Why is New York City called the Big Apple?

When you think of New York City, images of dazzling skyscrapers, yellow cabs, Broadway lights, and that unmistakable energy come to mind. But before it became “the city that never sleeps,” New York earned another equally famous nickname, The Big Apple. It’s on T-shirts, souvenir mugs, and travel posters everywhere. But have you ever wondered what apples have to do with America’s most iconic city? Well, let’s find out together. The story begins in the early 1920s, at a horse racing track. John J. Fitz Gerald, a sports journalist for The New York Morning Telegraph, often covered horse races across the country. It so happened that during one of his trips to New Orleans, he overheard stable hands referring to New York City’s racetracks as “The Big Apple,” a place where the biggest prizes an