Sally Pavia wrote..... >>In 1778, ONE vote gave America the English language instead of German.<< Unfortunately, Sally, there would appear to be some Americans today who think that all Europeans, including the English, ARE German!!! I kid ye not, the following stories are absolutely true..... A good friend of mine a few years ago was posted to Los Angeles as US West Coast correspondent for a very large British national newspaper (circulation of well over 4 million). He was born in England, brought up here all his life and obviously speaks with an English accent. In his passport it says he is British. Unfortunately (and this is a side issue but it is a cause of some annoyance to most Brits) we now have to have a silly little passport issued under the name of the European Economic Community. When my friend went to open a bank account at a major bank in LA he was aghast to notice that the girl writing down his details entered his nationality as "German"!!! When he protested he was British, she replied: "Well, you have an EEC passport and everybody knows that that means Germany." It was only after repeated protests and demands to see a higher authority that the bank eventually, reluctantly, accorded him his true nationality. Second story..... Another friend of mine went into a restaurant in St Paul, Minnesota, with a business colleague. They overheard the manager tell the waitress to be especially attentive to them as they were visitors from England. The waitress (a blonde, as it happens, but I don't wish to irritate all you blondes out there by suggesting it meant anything particularly!) replied: "From England, huh? Will they need me to translate the menu for them?" Please assure me these two ladies are not typical of the average American bank official/waitress!!!!! Roy Stockdill Editor, The Journal of One-Name Studies The Stockdill Family History Society (Guild of One-Name Studies, FedFHS) STOCKDILL PREST YELLOW BOLTON WORSNOP GIBSON MIDGLEY BRACEWELL SHACKLETON BRADLEY MOODY in Yorkshire North & West Ridings MEAD YOUNG in Somerset, Wiltshire & Gloucestershire Web page of the Stockdill Family History Society:- http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/roystock ”Never ask a man if he comes from Yorkshire. If he does he will tell you. If he does not, why humiliate him?" - Canon Sydney Smith (scholar and humorist 1771-1845)