and indicates that the man bearing it is a descendant of Aaron, and hence a priest. The name of a late chief rabbi of France,
Zadoc Kahn
, was simply
Katz
reversed.

1
New York, 1942, p. 50.

2
A general officer in the Civil War and the first Governor of Alaska. His descendants retain the name unchanged.

3
The thing, of course, runs the other way, and Polish-American writers encounter difficulties when they try to represent American loan-words in Polish print. I offer a few examples from
Oredownik Jezykowy
, a Polish monthly published at St. Francis, Wis., by the Rev. B. E. Goral:
ajskrimsoda
(ice-cream-soda),
akjurejt
(accurate),
autsajd
(outside),
baj gasz
(by gosh),
Dzio
(Joe),
bendedz
(bandage),
berykejda
(barricade),
blosz
(blush) and
blesfana
(blast furnace).

4
The name of a distinguished engineer (1861–1940) whose mother, Helena
Modjeska
(1844–1909) was a distinguished actress. The difference between the feminine and masculine suffixes will be noted. The Poles, like the Russians, also inflect proper names for case, etc.

5
I am indebted for these examples to Mr. Charles C. Arensberg, of the Pittsburgh Bar. They come from the records of the Allegheny County Court of Common Pleas. Most Poles applying for registration of new names explain why they want to get rid of their old ones. Some of these reasons are that the old name is “hard to spell and pronounce,” or is “embarrassing socially and in business,” or that the new one is the name of some American relative-in-law or a cherished friend, or is “of better euphony.”

6
Death notice, New York
Times
, Oct. 6, 1940.

7
Same, same, March 20, 1946. I am indebted for the last two to Mr, Alexander Kadison.

1
Baltimore
Sun
, Jan. 28, 1936. Dr. Alfred Senn says in Lithuanian Surnames,
American Slavic and East European Review
, Aug., 1945, p. 134, that
-ski
in Poland designated nobility and that many parents had their children registered under names so terminating in order to smooth their way in life.

2
What’s Your Name?, pp. 11–13.

3
The Americanization of Slovak Surnames,
Slovak Review
, Autumn, 1946, pp. 67–73.

1
Kramoris has kindly given me access to a much more extensive paper, Notes on the Americanized Slovak Surname, but it is not yet published.

2
pp. 486–88.

3
Czech Surnames in America,
American Mercury
, May, 1925; The Americanization of Czech Surnames,
American Speech
, Dec., 1925; Czech-American Names,
Czechoslovak Student Life
(Lisle, III.), April, 1928.

4
Life
reported in 1946 that one of its photographers,
Jerry Cooke
, “was born
Jury Kuchuk
, of Russian parents.” The
New Yorker
, March 9, 1946, p. 20, mentioned a New York orchestra leader named
Coolidge
, originally the Russian
Kudisch. Variety
, Nov. 17, 1943, recorded the death of a Victor
Hyde
who immigrated to America as a Russian dancer named
Haidbura
. Many female dancers bearing Russian names are actually Englishwomen.
Boris Karloff
, the movie actor, says in Who’s Who in America that his real name is
William Henry Pratt
.

1
I am indebted here to the kindness of Dr. Alfred Senn, of the University of Pennsylvania, the foremost American authority on Lithuanian.

2
Lithuanian Surnames, by Alfred Senn, before cited, pp. 127–37 – a paper read at a meeting of the Modera Language Association in New York, Dec. 28, 1944. In an earlier form it was read at a meeting of the Linguistic Society of America at Chapel Hill (N.C.), July 11, 1942.

3
The Lithuanian republic was launched Aug. 1, 1922, and sunk without trace by the Russian liberators July 21, 1940.

1
pp. 492–93.

2
Finnish Surnames in America, Feb., 1939, pp. 33–38.

1
John Morton, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was the descendant of a Finn named
Marttinen
. Albert Payson Terhune, the writer about dogs (1872–1942), was descended from a Finnish
Terhunen
. The Finnish republic was established June 17, 1919; its liquidation by the Russian liberators began Nov. 30, 1939.

2
pp. 490–92.

3
The Swedish Surname in America,
American Speech
, Aug., 1928, pp. 468–77.

4
The Study of American Place-Names of Swedish Origin,
Covenant Quarterly
, Nov., 1946, pp. 1–16.

1
This practise still survives in Iceland, and it survived in the Shetland Islands, which were settled by Scandinavians, until the middle of the Eighteenth Century,
e.g., Margaret Nicholsdaughter
was the sister of
John Nicolson
. See A Shetland Merchant’s Day-Book in 1762, by William Sandson; Lerwick, 1934. Lerwick is the most northerly town in the British Isles.

1
Mr. Charles F. Dery tells me of a Rhode Islander born in Quebec whose Swedish great-grandfather became
Munson
there, and who is himself now
Mongeon
.

2
It was thus that Professor C. H. Seashore, of the University of Iowa, translated
Sjöstrand
.

3
John Adolf
Dahlgren
(1809–70), a Federal admiral in the Civil War and the inventor of the cannon bearing his name, was of Swedish ancestry. When he occupied Charleston in Feb., 1865, the commander of the collaborating land force was General
Schimmelpfennig
.

