A little history

The Michigan Accent Pronunciation Guide got its start back in the 1980s. I was a twenty-something software developer working for Allnet Communication Services, a Detroit-based telecom provider. My friends and coworkers and I started talking about the Michigan accent, sharing unique regional euphemisms, and laughing at funny sayings — and I started writing them down.

When the web was young, maybe around 1997, I started posting my one-page list of funny Michiganisms on my personal site, and started getting comments from strangers. In 2002, I added a blog and my own line of funny Michigan paraphernalia via CafePress.com, and gave the Guide its own URL at MichiganNative.com.

In the 20+ years since, traffic to MichiganNative.com has grown exponentially. The site was written up on local and national news sites, and I was interviewed by a couple of talk radio hosts.  I’ve also had people steal my artwork and copy, verbatim, since then — proof, I guess, that 1) the topic of the Michigan Accent always gets engagement, and 2) as Dad would say, “people are terrible,” and 3) as Mom would say, “we just can’t have nice things.”

It’s all tongue-in-cheek

Quick to be offended? Constantly outraged? Easily triggered? This site was written to be funny, people — not as some perceived personal attack. Geez-o-pete — take it with a grain of salt — maybe from the salt mines under Detroit.

Special thanks

Jay Nordlinger for his very nice comments in National Review on October 19, 2006…to Susan Whitall of the Detroit News for her article on February 20, 2004; Shawn Peterson of the Michigan Talk Radio Network for the March 2001 interview on the “Captain and Crew” Show, and Cameron Knowles of WSGW-AM for his radio interview on September 29th, 2000.

And to my friends Carl Wilson, John Purugganan and Amy Bailey from Allnet — who made me laugh every single day.