Why is New York also called the big apple?

Answer

Hi Christine,

I may not be a linguist, but your question intrigued me. So I did some quick research.

Its origins lie in the horse racing world. In the 1920s, African-American grooms apparently referred to “The Big Apple” when it came to horse racing in New York. A sports journalist, John Fitzgerald, is said to have adopted this term from them and published a column in the Telegraph a few years later entitled ‘Around the Big Apple’.

A few years later, jazz musicians adopted this term and referred to “The Big Apple” when talking about New York City, the center of the jazz world. The term “Big Apple” quickly became synonymous with New York City.

In the 1971 the term was brought up again in a campaign to promote New York, with the theme I♥NY and as the image ‘the big apple’ (see photo). In 1994 a Tourism Achievement Award was presented for this campaign and so the Big Apple continues to live on.