{"id":12787,"date":"2018-11-12T11:58:21","date_gmt":"2018-11-12T16:58:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phillyhistory.wpengine.com\/?p=12787"},"modified":"2018-11-12T12:14:14","modified_gmt":"2018-11-12T17:14:14","slug":"the-hoagie-is-venerable-but-not-as-historic-as-weve-been-led-to-believe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/2018\/11\/the-hoagie-is-venerable-but-not-as-historic-as-weve-been-led-to-believe\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hoagie is Venerable (but not as historic as we\u2019ve been led to believe)"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Maggie’s, Veree Road, Bustleton Avenue to Red Lion Road, February 17, 1959 (PhillyHistory.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There\u2019s been a lot of big talk and conflicting claims over the years, as to who invented the hoagie, and when. Was it conjured up for workers going to the shipyards at Hog Island in World War I? Was it first introduced by South Philadelphia sandwich purveyors Antoinette Iannelli, Al DePalma or the Scarsi Brothers? Or someone else?<\/p>\n

\u201cI made the first hoagie back in 1935,\u201d declared Antoinette Iannelli in 1983. Why call it a hoagie?\u201d asked food writer Jim Quinn. \u201c\u2019I didn\u2019t,\u2019\u201d responded Iannelli, \u201cI called them submarines\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hmmm.<\/p>\n

It may be we cannot actually know <\/em>when Philadelphia\u2019s official sandwich was invented and named. What we do<\/em> know is that the hoagie originated in South Philadelphia at some point during the first half of the 20th<\/sup> century. Hard evidence is sparse, and there\u2019s conflicting verbal accounts shared decades later. Opinion and hearsay . . . lore yearning to be legend.<\/p>\n

Fact is, there\u2019s no recorded oral history pegging the hoagie to Hog Island at the end of WWI. Looking for evidence in print, we find there\u2019s no mention of \u201choagie\u201d in the 1910s, or the 1920s, or even in the 1930s.<\/p>\n

The word \u201cHoagie\u201d does not appear in print until the 1940s.<\/p>\n

Sandwich scholars Edwin Eames and Howard Robboy explored the entire genre\u2014the Bomber, Cuban Sandwich, Garabaldi, Grinder; Hero, Hoagie, Italian Sandwich, Musalatta, Poor Boy, Rocket, Submarine, Torpedo and Zepplin\u2014and found that the first use of the terms \u201choggy,\u201d \u201choggie\u201d or \u201choagie\u201d simply do not appear before the 1940s. The earliest mention of \u201choagie\u201d Eames and Robboy located was in the Philadelphia Telephone Directory from 1943.<\/p>\n

We delved into the database at Philly.newspapers.com<\/a> and found corroborating evidence. The word \u201cHoggie\u201d appears twice in the Inquirer <\/em>classified ads in 1943. From April 4: \u201cHOGGIE SHOP. Doing gd. Bus. Must sell account sickness. 6305 Greenway ave.\u201d Then, on September 12: \u201cWoman, active 25 to 45, to work part time in sandwich shop. 7 p.m. to 1 a.m. no Sun. 40c an hr. to start. Tony\u2019s Hoggie Shop, 6709 Woodland ave.\u201d<\/p>\n

The word \u201choagie\u201d doesn\u2019t appear for another three years.<\/p>\n

That classified advertisement published February 4, 1946 reads: \u201cHOAGIE & Luncheonette shop. Doing gd bus. Gd. Reason for selling. Apply 5501 Chester ave.\u201d Four days later, the ad is edited: \u201cHOGGIE SHOP & luncheonette. Doing a swell business. Good reason for selling. 5501 Chester ave.\u201d<\/p>\n

Digging deeper, we find between 1946 and 1950, the words \u201choggie\u201d and \u201choagie\u201d appear with equal frequency.\u00a0 The former appears 127 times and the latter 124 times. But at the end of this period, there’s a shift where \u201choggie\u201d gives way to \u201choagie.\u201d In 1950, the \u201choagie\u201d pulls ahead for the first time, appearing 73 times compared with only 45 times for \u201choggie.\u201d In the next five years, from 1951-1955, \u201choggie\u201d appears 44 times while \u201choagie\u201d appears a robust 565 times.<\/p>\n

