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How To Talk With a New Hampshire Accent

Woe to the presidential wannabe who doesn’t study the New Hampshire accent before entering the First in the Nation Presidential Primary (and don’t suggest it isn’t the first). He or she will instantly lose credibility if they claim happiness at coming back to Con-cord.

It’s KON-k’d.

If you can’t find Concord, don’t ask the locals. You’ll never figure out what they’re telling you. You will, however, find Concord south of the Kancamangus, where all the leaf peepers go in the fall, and north of Manchester. You shouldn’t say “ManchVegas,” by the way, but you can say “The Kanc.” It’s a highway.

The local accent and nomenclature do take some getting used to. Here’s how.

How It Started

The New Hampshire accent started with the English colonists who first arrived in North America. They brought with them speech patterns from Elizabethan London and part rural speech from Yorkshire and Lancashire.

That evolved into the New Hampshire accent, as well as the Boston accent, the Providence accent, the Northern, Eastern and Western New England accent — and so forth. The local accents come with local slang, though you’ll hear the word ‘wicked’ (as in ‘wicked pissah’) throughout New England. In fact, you’ll hear it a lot.

As late as the Great Depression, people in Seabrook, N.H., still spoke much the same way their forebears did hundreds of years earlier.

In 1938, the Federal Writers Project WPA Guide to New Hampshire described Seabrook as, “a village, Old World in appearance and atmosphere, set in the midst of sand-dunes, with cocks of salt hay scattered over them, an unchanged landscape of three centuries ago.”

“A section of the town of Seabrook speaks a language strangely reminiscent of rural England, and at times suggestive of the Yorkshire dialect,” concluded the federal writers.

Where leaf peepers go, probably Up Above

New Hampshire Accent

The New Hampshire accent shares characteristics of Massachusetts, Maine and sometimes Vermont accents. It’s less pronounced in the southern tier of the state because of all the Massholes who moved there.

The Old Man of the Mountain

Of the four states, New Hampshire is uniquely allergic to the letter “r.” “It is only in New Hampshire where vocalized /r/ falls to very low levels,” wrote linguist William Labov.

Words don’t end in “r” but in “ah.” ‘New Hampshire’ is actually pronounced N’Hampshah. You put your socks in a draw.

New Hampshire has a key line of demarcation: Franconia Notch. The Old Man of the Mountain – known simply as the ‘Old Man’ – used to live there until he collapsed in 2003. If you live north of the Notch (called a “pass” or a “gap” elsewhere), you live “Up Above.” You say people who live south of the Notch come from “Down Below.”

R-lessness and Ahs

Words that end in ‘r’ but are preceded by an “e,” “i” or “o” get a “y” inserted. So it’s “theyah,” not “there” and “deeyah,” not “dear.”

To confuse matters, words that originally end in ‘ah’ are pronounced “r.” “Linda” becomes “Linder” and ‘idea’ becomes “idear.” Americer is north of Cuber, which is south of Florider. So many snowbirds go to Florider that John Durkin, a candidate from Franklin, N.H., campaigned for U.S. Senate theyah back in the 1970s.

The broad “a” is another feature of the New Hampshire accent. You can hear it in words like aunt, father, laugh, half and can’t.

It’s also typically heard in “ar” words like car. So “Pahk the cah in Hahvahd Yahd” is how a New Hampshire native would tell you where to deposit your vehicle in Cambridge, Mass.

New Hampshire has its own unique words, shared with other Eastern and Northern New Englanders. A soda is a soft drink and a brook is a creek. A sneaker is an athletic shoe that used to be made in Berlin (pronounced BER-lin) before the factory moved to Chiner.

You don’t go to the basement in New Hampshire. You go ‘down cellar.’ Aluminum foil is tin foil. A rubber band is an elastic. A drinking fountain is a bubbler.

You can fish for hornpout in New Hampshire during mud season, but you probably want to stay indoors during black fly season. You can also fish in the wintertime if you have a bobhouse to take onto the ice. Hamburg is what you eat on a bulkie roll with a side of French fries and a frappe.

Lower Molars

Audiobook narrator Matt Haynes studied the accent in case he had to narrate a book with a character from New Hampshire. He found some further refinements based on the sound going toward the lower molars. (In Maine they go to the higher molars.)

‘Or’ becomes ‘ou,’ so ‘ignore’ becomes ‘ignou.’
‘Er’ becomes ‘eh,’ so ‘world’ becomes ‘wehld.’
‘S’ becomes almost an ‘sh;’ so ‘it looks like rain’ becomes ‘it looksh like rain.’
Final vowels tend to be deadened, so ‘–ing’ become ‘-in.’

To listen to a real New Hampshire accent, click here.

If you want to speak with a Maine accent, click here. For Rhode Island, click here, for Connecticut, click here. And if you want to talk with a Boston accent, click here.

Image of New Hampshire in Autumn By Someone35 – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15702944. License plate By Stripey the crab – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16105204.

This story was updated in 2022.

