Walk The Real Tolkien Trail.

[The Lady of Ithilien]

Wading through the thickets of politics and geography for a bit....

Originally posted by Artanis
*still smiling*
LOL! The idea of America representing the Undying Lands ...

Say rather, the Americas, and think of Númenor, whence either directly or through its empire came all those "New World" things into Middle-earth: tobacco, potatoes, coffee, etc.

But also a good case can be made for an influence on Tolkien from the United States. Exhibit A would definitely be Stephen Crane's The Black Riders and Other Lines. Crane's black riders referred to a childhood dream he had where black riders had appeared out of the sea. One could say this is a coincidence, but check out #37:

On the horizon the peaks assembled;
And as I looked,
The march of the mountains began.
As they marched, they sang,
"Aye! We come! We come!"

Tell me JRRT's song of the Ents wasn't influenced by this!

Then there is Ambrose Bierce's definition of "Belladonna" in The Devil's Dictionary:

Belladonna, n. In Italian a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the essential identify of the two tongues.

Perhaps it's reaching a bit to say JRRT was taken by this, perhaps by the language reference, and chose the name for Bilbo's mother; however, Bierce himself was familiar enough with Oxford (versus Cambridge) to complain about the British pronunciation "Maudlin" for "Magdalen" (College, in Oxford): see the entry in his dictionary for "Magdalene." Perhaps he lectured there.

Anyway, these two writers were alive, famous and and influential at about the time JRRT was at his most impressionable. I'd say there's a strong case for an American influence on him.