Town and city names.

[Kleftiwallah]

Is there a website where I can look up the explanation of American town and city names? I know we Brits have some wierd ones, I mean Piddle Hinton, Sixpenny Handley, Sour Milk Ghill and the place where I was born Longcleughside but you lot have some real crackers! Cheers, Tony.

 

[Wade E]

Not to my knowledge but who knows.

 

[ibglowin]

If there is a story behind how a town got its name I would think Wikipedia would have some type of blurb about it.

 

[Rocky]

They are normally named after famous families who settled the area, a geographical feature of the area, a historical personality or a business that originated or was prominent in the area. We have many cities that come from American Indian languages ("native American" if you prefer the politically correct term for people who emigrated over the Bering Strait from Asia) and some that come from French or Spanish settlers in the area. Lastly, some are named after European cities from which the settlers came.

Did you have a particular city or town in mind? For example, I live in Powell, Ohio. Judge Powell settled in the area many years ago. I am originally from Pittsburgh, named after William Pitt, one of your "goombas." Mike is from Los Alamos, New Mexico. In Spanish, it means, "the cottonwoods" which would suggest that at present or at one time there were a lot of these poplars in the area.

One can usually get to the etymology of the location, but Intercourse, Pennsylvania remains a mystery to me. It is in southeastern Pennsylvania near the towns of Blue Ball, Paradise, Bird in Hand and Fertility. What puzzles me is that the town was incorporated in AD 1754 and still has fewer than 1600 inhabitants.

 

[thecrabappler]

Is there a website where I can look up the explanation of American town and city names? I know we Brits have some wierd ones, I mean Piddle Hinton, Sixpenny Handley, Sour Milk Ghill and the place where I was born Longcleughside but you lot have some real crackers! Cheers, Tony.

LOL! Made me chuckle. I just stumbled upon this. I am from a city called Regina. Named in 1882 after Queen Victoria, Victoria Regina. But before that, The natives reffered to the area as Pile of Bones. From some Bison bones that were in the area. Not the best story but, sound cooler than Regina lol.

 

[Runningwolf]

One can usually get to the etymology of the location, but Intercourse, Pennsylvania remains a mystery to me. It is in southeastern Pennsylvania near the towns of Blue Ball, Paradise, Bird in Hand and Fertility. What puzzles me is that the town was incorporated in AD 1754 and still has fewer than 1600 inhabitants.

LMAO, Rocky you really held back on that one! Rocky is right all of these towns are near Lancaster, PA in a huge Amish settlement. Along with the towns he named he left out Intercourse. There have been several movies filmed there or near by. You can always Goggle a towns name also.

Intercourse was founded in 1754. The community was originally named Cross Keys, after a local tavern. Intercourse became the name in 1814. The village website gives several theories for the origins of the name.


"Another theory concerns two famous roads that crossed here. The Old King's highway from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh (now the Old Philadelphia Pike) ran east and west through the center of the town. The road from Wilmington to Erie intersected in the middle. The joining of these two roads is claimed by some to be the basis for the town 'Cross Keys' or eventually 'Intercourse'.[1] A final idea comes from the use of language during the early days of the Village. The word 'intercourse' was commonly used to describe the 'fellowship' and 'social interaction and support' shared in the community of faith, which was much a part of a rural village like this one."[

 

[djrockinsteve]

There are many towns with amusing names. Here's a web site for a list.
http://www.accuracyproject.org/towns.html

I agree wikipedia would be a great place to start for research.

 

[Runningwolf]

OMG Steve those are too funny!

 

[countrygirl]

i live in fancy farm, ky...will see if we made the list, hahaha

 

[countrygirl]

didn't make the cut, hahahaha

 

[djrockinsteve]

OMG Steve those are too funny!

Yea some of those were really funny. Can't imagine living in some of those towns. It would be a great conversation starter though.

 

[Dugger]

How about Dildo, Newfoundland!! One of their more colourful place names!

 

[BobF]

My town is 'Licking'

 

[countrygirl]

dang bobf, we been to licking!!! love to stay there and fish at montauk!

 

[BobF]

dang bobf, we been to licking!!! love to stay there and fish at montauk!

It's that time again soon!

 

[JohnT]

"This is America baby! Our names don't mean S##T".

(quote: Bruce Willis in "Die Hard").

 

[SLOweather]

In California, many place names come from Spanish: Atascadero- muddy hole, Arroyo Grande- deep ditch, and anything beginning with San or Santa is named for a saint. San Luis Obispo is named for St. Louis of Anjou, the Bishop of Toulouse (St Louis the Bishop).

A lot of proper Spanish city names are shortened for English brevity. Paso Robles is officially El Paso De Robles (The pass of the oaks), and Ventura is the City of San Buenaventura.

And therefore a lot of place and street names are based on Spanish words. Our street is Via Laguna Vista (literally Road Lagoon View). Since English speakers make so many of these up, they are not grammatically correct Spanish. I think if that were correct, it would be something like Via De La Vista De La Laguna.

This also leads to some cross-language redundancy. The lake referred to above is Laguna Lake (Lagoon Lake). North of town is Cuesta Ridge (Slope Ridge) and the US 101 path over it is called Cuesta Grade (Slope Grade).

So when you live on Via Laguna Vista, in San Luis Obispo, and you are ordering on the phone with anyone east of the Sierra Nevada Mountains (Snowy Jagged Mountain Mountains), you learn to spell EVERYTHING!