Why is the big apple called that

Why is New York City called the Big Apple?

This commonly asked question got me wondering, why do we call New York City the Big Apple? While I’ve seen several apple trees in New York City, I don’t particularly recall them as being in notable quantity — there are certainly more pigeons than apples in New York City, but we don’t call New York City the «Big Pigeon.» As with anything New York, there are many opinions and contradictions.

In the early 1920s, «apple» was used in reference to the many racing courses in and around New York City. Apple referred to the prizes being awarded for the races — as these were important races, the rewards were substantial.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, New York City’s jazz musicians began referring to New York City as the «Big Apple.» An old saying in show business was «There are many apples on the tree, but only one Big Apple.» New York City being the premier place to perform was referred to as the Big Apple.

A 1971 campaign to increase tourism to New York City adopted the Big Apple as an officially recognized reference to New York City. The campaign featured red apples in an effort to lure visitors to New York City. It was hoped that the red apples would serve as a bright and cheery image of New York City, in contrast to the common belief that New York City was dark and dangerous. Since then, New York City has officially been The Big Apple.

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The Big Apple: How NYC Got Its Name

TripSavvy / Brakethrough Media

New York, New York, the most populous city in the United States, has been given many nicknames, including The City That Never Sleeps, Empire City, and Gotham—but perhaps the most famous one of all is the Big Apple.

The nickname «The Big Apple» originated in the 1920s in reference to the prizes (or «big apples») rewarded at the many racing courses in and around New York City. However, it wasn’t officially adopted as the city’s nickname until 1971 as the result of a successful ad campaign intended to attract tourists.

Throughout its history, the term «big apple» has always come down to simply mean the best and biggest of places to be, and New York City has long lived up to its nickname. Once you visit this seven-mile-long city, you’ll truly understand why it’s called the Capital of the World and the Big Apple.

The Big Reward: From Racing to Jazz

The first mention of New York City as «The Big Apple» was in the 1909 book «The Wayfarer in New York.» In the introduction, Edward Martin writes about the dynamic between NYC and the Midwest, using the apple as an extended metaphor:

«New York is merely one of the fruits of that great tree whose roots go down in the Mississippi Valley, and whose branches spread from one ocean to the other, but the tree has no great degree of affection for its fruit. It inclines to think that the big apple gets a disproportionate share of the national sap. It is disturbed by the enormous drawing power of a metropolis which constantly attracts to itself wealth and its possessors from all the lesser centers of the land. Every city, every State pays an annual tribute of men and of business to New York, and no State or city likes particularly to do it.»

The term only started gaining traction when sports writer John J. Fitz Gerald began writing about the city’s horse races for the New York Morning Telegraph. In his column, he wrote that these were «the big apples» of competitive racing in the United States.

Fitz Gerald got the term from African American stable hands in New Orleans; jockeys and trainers who aspired to race on New York City tracks referred to the money prizes as the «Big Apple. He once explained the term in an article for the Morning Telegraph:

«The Big Apple. The dream of every lad that ever threw a leg over a thoroughbred and the goal of all horsemen. There’s only one Big Apple. That’s New York.»

Although the audience for Fitz Gerald’s articles was markedly smaller than most, the concept of «big apple» representing the best of the best—or most-sought-after of rewards or accomplishments—began to popularize across the country.

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, the nickname started to become well known outside of the northeast, as New York City’s jazz musicians began referring to New York City as the «Big Apple» in their songs. An old saying in show business was «There are many apples on the tree, but only one Big Apple.» New York City was (and is) the premier place for jazz musicians to perform, which made it more common to refer to New York City as the Big Apple.

A Bad Reputation for the Big Apple

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, New York City was quickly earning a national reputation as a dark and dangerous city. To increase tourism to New York City in 1971, the city launched an ad campaign with Charles Gillett, president of the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau, at the helm. A fan of jazz, he wanted to restore the city to its former glory by adopting the Big Apple as an officially recognized reference to New York City.

