Well, what do you know. Although I'll bet his family (however far back) just got sick of correcting everybody and finally adopted the pronunciation as their own out of pure fatigue.

Thanks. BTW, have you ever considered just chucking programming and going into professional research? I'll bet you could make a fortune.


>I thought this was interesting:
>http://www.loc.gov/nls/other/saywhat.html
>
>
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>>>>Oh, and I have a word for you. There's a street by the name of "Kuykendall" in Houston, but only native Houstonians ever pronounce it right: "Kirkendoll".
>>>
>>>
>>>Hmmm, seems and old dutch word to me, kuikendal (in old dutch the ui was written with uy, though I cannot explain where the double ll comes from), which means something like chicken valley: Does houston have a history of chicken ??
>>>
>>>update - Seem indeed to be dutch, but the street probably is named after someone called that name: http://www.kuykendall.info/
>>>
>>>Anyways, in this case 'Kirkendoll' is not the right prounancation. Saying just as it writes seems to be closer.
>>>
>>>Walter,
>>
>>Without naming any actual countries, there is a quarterback in the NFL named of Brett Favre, and everybody south of Canada and north of Mexico pronounces his last name 'Farv'. I've never heard him say it himself.