Presidential Layers

Twelve Mile Circle discovered quite the layering of Presidential place names recently, completely by accident. I tried to find a better example during the larger part of an afternoon and never came close. Someone from the audience should feel free to post a comment with better results.


Washington State

Washington State Capitol. Photo by dannymac15_1999; (CC BY-ND 2.0)
Washington State Capitol

George Washington as the first President of the United States certainly deserved places named for him in abundance. He probably didn’t need Washington Ditch although I couldn’t fault those responsible for digging a path through a swamp for seizing the opportunity.

New York City served as the US capital at George Washington’s inauguration in 1789 and it moved to Philadelphia the following year. In 1791, Washington appointed a commission to establish a new capital city in accordance with the Residence Act. The Commissioners came up with a new name for the city… Washington. I mentioned that because a really important place — namely the capital city of the United States — honored George Washington from the very earliest days of the nation.

Settlers moving to the Pacific Northwest north of the Columbia River wished to split from the previously-established Oregon Territory in 1853. They wanted to call their news state Columbia. Oregon Territory’s nonvoting representative in Congress took their case to the floor of the House of Representatives. Then things took a strange twist.

“Upon the completion of Lane’s speech, a new issue was injected into the proceedings. Suddenly the question was not whether the new territory should be created, but what name it should be called. Representative Richard Stanton of Kentucky rose and moved that the bill be amended by striking the word ‘Columbia’ wherever it occurred and substituting ‘Washington.’ The House then voted favorably on the motion.”

Despite legends to the contrary, the change was actually just one of those things that happened on a whim. They weren’t trying to prevent confusion with the District of Columbia. Congress simply wanted to honor George Washington even more. Thus the US ended up with a Washington State (map) not a Columbia State.


Lincoln County

Lincoln County Courthouse (Davenport, Washington). Photo by cmh2315fl; (CC BY-NC 2.0)
Lincoln County Courthouse

Washington State eventually subdivided into 39 counties. Several of them honored presidents other than Washington: Adams; Garfield; Grant; Lincoln; Jefferson and Pierce. Lincoln County (map) appeared in 1883, one of many places named for Abraham Lincoln in the US in the decades immediately following his assassination. The western states settled quickly during that era. Only Native Americans lived in what became Lincoln County just a decade earlier.

“‘Wild Goose Bill’ (Samuel Wilbur Condit) might have justly claimed the honor of being the first actual white settler of Lincoln County as he claims his advent into this country as a settler where the town of Wilbur now stands in 1875. Wilbur, named for its founder in 1887, was incorporated in 1889. While out hunting Mr. Condit once mistook a settler’s poultry and shot a fat gander. Ever after he was known as ‘Wild Goose Bill’. Before he platted and named Wilbur, his trading place was known as ‘Goosetown’.”

I liked that some guy accidentally shot a neighbor’s goose and they stuck him with a ridiculous lifelong nickname. People on the frontier could be cruel.


Lincoln (community)

Within Lincoln County I found a community of Lincoln. Sure, I’d prefer another president instead of the repetitious Lincoln. That didn’t happen. Lincoln County honored no presidents other than Lincoln although the notion of a President Fishtrap intrigued me. So I took what I could get. Nothing much distinguished the community of Lincoln beyond an RV Park/Campground and a post office with its own ZIP code (99147). It’s possible to send mail to people living in Lincoln, WA 99147.


Franklin Delano Roosevelt Lake

Actually one thing distinguished the tiny community of Lincoln. It stood on the banks of Franklin Delano Roosevelt Lake.

Lake Roosevelt formed as a result of the Grand Coulee Dam on the Columbia River (map). Construction began in 1933 at the beginning of the Roosevelt Administration and it took nine years to build. Its massive reservoir stretched 150 miles (240 kilometres), and the dam produces more electricity than any other facility in the United States even today. The President didn’t name the lake after himself, though. That happened after he died. I don’t know if this was the first place named for Roosevelt after his death although it had to be somewhere near the top of the list. Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes selected the name only five days after Roosevelt died.

Thus, the spectacular presidential layering to beat in this silly competition: Roosevelt Lake, with a community of Lincoln along its shores, in the county of Lincoln in the state of Washington.

Comments

2 responses to “Presidential Layers”

  1. Joe Avatar
    Joe

    Pretty sure it has been mentioned on here before, but best I have for you is the John Quincy Adams trifecta. John’s Square in Quincy, Adams County, Illinois is the central square of downtown Quincy, although it has since been renamed to Washington Park. In addition to the tribute to Adams, it also served as the site for one in a series of famous debates between Lincoln and Stephen Douglas. The park was also the site of a visit and speech by President Bill Clinton in January 2000. I am unable to find any conclusive evidence that the name change to Washington was for the president, but given the amount of historical naming in the area (including other squares/parks named Jefferson and Madison), it is a fairly safe assumption that the renamed Washington Park was for the First President.

  2. Washingtonian Avatar
    Washingtonian

    There’s all sorts of interesting presidential placenames throughout the state. The town of “George” on I-90 was named solely to be said alongside the state name, and there is/was a hotel called “Martha Inn” there.

    Speaking of Roosevelts, Seattle has a neighborhood called Roosevelt named for Teddy. There’s the Teddy bar, The Eleanor apartments, and the new light rail subway station there will have a pictogram depicting a bull moose (of the Bull Moose Party).

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