The campaign featured red apples in an effort to lure visitors to New York City. The red apples, intended to serve as a bright and cheery image of the city, would stand in contrast to the common belief that New York City was riddled with crime and poverty. T-shirts, pins, and stickers promoting the «Big Apple» quickly became popular, thanks in part to the help of celebrities like New York Knicks legend Dave DeBusschere—and the city welcomed tourists to «take a bite out of the Big Apple.»

Since the conclusion of the campaign—and subsequent «rebranding» of the city—New York City has officially been nicknamed The Big Apple. In recognition of Fitz Gerald, the corner of 54th and Broadway (where Fitz Gerald lived for 30 years) was renamed «Big Apple Corner» in 1997.

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Why is New York City Called The Big Apple?

New York City has been called many things—“The Great American Melting Pot,” “Gotham,” “The City that Never Sleeps”—but its most famous nickname is “The Big Apple.” So just where did this now-ubiquitous moniker originate?

MAKING A BIG APPLE

Over the years, there have been many theories about how New York City came to be called “The Big Apple.” Some say it comes from the former well-to-do families who sold apples on the city’s streets to make ends meet during the Great Depression. Another account posits that the term comes from a famous 19th-century brothel madam named Eve, whose girls were cheekily referred to as her “Big Apples.” But the nickname actually springs from a catchphrase used in the 1920s by The Morning Telegraph sports writer John J. Fitz Gerald in his horse racing column, “Around the Big Apple.” Beginning on February 18, 1924, he began every column with the header, “The Big Apple. The dream of every lad that ever threw a leg over a thoroughbred and the goal of all horsemen. There’s only one Big Apple. That’s New York.”

At the time, the jockeys and trainers of smaller horses were said to want to make a “Big Apple,» which was their term for the big money prizes at larger races in and around New York City.

Fitz Gerald reportedly first heard «The Big Apple» used to describe New York’s racetracks by two African American stable hands at the famed New Orleans Fair Grounds, as he explained in his inaugural «Around the Big Apple» column: “Two dusky stable hands were leading a pair of thoroughbreds around the ‘cooling rings’ of adjoining stables at the Fair Grounds in New Orleans and engaging in desultory conversation. ‘Where y’all goin’ from here?’ queried one. ‘From here we’re headin’ for The Big Apple,’ proudly replied the other. ‘Well, you’d better fatten up them skinners or all you’ll get from the apple will be the core,’ was the quick rejoinder.” Fitz Gerald nabbed the colloquialism for his column, where it quickly took off.

CATCHING ON

Once the term entered the vocabularies of society up north, its popularity slowly spread outside of the horseracing context, and everything from nightclubs in Harlem to hit songs and dances about the city were named after “The Big Apple.” Most notably, New York jazz musicians in the 1930s—who had a habit of using the nickname to reference their hometown in their songs—helped the nickname spread beyond the northeast.

Throughout the mid-20th century, it remained New York City’s nickname until it was officially adopted by the city in the 1970s. The New York Convention & Visitors Bureau hoped that using the moniker would brighten the image of an economically downtrodden and crime-ridden city in decline and revive the tourist economy. In 1997, to give Fitz Gerald his (somewhat unjust) due, then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani signed legislation naming the corner where Fitz Gerald and his family lived at West 54th Street and Broadway between 1934 and 1963 “Big Apple Corner.”

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Why is New York Called Big Apple

If you are aware of American culture you must wonder why is New York called big apple? US is generally referred to as America by the people. It is a developed and very advanced country with great opportunities for all those who dream and are ready to work hard to realize their dreams. Many people refer to as America as Big Apple though it is the city of New York that is actually nicknamed the Big Apple. Not many people are aware of the reason behind this nickname though they continue to use this name for this big and very important city of US. This article takes a look at the origins of the nickname Big Apple for the city of New York.

