The grinder, the sub and the hero, the po’boy and the Italian sandwich along with the torpedo are all recognized on National Eat a Hoagie Day on September 14.
The hoagie consists of meats, cheeses, vegetables, sauces and seasonings on a long roll of Italian or French bread. The origin of this giant sandwich is a bit of mystery.
The epicenter of the controversy seems to be eastern Pennsylvania where the DiCostanzas and DePalmas lay claim to being the first to make the hoagie. One family claims to have been making the sandwich since 1923 and the other since 1925. But who has the proof?
Another story from the Philadelphia area during World War I describes large Italian sandwiches shipyard workers would bring to work wrapped in newspaper to help them get through their long days. The massive sandwiches were nicknamed “hoggies” because anyone eating them at one sitting would have to be a hog. The transformation of the word to “hoagie” is explained by the Philadelphia accent which often exaggerates vowel sounds.
At one time if a kid skipped school it was called being “on the hook” or “playing hokey.” A “hokey” sandwich could be bought for a price a kid on the lam could afford, and eventually “hokey” became “hoagie” especially if the kids were skipping school.
But the best myth puts the ground zero of subbery in New London, CT, around World War II. The city (well, technically the town of Groton, across the river from the city proper) is home to the Navy’s primary submarine base and a large shipbuilding yard, both of which were understandably bustling during the war. According to this story, the big sandwich itself was invented by an Italian shopkeeper named Benedetto Capaldo in New London, but was originally known as a “grinder.” Once the sub yard started ordering 500 sandwiches a day from Capaldo to feed its workers, the sandwich became irrevocably associated with submersible boats.
A nice story, but the OED’s first printed record of “submarine sandwich” dates to a January 1940 phone book for Wilmington, DE, where a restaurant was advertising “submarine sandwiches to take out.” Seeing as how we didn’t mobilize for WWII until two years later, that pretty much torpedoes the New London legend.
You can read other legends of how this sandwich received its name HERE
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