The particular dialectal feature Eric Baković notes at Language Log is not confined to Louisville. My wife and I have somewhat frequent discussions about whether she’s looking for a “pen” to write with or a “pin” to sew with, and she’s not even from the same state. (She’s from Kentucky.) (And if you’ve ever lived in Louisville, you know what I mean.) It’s the same with my relatives in Bell County, Kentucky. I’ll have to double-check my parents, though. They’ve lived in Michigan so long their accent has drifted some—although not by much.
What I really wish Eric had explained, however, was how one manages linguistically to condense “Louisville” into two and a half syllables!
Dr. Platypus 
I’ve got family in Louisville. One of them lives in “Luhvul” and the other in “LouEville”. Odd. Though one’s originally from Frankfort and the other is originally from the foothills …
I still remember my dad carefully explaining to me how to pronounce his home town (Lex’n’n).
Take care & God bless
Anne / WF
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I heard the pen/pin thing growing up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. There it was south side vs north side. Apparently my cousin was sure I wrote with a PIN. I could have sworn I wrote with a PEN.
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