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The Presidential Primary That Put New Hampshire on the Map

The New Hampshire Presidential Primary might not rank as a crucial early testing ground today were it not for three things. First, Yankee frugality. Second, an inspired change to the ballot. And third, a foolish comment by President Harry Truman.

New Hampshire’s primary election was then, as now, the first in the nation. No one intended it that way. Town leaders simply saw no reason to heat town halls twice for Town Meeting, so they held the primary at Town Meeting time.

NH Presidential Primary

Primaries had been around since the turn of the century. Reformers had then tried to replace backroom wheeling and dealing with direct democracy. But not many people paid attention to them.

Robert Upton, speaker of the New Hampshire House of Representatives, was upset the 1948 primary had gone almost unnoticed. And he had an idea to put the New Hampshire Presidential Primary on the map.

Upton drafted a bill to put the candidates’ names on the ballot instead of the unknown, uncommitted party representatives.

Gov. Sherman Adams expressed skepticism that it would make any difference, but he signed the bill into law anyway.

Robert Upton

‘Estes’

That year, Ohio Sen. Bob Taft was considered the Republican front-runner and President Harry Truman the likely Democratic candidate. But Truman’s popularity had plummeted, and he didn’t announce whether he would run for re-election.

Tennessee’s senator Estes Kefauver opposed Truman’s machine-style politics. He came to New Hampshire in early 1952 to challenge Truman. Kefauver went to town hall meetings, worked assembly lines and attended teas in people’s homes. He shook voters’ hands, remembered their names and sent them thank-you notes signed “Estes.”

His campaign found an old fire truck in Hooksett, rigged it up with lights and ran it up and down the streets of Manchester. Kefauver walked behind it, shaking hands.

Reporters asked Truman at a news conference about Kefauver’s primary campaign. “All these primaries are just eyewash,” he replied.

Upsets

The comment insulted New Hampshire voters.

“The primaries are indeed eyewash,” editorialized the Keene Sentinel. “They rest the bloodshot eyes of delegates who have been subjected to the pressures of machine politicians and allow them to see more clearly.”

Truman did decide to run in the primary that year. Despite a snowstorm, the energized voters came out to vote, doubling turnout over 1948.

Sen. Estes Kefauver

Kefauver trounced Truman by nine points. On the Republican side, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower beat Taft soundly.

The two upsets made major national news, and the New Hampshire Presidential Primary was on the map.

New Frontier

Eight years later, Massachusetts Sen. John F. Kennedy understood the 1952 primary had ended one era of politics and begun another. He knew he had to win the state primaries. Otherwise, party bosses would shove him aside at the convention in Los Angeles.

Though a favorite son, he campaigned in the Kefauver style. He stopped at diners, tried out a dogsled and patted livestock. New Hampshire voters then rewarded him with a record 42,969 votes on March 8, 1960.

Kennedy went to the White House. Truman went back to Missouri.

This story was updated in 2022. Image of Manchester crowd By Ted Eytan from Washington, DC, USA – 2016.02.08 Presidential Primary, Manchester, NH USA 02669, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=58262174.

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11 Things You Didn’t Know About William Loeb

William Loeb had an outsize influence on national politics as publisher of the Manchester Union Leader, New Hampshire’s statewide newspaper. From 1946 until his death in 1981, he published pugnacious conservative editorials on the newspaper’s front page.

Presidential aspirants feared and courted Loeb because of his impact on New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation Presidential Primary. Candidates for state office fell into line with his demand they take a no-tax pledge – that is, if they wanted to win.

Loeb called Gov. Nelson Rockefeller a “wife swapper,” helping to derail his presidential campaign during the 1968 New Hampshire primary.

opined that President Eisenhower “has done more to destroy the respect, honor and power of the United States than any President in its history.” Eisenhower’s sin? The treaty that allowed the Soviet Union to continue influence over Austria.

“Jerry Is A Jerk” blared one headline about President Gerald Ford because he had offered amnesty to draft dodgers. Loeb had not served in World War II, but claimed he didn’t fail the physical on purpose. Critics said he drank huge quantities of alcohol before his physicals so his ulcer would flare up.

William Loeb, Mr. Low Ebb

Loeb famously crippled Sen. Edmund Muskie’s presidential campaign in 1972 by publishing a forged letter that accused Muskie of saying “Canuck,” a derogatory term for French Canadians. Muskie responded with a speech in front of the newspaper office that forever after was called “the crying speech.” David Broder of the Washington Post reported Muskie broke down three times. Others, including Muskie, said snow melted on his face.

Though Loeb could generally run down people, he was less successful building support for politicians. One exception was his support of New Hampshire Meldrim Thomson, a three-term governor who suggested nuclear weapons for the state’s National Guard.

Detractors called him Mr. Low Ebb.

Here are 11 things about William Loeb you may not have known:

1. His father was Teddy Roosevelt’s right-hand man.

William Loeb, Jr., served as executive secretary to President Theodore Roosevelt. He was the son of a barber who had immigrated to Albany, N.Y., from Prussia. Loeb became a stenographer and court reporter, and got interested in politics.

