... Cairo, Georgia - Cairo is a city in Grady County, Georgia, United States. Cairo is located in central Grady County at 30°52′39″N 84°12′5″W / 30.87750°N 84.20139°W (30.8774, -84.2013). South Georgians insert a “y” in pronouncing the Dooly County town: “Vi-yenna.” The Austrian city is kind of like “Vee-inner,” to Southerners anyway. The high school football team, however, still is nicknamed the “Syrupmakers.” The town’s slogan is “Where Life Is Sweeter,” and the city’s website is syrupcity.net.Cairo, Georgia, has always been a curiosity.
But in South Georgia, it’s most likely “All-Benny.”The little town of Hoschton in Jackson County is in the news again, not in a good way, so it’s time for a refresher course on places’ pronunciation.Cairo, Georgia, is famous for making syrup, although syrup apparently hasn’t been made on a large scale since the 1990s. How to say Cairo. The Georgia version is pronounced Kay-row. Many want to call it “Hosh-ton.” The correct pronunciation is “Hoosh- (rhymes with push) ton.”William Hosch later with his brother and sons established Hosch Bros., a wholesale dry goods business that once occupied the building behind the old Princeton Hotel, now Dress Up!Dahlonega is another town whose name requires some getting used to. It’s commonly pronounced around here as “Duh – LON- eger.”There’s Albany, New York, and Albany, Georgia. Dacula’s name somehow came from a few letters of the Decatur and Atlanta Railroad.And, no, there apparently is no relation between Cairo, Georgia, and Karo Syrup, based in New York and Chicago, whose name might have originated from the wife of a syrup chemist.It’s hard to mispronounce Demorest, but some have been known to call it “De-MORE-est.”William Hosch and his brothers founded Hoschton in 1881, and he built the first house there. He moved to Gainesville in 1889 and joined George P. Estes in business, a longtime retail clothing store in the downtown area.A lot of those Native American terms are confusing and sometimes hard to pronounce. It’s pronounced just as it’s spelled. Listen to the audio pronunciation in the Cambridge English Dictionary. Thank you for helping build the largest language community on the internet. Sign in to disable ALL ads. The Georgia town was named for the Austrian city, but earlier had the names Berrien and Drayton.Whenever Hoschton or the unfamiliar name of some other place comes up, TV announcers, as well as some new residents of the area, struggle with how to pronounce it. People who don’t know South Georgia and Grady County usually pronounce Cairo like the one in Egypt – Ki-row. The Georgia version is pronounced Kay-row.Pronunciation of Flowery Branch isn’t so difficult now that the Atlanta Falcons make the South Hall town its home. Sometimes you hear Hoschton’s next-door neighbor Braselton spoken with a “z” in it, such as “Brazelton.”Watch for more local history in this column next Sunday.The Hosches have been prominent in the communities where they lived, including some descendants who continue to live in Hall County.Likewise, you’ll sometimes hear the town of Marietta pronounced “May-retta.Some sources say the town was named for Cairo, Egypt; others say Cairo, Ill.This isn’t North Georgia; in fact, about as south as you can go in South Georgia.Johnny Vardeman is retired editor of The Times. People who don’t know South Georgia and Grady County usually pronounce Cairo like the one in Egypt – Ki-row. Cairo, Georgia, has always been a curiosity. As of the 2010 census, the city had a population of 9,607. He was a Civil War veteran and became a businessman and agent for the old Gainesville Jefferson and Southern Railroad, whose depot remains standing. It was originally “Chatu-huchi,” meaning painted rocks. Pronunciation of Cairo Georgia with 2 audio pronunciations and more for Cairo Georgia. Georgia State Route 93 passes through the center of Cairo as Broad Street and Fifth Street; it leads north 19 miles (31 km) to Pelhaman… The English got it closer with “Chatty noochee.”The crossroads of Choestoe in the North Georgia mountains is correctly pronounced “Cho-wee –sto-wee.” It’s an Indian word meaning “rabbit’s place.”