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For other uses, see Big Apple (disambiguation).
The Big Apple is a nickname or moniker for New York City. It was first popularized in the 1920s by John J. Fitz Gerald, a sports writer for the New York Morning Telegraph. Its popularity since the 1970s is due to a promotional campaign by the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau.
[edit] History of the termAlthough the history of the Big Apple was once considered a mystery,[1] research over the past two decades, primarily by noted amateur etymologist Barry Popik[2] and Professor Gerald Cohen of Missouri University of Science and Technology,[3] has provided a reasonably clear picture of the term's history. Prior to their work, there were a number of false etymologies,[4] of which the most ridiculous was the claim, subsequently exposed as a hoax[5] and now replaced on the source web site with more accurate information,[6] that the term derived from a New York brothel whose madam was known as Eve.[7] The Big Apple was first popularized as a reference to New York City by John J. Fitz Gerald in a number of New York Morning Telegraph articles in the 1920s in reference to New York horse-racing. The earliest of these was a casual reference on May 3, 1921:
Fitz Gerald referred to the "big apple" frequently thereafter.[9] He explained his use in a February 18, 1924, column under the headline "Around the Big Apple":
Fitz Gerald's reference to the "dusky" stable hands suggests the term's origin may lie in African-American culture. Support for this is found in the Chicago Defender, an African-American newspaper that had a national circulation. “Ragtime” Billy Tucker, a vaudeville/ragtime performer and writer for the Defender, there used "big apple" to refer to New York in a non-horse-racing context on September 16, 1922:
The same writer had earlier used "Big Apple" as a reference to a different city, Los Angeles. This example, from May 15, 1920, is the earliest known use of "Big Apple" to refer to any city. It is possible that the writer simply understood "Big Apple" as an appropriate nickname for any large city:
By the late 1920s, New York writers other than Fitz Gerald were starting to use "Big Apple" and were using it outside of a horse-racing context.[13] "The Big Apple" was a popular song[14] and dance[15] in the 1930s. Walter Winchell and other writers continued to use the name in the 1940s and 1950s.[16] By the 1960s, "the Big Apple" was known only as an old name for New York.[17] In the early 1970s, however, the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau (now NYC & Company, the official marketing and tourism organization for New York City),[18] under the leadership of its president, Charles Gillett, begin promoting "the Big Apple" as the city's moniker.[19] It has remained popular since that time. Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani in 1997 signed legislation designating the southwest corner of West 54th Street and Broadway, the corner on which John J. Fitz Gerald resided from 1934 to 1963, as "Big Apple Corner."[20] Since 1980, the New York Mets' baseball stadium has featured a top hat that a "Big Apple" rises from when a Mets player hits a home run. [edit] Other citiesBig Apple also refers to the literal Big Apple in Colborne, Ontario. Manhattan, Kansas, refers to itself as "The Little Apple" in its promotional literature. Minneapolis, Minnesota has called itself "The Mini-Apple". In Evita, Buenos Aires is referred to as "B.A., Buenos Aires, Big Apple" in the song Eva, Beware of the City. This reference was invented by lyricist Tim Rice and does not reflect preexisting use. Other cities with similar nicknames[21] include:
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[edit] External links
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