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by nerdponx 3252 days ago
"An historic" is not only still acceptable in the USA, but it also (IMO) sounds better. The leading "H" is not a strong-sounding consonant, and is often dropped in both American and British English.
1 comments

I will look that up in an history book and get back to you.
They're pronounced differently:

History: /ˈhist(ə)rē/

Historic: /hiˈstôrik/

The 'h' is stressed in 'history', not in 'historic'. Try pronouncing 'historic' with a stress on the first syllable, it sounds wrong. Since it's softer in historic it's more natural (to me anyway) to use 'an'.

(Also, I'm french so I barely pronounce h's to begin with - so in my speech the stressed 'h' in history is kinda soft, and the unstressed h in historic is barely there.)

(edited)

I've never heard the Hs pronounced differently here in the US. Perhaps its too subtle for me.