What can we infer from this instability of usage? Perhaps the word \u201choagie\u201d was still so new that one spelling, one pronunciation, wasn\u2019t yet widely and uniformly accepted? Was the hoagie still searching for its footing in the Philadelphia lexicon? Only in the final years of the 1950s does \u201choggie\u201d fade away, making an appearance only six times compared with 352 imprints for \u201choagie.\u201d By the 1960s, it\u2019s all \u201choagie,\u201d all the time, with nearly 1,000 impressions.<\/p>\n

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Maggie used both “hoagie” and “submarine,” much the way suspenders can be used with a belt. (PhillyHistory.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Meanwhile, in the mid-1950s, hoagie hustlers start staking out extravagant claims as to the origin stories. But without hard evidence, they appear to be based on memory. Competing boasts. Opinion and hearsay; lore yearning to be legend.<\/p>\n

Based on evidence in print, we have no reason to believe the words \u201choggie\u201d and its successor, the \u201choagie,\u201d date back to the World War I era. Rather, both appear to be the product of a rising, post-World War II hoagie hype. Entrepreneurial competition larded with nostalgia and spiced with boosterism.<\/p>\n

Searching for a turning point, we see 1972 as a watershed year in hoagie history, Ben DiAngelis, head chef at the Bellevue Stratford, adds hoagies to the hotel\u2019s menu. The Philadelphia-based, nationally broadcast Mike Douglas Show airs a hoagie demonstration. The Shackamaxon Society sponsors the first annual hoagie competition. The Daily News <\/em>names it’s first \u201cHoagie Editor.\u201d \u201cHome Sweet Hoagie,\u201d read the headline below a double truck, poster-size illustration of a hoagie in the Inquirer\u2019s Today Magazine<\/em>. Writer Stephen Friend describes how badly he missed the hoagie after moving to the mid-west, and how frustrated he felt trying to describe \u201cthe joys of a hoagie\u201d to friends in Detroit. \u201cIt\u2019s like describing the Mona Lisa in Braille.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another two decades pass and City Hall declares the hoagie the “Official Sandwich of Philadelphia.” A well-deserved status given twenty years after the fact.<\/p>\n

Revelers in hoagie history have a proud legacy to share, but that legacy only goes back to the 1940s.\u00a0Unless, of course, someone can turn up hard evidence proving the hoagie is ancient as well as venerable.<\/p>\n

[Sources: Jim Quinn, \u201cThe Story of the First Hoagie, Inquirer, Today Magazine<\/em>, January 16, 1972; Food Timeline Library<\/a>; Mary Rizzo, \u201cHoagies<\/a>,\u201d The Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia, Rutgers University, 2014; Edwin Eames and Howard Robboy, \u201cThe Submarine Sandwich: Lexical Variations in a Cultural Context<\/a>,\u201d American Speech<\/em>, Vol. 42, No. 4 (Dec., 1967), pp. 279-288; Dave Wilton, \u201cA Hoagie by any other name,\u201d Verbatim\u2013The Language Quarterly<\/em>, Vol. 23, No. 3 Autumn 2003; Gloria Campisi, \u201cA Hoagie a la Bellevue? Really!\u201d Daily News<\/em>, April 12, 1972; Kathy Begley, \u201c6-foot Hoagie Adjudged Winner Over New York Hero, \u201cInquirer<\/em>, April 20, 1972; Stephen F. Friend, \u201cHome Sweet Hoagie, Inquirer, Today Magazine,<\/em> April 9, 1972; Joe Clark, “‘Now’ Hoagie Big, Wet,” Daily News<\/em>, April 20, 1972.]<\/span><\/p>\n

Also see: A Fresh Take on the Hoagie Origin Story<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been a lot of big talk and conflicting claims over the years, as to who invented the hoagie, and when. Was it conjured up for workers going to the shipyards at Hog Island in World War I? Was it first introduced by South Philadelphia sandwich purveyors Antoinette Iannelli, Al DePalma or the Scarsi Brothers? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12787\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}