He received an appointment as an official stenographer when Roosevelt won election as governor of New York. Roosevelt liked his ability to perform tasks without specific instructions and his familiarity with Albany politicians. He went to the White House with Roosevelt as one of his most trusted advisors.

When William Loeb III was born on Dec. 26, 1905, Roosevelt stood godfather to the child.

William Loeb Jr., father of the New Hampshire publisher, was press secretary to President Teddy Roosevelt.

2. He always carried a gun.

A New York magazine profile of William Loeb called him the “pistol-packing publisher.” He always carried Charter Arms .38 in a shoulder holster; his wife carried hers in her purse. He was reported to have shot the office cat, an accusation he denied.

In 1971 he told the New York Times Magazine that everyone should know how to use a gun. “It might lead to a few more wife killings and that sort of thing,” he said. “But it would lead to a great diminution in armed crime.”

3. He fired Ben Bradlee.

Ben Bradlee

Benjamin C. Bradlee, the storied Washington Post editor, cut his teeth as a reporter for the New Hampshire Sunday News, absorbed two years later by the Manchester Union Leader.

After Loeb fired him, he went to work for the Post. Bradlee later published the Pentagon Papers with the New York Times, and he supported the reporters coverage of the Watergate scandal.

Bradlee also had a close friendship with John F. Kennedy, later a nemesis of William Loeb.

4. He tried to keep his second marriage secret.

As a 20-year-old Williams College student he secretly married a Smith College faculty member, Elizabeth Nagy, on May 29, 1926. She was eight years his senior. He dreamt of becoming a lawyer and got into Harvard Law School, but Elizabeth discovered his affair with another woman. She accused him of violating the state’s anti-adultery laws and he had to leave Massachusetts.

Then he married Vermont resident Eleanore McAllister in 1947, a union that lasted until 1952. He tried to hide his first marriage from his second wife, but he couldn’t hide his second marriage from his third wife, Nackey Scripps Gallowhur. They were both married when they began courting.

5. His mother and father cut him out of their wills.

His father disinherited him when he married Elizabeth Nagy. William Loeb, Jr., didn’t even mention William Loeb III in his will. His mother did mention him, but only to say she was leaving him nothing. The bulk of her million-dollar estate went to his daughter, Penelope, by his second wife. He remained estranged from his daughter for the rest of his life.

William Loeb, Jr.

One reason for the animosity between mother and son was that she believed he tried to cheat her. He deposited $250,000 in securities as collateral for a loan from her to buy the paper. Then she discovered the securities were missing.

Loeb sued her estate, draining it of most of its money and ending up with about 10 percent of it.

6. He ran the newspaper from his estate and his ranch.

Though William Loeb struck fear into the heart of New Hampshire politicians, he didn’t run the paper from New Hampshire. He called in his editorials from his mansion in Pride’s Crossing, a wealthy enclave in Beverly, Mass. (It was once featured in a General Motors ad for a luxury car.)

Loeb also called them in from his ranch outside of Reno, Nev., where he and Nackey got their divorces. He also declared Nevada as his legal residence so he could pay fewer taxes than in he would have in Massachusetts.

7. He published his baptismal certificate.

President Theodore Roosevelt by John Singer Sargent

He did it twice, on the front page of newspapers he owned — the St. Albans Messenger, the Burlington Daily News and the Manchester Union Leader. Some said he did it to prove Teddy Roosevelt was his godfather. Others said he did it to prove he wasn’t Jewish.

8. He spent a night in jail.

How exactly he ended up spending a night in jail is unclear. He himself admitted to it. According to one story, George Gallowhur, first husband of Loeb’s third wife, sued Loeb for alienation of affections under an old Vermont law. Loeb couldn’t post bond and spent a night in jail.

According to another story, the local police chief tried to serve both him and Nackey while they were having dinner with his mother. Nackey slipped out and Loeb wouldn’t say where she went. So the police chief arrested him.

9. He falsified his resume.

William Randolph Hearst

He claimed in a 1974 editorial to have worked for eight years as a reporter for the Hearst Corporation’s New York World.

Hearst denied it, pointing out the newspaper folded eight years before Loeb claimed to have worked for it.

10. He couldn’t crack the Boston market.

During a Boston Herald strike he tried to import the Union Leader into the city, but stopped when crime figures threatened him because the newspaper printed incorrect sports information.

11. JFK denounced William Loeb.

JFK delivering a speech.

He called Sen. John F. Kennedy “the No. 1 liar in the United States” after Kennedy denounced the Union Leader on the day before the 1960 New Hampshire Primary:

Kennedy timed his attack carefully, so Loeb couldn’t do him any damage. He did it on the day before the 1960 New Hampshire Primary.

“I believe there is probably a more irresponsible newspaper than that one right over there.” said Kennedy. “But I’ve been through 40 states and I have not found it yet. I believe that there is a publisher who has less regard for the truth than William Loeb, but I can’t think of his name.”

Images: Ben Bradlee By John Mathew Smith & www.celebrity-photos.com from Laurel Maryland, USA – Ben Bradllee, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=75081998. This story updated in 2022.

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