“Big Apple” explained (“Countdown” UK game show, 2025)

Countdown (a British game show on Channel 4) explained “Big Apple” in a segment of the show that aired on February 6, 2025:
 
“Well, I couldn’t not do Big Apple for y0u and where that comes from because it’s been teasing etymologists for a very long time. So we do know that this lovely nickname for New York City was really popularised in the 1970s thanks to the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau. So, essentially, it was part of a tourism campaign and it was a promoter’s dream. It just took off and everybody began to know New York as the Big Apple. But they didn’t invent it because we have lots of records of this nickname going back decades, actually, before. And the first printed evidence that we can find is from a racing writer called John J. Fitzgerald. And he wrote a regular column in the New York Morning Telegraph and actually, he called his column ‘Around the Big Apple.’ And it was thanks to this that it sort of began to take off, but it was very much focused on racing. And a few years later, he started to use it so by 1924, for the race tracks of New York City in general and beyond. So we know that it began in the racing world and when he was asked John J. Fitzgerald said that he had picked it up from some stable hands in New Orleans who had looked over to New York and in their minds’ eye it was just the city of dreams. and it was like this huge red apple that was kind of tempting them from afar, and I guess apple fits nicely with horses etc. as well. But when I was looking into the Big Apple I looked at the New York minute. Have you heard of a New York minute? Which is really, really quick, and if you do something in a New York minute you pretty much do it immediately. And the best guess that we have as to where this came about is that it’s the nanosecond between the traffic light turning green and the driver behind you in New York City honking their horn.”
 
   
Wikipedia: Countdown (game show)
Countdown is a British game show involving word and mathematical tasks that began airing in November 1982. It is broadcast on Channel 4 and is most recently presented by Colin Murray, assisted by Rachel Riley with lexicographer Susie Dent.
 
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RicardoDelSol
@RicardoDelSol3
You forgot to mention, in your ‘Origins of Words’ segment on @C4Countdown today about “Why New York is nicknamed The Big Apple”, following the election of New York’s most famous citizen as president, that, after the Dutch recaptured it from the British,it was called “New Orange”.
11:49 AM · Feb 6, 2025
 
X/Twitter
John Nigel McFadden #PATH
@johnnigmcfadden
Apparently audio levels poor on earlier post of this television clip from Countdown(UK) TV programme. This clip is about the horseracing origins of New York being referred to as The Big Apple. Musk’s X seems to have an issue reproducing the audio level of the video, hope this ok.
(From video: “Well, I couldn’t not do Big Apple for y0u and where that comes from because it’s been teasing etymologists for a very long time. So we do know that this lovely nickname for New York City was really popularised in the 1970s thanks to the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau. So, essentially, it was part of a tourism campaign and it was a promoter’s dream. It just took off and everybody began to know New York as the Big Apple. But they didn’t invent it because we have lots of records of this nickname going back decades, actually, before. And the first printed evidence that we can find is from a racing writer called John J. Fitzgerald. And he wrote a regular column in the New York Morning Telegraph and actually, he called his column ‘Around the Big Apple.’ And it was thanks to this that it sort of began to take off, but it was very much focused on racing. And a few years later, he started to use it so by 1924, for the race tracks of New York City in general and beyond. So we know that it began in the racing world and when he was asked John J. Fitzgerald said that he had picked it up from some stable hands in New Orleans who had looked over to New York and in their minds’ eye it was just the city of dreams. and it was like this huge red apple that was kind of tempting them from afar, and I guess apple fits nicely with horses etc. as well. But when I was looking into the Big Apple I looked at the New York minute. Have you heard of a New York minute? Which is really, really quick, and if you do something in a New York minute you pretty much do it immediately. And the best guess that we have as to where this came about is that it’s the nanosecond between the traffic light turning green and the driver behind you in New York City honking their horn.”)
1:09 PM · Feb 6, 2025 from Inverness, Scotland
 
X/Twitter
John Nigel McFadden #PATH
@johnnigmcfadden
One more time, The Big Apple, the horseracing origins of the name. This clip is from the UK programme Countdown and shows their own captions on this post. Apparently audio comes over on X poorly.
1:02 / 1:59
(From video: “Well, I couldn’t not do Big Apple for y0u and where that comes from because it’s been teasing etymologists for a very long time. So we do know that this lovely nickname for New York City was really popularised in the 1970s thanks to the New York Convention and Visitors Bureau. So, essentially, it was part of a tourism campaign and it was a promoter’s dream. It just took off and everybody began to know New York as the Big Apple. But they didn’t invent it because we have lots of records of this nickname going back decades, actually, before. And the first printed evidence that we can find is from a racing writer called John J. Fitzgerald. And he wrote a regular column in the New York Morning Telegraph and actually, he called his column ‘Around the Big Apple.’ And it was thanks to this that it sort of began to take off, but it was very much focused on racing. And a few years later, he started to use it so by 1924, for the race tracks of New York City in general and beyond. So we know that it began in the racing world and when he was asked John J. Fitzgerald said that he had picked it up from some stable hands in New Orleans who had looked over to New York and in their minds’ eye it was just the city of dreams. and it was like this huge red apple that was kind of tempting them from afar, and I guess apple fits nicely with horses etc. as well. But when I was looking into the Big Apple I looked at the New York minute. Have you heard of a New York minute? Which is really, really quick, and if you do something in a New York minute you pretty much do it immediately. And the best guess that we have as to where this came about is that it’s the nanosecond between the traffic light turning green and the driver behind you in New York City honking their horn.”)
6:49 PM · Feb 6, 2025 from Inverness, Scotland·