Groublogpon – The Serious Blog of Groupon

This week we investigated San Diego’s Gulf Coast Grill, which to our surprise, is not located in the Gulf Coast. In fact, the Gulf Coast region you know and love was not the first “Gulf Coast”:

Today, the Gulf Coast region is composed of the five U.S. states that border the Gulf of Mexico—but that was not always the case. The five original Gulf States—New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, and America Jr.—were known as the Gulf States because “Gulf” once meant “highfalutin” and did not refer to a body of water. This was also when Philadelphia was a state and “four” and “five” meant the same thing.

Soon, however, the popular usage of “Gulf” shifted, and the states that were near the Water-Gulf of Mexico took the mantle of Gulf States. Unfortunately, history has not been kind to the original Gulf States: New York was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire; New Jersey is currently 80% covered in water parks; Philadelphia lost its statehood in a friendly World Series bet between governors; and America, Jr. became Portugal.