Why is New York Called Big Apple – Reasons

Various reasons put forward for this nickname

New York is a metropolitan that has got not one but several nicknames. These include The City that Never Sleeps, Gotham, The Great American Melting Pot, and of course The Big Apple. However, it is The Big Apple that has stuck and used most commonly by the people around the country. There are some people who say that the name came from some rich families that were forced to sell apples on the streets of the city after their wealth collapsed during the Great Depression. There is even a story that links the name Big Apple with a brothel owned by a lady called Eve in the 19th century. The girls of this particular brothel were referred to as Big Apples by the people of the city.

Sports columnist FitzGerald used the phrase in his column

However, more realistic account of the name Big Apple comes from a phrase used by sports journalist John J FitzGerald in his newspaper column called Around the Big Apple. He used to start his column with a header titled ‘The Big Apple’. His column was dealing with horse racing. This was a time when it was a dream of every jockey to earn big prize money by taking part in big races. Big Apple was a phrase that alluded to a large purse of money given to winners in races held in New York in those times. Soon the phrase caught the fancy of the common people and New York came to be referred as Big Apple by not just the people of the city but even the outsiders.

Big Apple has become a symbol of New York

The phrase Big Apple was made popular by the jazz musicians of those times as they used it to describe the jazz scene in the city of New York. The name lost some of its appeal in the next two decades. However, it once again became popular in the 1970’s when New York Convention and Visitors Bureau made a red apple as its logo to attract visitors to the city. Since then, Big Apple has become associated with the city of New York and it has even become an unofficial name for New York just as Sin City has become a nickname for Las Vegas.

The phrase Big Apple, when used to refer to New York, reflects the alluring nature of the city. It symbolizes New York as a fast moving and exciting city with lots of opportunities for who dream to make it big someday in their lives.

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Why Is New York City Called the «Big Apple»?

The skyline of Manhattan, New York City.

New York City is America’s largest city and one of the most popular in the world. The city is home to some of the world’s most historic monuments, magnificent buildings, and countless dazzling skyscrapers. For centuries, New York has been an urban jungle and epicenter for art, dining, shopping, and trendy neighborhoods. New York has been nicknamed the «Big Apple,» although the name has no reference to the growing of apples. The nickname the «Big Apple» primarily gained relevance in the 1920s through horse racing, as reported in the New York Morning Telegraph by John J. Fitz Gerald. Prior to this, the city referred to as the «New Orange,» nicknamed after William III of Orange, the Dutch leader who conquered the English and took over New York.

Origin of the «Big Apple» Nickname

Various myths existed regarding the origin of the name, including a reference to the people who sold apples on the streets to earn a living during the Great Depression. However, other accounts claim the name originated from a woman named Eve who ran a brothel was referred to by her girls as «Big Apples.» However, the name is believed to have originated from a precept used by newspaper sports columnist John J. Fitz Gerald in the New York Morning Telegraph. On February 18, 1924, Fitz Gerald officially nabbed the colloquialism in his articles under the heading “The Big Apple.”

Fitz Gerald had heard the name being used by two African-American stable hands to refer to the New York City, whose horse racing trails were deemed the most preeminent venues. Once the name became popularized, it spread beyond sports into nightclubs and music. In 1930, jazz artists from New York took on the term to refer to their hometown in their music, popularizing the name further to the northeast.

Use in Popular Culture

The moniker soon languished from use until the 1970s, when it was revived as part of a campaign in hope of reviving New York’s tourist economy. During that time, the city was in economic distress, coupled with intensified street crime that tarnished the city’s image. In the hopes of restoring the city to its former glory, Charles Gillett, president of the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau, promoted the city as the «Big Apple,» and used there image of the apple on t-shirts, placards, and promotional materials. This time, the nickname stuck.

In 1997, the corner of West 54th Street and Broadway, where Fitz Gerald had lived between 1934 and 1963, was named «Big Apple Corner» in his honor. In 2016, President Donald Trump hosted a party to celebrate his victory and named it the ‘Big Apple Ball’ with decorations and cut-outs of New York landmarks in honor of his home city.

Today, the nickname is ubiquitous with New York City throughout the English-speaking world.

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