Loved this thread....some observations.....

Hello to my fellow Buckeyes...a quick modification....here in Cleveland Ohio USA, Ohio's prounounced Ohio, not Ahia. Seems like Ohioans become Ahians somewhere just north of Akron....which, post WW2, earned the moniker "Little West Virginia".

Reputedly, the Midwest of USA is the most accent-free region in the USA, but I'm not convinced.

Some Pennsylvania colloquialisms have rooted (and it is root) in NE OH, with the most memorable being "warsh". As in "I'm going to warsh the clothes now."

We've used "jagov" since childhood, and often shortened it too. An oft-used tearm of endearment was "you jag."

Lima OH is indeed like the bean. And we have a Worchester, Worcester, or whatever. It's Wooster, the county seat of Wayne County, and to my knowledge, always pronounced "whuster", as oppposed to "woooooooster".

Down and over in the tri-state area (Ahia, PA, WV) the town of Bellaire is pronounced "blair". I was on a horseback trail riding weekend down that way once, and asking for the nearest town to buy supplies, was told "blair". I'd never heard of the town, and not making the connection, was too embarassed to ask.

Along those lines, the capital of South Dakota, Pierre, is pronounced "pier", as in "take a long walk off a short pier." As opposed to "lucky Pi-erre." Anyone from SD could confirm or refute that.

Another one I recall from my youth: listening to CKLW, AM800 on your dial, out of Detroit(in southern speak, hard accent on the DE,as in DE-troit; listen to Bobby Bare's "Detroit City". In Cleveland, it's de-TROIT)

Anyway, I was always mystified by one address in the commercials. The DJ would always say, "Grass-shit and 8 Mile Rd...". Turns out it was spelled Gratiot. Only sounded like grass-shit.

Sorry for the long post. You got me going, but I'll close now.

Bill