CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | Contact
An elderly sun-kissed Northerner has today made a point of referring to Mackay as Mack-Kay, instead of the modernised pronounciation of ‘Mack-Kye’.
Sarina Ingham (82) says as a 7th generation Maltese-Italian-South Sea-Irish-Townsvillian mix who used to work in the cane fields as a little girl, she is a pretty good authority on how to pronounce the name of the town she’s lived in her whole life.
Not since the New South Wales city of Newcastle hosted the NewCARSSEL versus New CASSELL debate in the mid 1990s, has Australia seen a town that just flat out can’t remember how to say it’s own name.
But debates still rage amongst young and old, and newly settled residents. Many believe that if something isn’t done about it soon, the correct pronunciation of Mackay will be lost forever.
Sarina, who now runs the books at a local fishing charter company says it’s ‘MACK-aye’ and that’s because she actually used to dance the Pride Of Erin at the old Returned Services clubs with some of the descendants of John Mackay, founder of the town.
“It was always Mack-Kay”
“Then all of a sudden we got television and those bastard weathermen in Brisbane started saying Mack-Kye”
“I’ll never forgive them for what they did to my lovely town. They should be ashamed of themselves”
