I have heard something similar, though I have never found a description of it that seemed completely reliable. 

The story seems to be that Noah Webster "rationalised" spellings when compiling his dictionary, in some cases reverting to more ancient forms which didn't have the French influence that British spellings did. I don't know if that accounts for examples like the replacement of 'ph' with 'f' though. I'd like to find a detailed explanation written by a linguist or similar academic, but so far I have failed to do so.

I'd also prefer to get away from the haranguing which is often resorted to on both sides of these arguments. "Those *@*s over there don't know how to spell properly". You know the type of thing.

I quite like 'Leftpondia' and 'Rightpondia' by the way. Never encountered those before.