1
I am indebted here and for most of what follows to the work of Dr. Marjorie M. Kimmerle. Her doctoral dissertation at the University of Wisconsin, written under the direction of Dr. Einar Haugen, professor of Scandinavian languages, was devoted to a study of the names in the church records of two Norwegian Lutheran congregations in Dane county, Wisconsin. This dissertation was summarized in Norwegian-American Surnames,
Norwegian-American Studies and Records
(Northfield, Minn.), Vol. XII, 1941, pp. 1–32. Dr. Kimmerle has since published Norwegian-American Surnames in Transition,
American Speech
, Oct., 1942, pp. 158–65, and A Study in Connotation, in Elizabethan Studies and Other Essays in Honor of George F. Reynolds,
University of Colorado Studies
, Oct., 1945, pp. 337–43.

1
Norwegian-American Surnames, before cited, p. 17.

2
The reference here, of course, is to rural Norway. In the larger towns the merchants began to take surnames in the Fifteenth Century, chiefly influenced by German example. The names of the nobles and of the learned were also imitations of German usage. The clergy did not use family names until the Seventeenth Century.

3
Dr. Harold S. Palmer, of the University of Hawaii, writes: “My mother was born in Norway and her maiden name was
Schjøth
, which I cannot pronounce properly, though it is my middle name and also my older brother’s. I usually use only the middle initial, and when I have to give my name in full I avoid the ø. I try for an umlaut over the
o
if I think it will stick. If not, I use
oe
.”

1
I am indebted here to Mr. Wallace Lomoe, of Milwaukee. His own name, originally
Lömoe
, is now pronounced
LaMoe
, with the accent on the second syllable.

2
Norwegian Surnames, by George T. Flom,
Scandinavian Studies and Notes
, Vol. V, No. 4, 1918, pp. 139–54.

3
Edvard
Grieg
, by David M. Johansen; New York, 1938, p. 11. I am indebted here to Dr. Einar Haugen.
Greig
or
Gregg
is a common Scottish surname, traced by Black to
c
. 1214. Danes and Norwegians who settled in isolated American communities, out of contact with their countrymen, sometimes had their surnames changed without their let or leave. In Among the Isles of Shoals; Boston, 1878, Celia Thaxter tells of one named
Ingebertsen
who invaded that remote region. “To expect any Shoaler,” she says, “to trouble himself to utter such a name as that was beyond reason. At once they called him
Carpenter
apropos of nothing at all, for he never had been a carpenter. The name was the first that occurred to them.”

1
I borrow most of these from Personal Names in Hawaii, by John E. Reinecke,
American Speech
, Dec., 1940, p. 350.

2
I am indebted here to Mrs. G. A. Meek, of Oakland, Calif. Mr. Charles J. Lovell tells me that it is also common for
Smith
to be substituted for
Silva
. In New Bedford, Mass.,
Sylvia
is the commonest surname, followed by
Smith
, which conceals many
Silvas
. Third place is held by
Perry
.

3
Albert R.
Lopes
, of Loyola University, New Orleans.

4
Amigos
(Chicago), Oct., 1941.

5
I take this from Personal Names in Hawaii, lately cited, p. 350.

6
pp. 481–82 and 495.

1
Creole Dialect of Missouri,
American Speech
, April, p. 119 n. 29.

2
It is described by John Francis McDermott in French Surnames in the Mississippi Valley,
American Speech
, Feb., 1934, pp. 28–30. There were patronymics,
dit
names referring to some personal characteristic or item of personal history, and names borrowed from estates. The latter did not always descend to sons, who not infrequently acquired estates and names of their own. Thus Charles
Le Moyne
(1656–1729) a famous figure in early Canadian history, had the territorial surname of
Longueuil
, but five of his sons came to fame in Louisiana as
Iberville, Bienville, Sauvolle, Chateaugué
and
Serigny
.

3
Reported from Bristol, Conn., by Mr. Epaphroditus Peck; private communication, July 2, 1936.

4
Name Tragedies, by C. P. Mason,
American Speech
, April, 1929, p. 329.

5
The last three are reported from northern Vermont by Mrs. Albert T. Stearns; private communication, July 3, 1937.

6
The eponym of
Bunker Hill
was not a
Bon Coeur
, but the descendant of an English
Bunker
who immigrated before 1635. See AL4, p. 481, n. 2. But I am informed by Mr. Barrington S. Havens, of Schenectady, N. Y. (private communication, March 3, 1938), that his own paternal grandmother was a
Bunker
descended from a French Huguenot
Bon Coeur
who came to America by way of England and founded a family long settled on Nantucket.

7
Mr. Alexander Johnson, of Fort Wayne, Ind., tells me (private communication, Jan. 28, 1924) that he once encountered a man in Switzerland county, Indiana, who spelled his name
Thibaud
and pronounced it
Kabo
. In Missouri
Thibaud
or
Thibeau
has become
Teebo
.

8
The last five are from Notes on French-Canadian Proper Names in New England, by Robert E. Pike,
American Speech
, April, 1935, p. 118. Pike also records some translations,
e.g., Lapierre
to
Stone
and
Boisvert
to
Greenwood
.

9
Jesse Lee
Reno
, a Union major-general in the Civil War, was killed leading a charge at South Mountain, Sept. 14, 1862. One of his sons, Jesse Wilford, invented the escalator, and another, Conrad, made inventions in the field of radio.
Reno
, Nev., the divorce metropolis, was named after the general. Mr. Victor T.
Reno
, of Los Angeles (private communication, May 30, 1946), tells me that the founder of the American family was a Huguenot who came to America about 1700.