Spelling of Delorean / De Lorean

[dmcjohn]

Hi,

Not sure if you've come across Google's latest gadget - the Ngram Viewer... basically because Google have scanned 500 million books/magazines, etc going back a few hundred years, you can use the tool to trace the evolution of words over a period of time.

I just used it to trace the occurrence of the spelling "delorean" versus "de lorean" - looks like they were pretty close until the late 70's, but since then the spelling without the space has been much more common, even though at that time JZD was spelling it with the space...

http://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=DeLorean%2CDe+Lorean&year_start=1960&year_end=2000&corpus=0&smoothing=3

http://books.google.com/ngrams/chart?content=DeLorean%2CDe%20Lorean&corpus=0&smoothing=3&year_start=1960&year_end=2000

When did John DeLorean started spelling his name with the space?

John

[Jeremy Popp]

Interesting. I seem to remember seeing documents in the past refering to it as a half-space instead of a full space :confused:

[LEVY]

Half space was only used on the logo.

LEVY



Interesting. I seem to remember seeing documents in the past refering to it as a half-space instead of a full space :confused:

[Chris 16409]

There is an interesting anecdote Bill Haddad talks about in his book. He said John added the space to make his name sound more European (French) or something like that.

[Rhsxo]

There is an interesting anecdote Bill Haddad talks about in his book. He said John added the space to make his name sound more European (French) or something like that.

I guess it worked. My friend jokes around with me and calls my car "The Day-loraine".

[thirdmanj]

The half space was used in DMCLs letterhead and in typed memos and the like. I've seen those on eBay.

[awildermode]

I asked a family member and the name is suppose to be "De Lorean". Capital "D" and "L" with a space in between.

[Dangermouse]

Turns out that "Delorean" is really in the minority

http://books.google.com/ngrams/chart?content=DeLorean%2CDe%20Lorean%2CDelorean&corpus=0&smoothing=3&year_start=1960&year_end=2000

[Elvis]

I asked a family member and the name is suppose to be "De Lorean". Capital "D" and "L" with a space in between.


strange, because he wasn't french at all. What family member was that ?

[Chris 16409]

Here's the passage from Haddad's book.

[awildermode]

strange, because he wasn't french at all. What family member was that ?

John's nephew, Jack"s (born Zachary) son.

Regarding John adding the space. I was told that when Zachary came over to the US, the 'official name takers' made it without the space. It was common to "Americanize" names for ease of spelling and reading for government papers. At some point, John changed it back to the original spelling, with the space.

[Sidaries]

strange, because he wasn't french at all. What family member was that ?

His father was Romanian and his mother was Hungarian. If you make a google search for Delorean Gyula, you will find a Hungarian relative in Romania.
Those relatives write their names as Delorean. I think this was the default and the rest is myth, made by John.