Aus dem Haus

Hamburgs of the world, unite!

A little interwebbal research has shown me that Hamburg, Hansestadt, HH, meine Perle, is not the only Hamburg on this green Earth. In fact, I was able to find evidence of 13 (thirteen! Oooh, I hope you’re not superstitious) different Hamburgs around the world.

Okay, they’re not so much around the world as in the US, but there are Hamburgs in Arkansas, Illinois, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Wisconsion and even a Hamburg which is a wee village in South Africa. The thirteenth (and I don’t know if this counts) is that Hamburg is the German name for the Slovakian town of Brezovička.

The history of this German nomenclature among American placenames seems pretty straightforward. There was a huge influx of German settlers to the USA in the 18^th Century, and the US Embassy reckons that in 1790 roughly 277,000 Americans were of German ancestry - about half of these lived in Pennsylvania, where they made up around a third of the population.

In fact, legend even has it that German almost became the official language of the United States. The “Muhlenberg legend” tells that during the 1790s, the Pennsylvanian parliament took a vote on it, and it was one Frederick A. Muhlenberg who cast the deciding vote, which ensured that Americans today eat fries rather than pommes.

Of course such a vote never occurred, but the German heritage of America remains enshrined in the placenames, like Hamburg. Maybe there should be a Transatlantic Hamburg Alliance (For the Advancement of Inter-Hamburger Relations)? THAFAIHR. Almost as catchy as LOLCAKAOPULIA.

Now the tale of the edible Hamburger, that’s a different story…