Moose Factory, Ontario, is not a place where mooses are assembled, but where a factor of the Hudson’s Bay Company was stationed.
Mt. Erebus, Antarctica, was not named after a dark region of Hades, but after an exploring ship, the HMS Erebus. Likewise Mt. Terror, was not named for its fearsome climate but after another ship in the same expedition.
Normal, Illinois, was not named for its ordinariness, but because it was the site of the Illinois State Normal University.
The name of my home city of El Cerrito means “the little hill” in Spanish. The hill the city is named for is in the nearby city of Albany.
Melbourne, Australia was founded by John Batman, and the name “Batmania” was (supposedly) a serious contender.
John Batman’s name is pronounced BAT m’n, unlike Batman of the comics which gives equal stress to both syllables.
Slight nitpick, it still has a port (or it did when I cycled past it a couple of hours ago) just that it is now used for pleasure craft rather than commercial traffic.
You could extend the theme as well and have Gershwin lane as elegant art-deco townhouses. Wagner parade would be towering neo-classical villas and Stockhausen st. would be stretches of scrubland punctuated by an igloo, a statue of a skipping pig, a broken lawnmower and a dripping tap.
The Sandwich Islands were discovered by Capt. Cook, one of John Montagu (4th Earl of Sandwich)'s card-playing buddies. “Sorry, your lordship, I haven’t the funds to fade that bet.” “Oh, name some new island after me or something.”
As for Alexandria VA, they have a historic marker claiming that it was named after the daughter of “Belhaven and Hunting Creek Warehouse’s” primary landowner, although Wikipedia cites a number of other founders with the surname of “Alexander.” I’m too far out of town to go check.
You don’t want to know what Picasso Place looks like.
Yeah, if in doubt it was probably taken from somewhere in the UK 
I come from a small town of about 20,000 people. Apparently there’s six places named after it in the US, as well as a couple in Canada.
The shame of seeing that I’d actually posted in this thread about ten months before this post. Dear oh dear.
HMS Erebus was, however, named after the region of Hades. It, like HMS Terror, was a Royal Navy bomb vessel, which were traditionally named after fear-inspiring things. Another example of “once-removed” name inspirations.
tl;dre-r, so somebody or I myself might have already posted this:
Houston Street NYC named after William, not Sam.
It’s a major dividing street–equivalent to “0” street before the numbers, and anyone who pronounces it like Sam and not “How-ston” reveals his non-nativity.
Although I have never seen proof that William pronounced it that way, come to think of it (not that I’ve tried).
What a burn if all the smug natives were wrong, at least at one level.
Ironically, Calgary, Alberta, is named after Calgary, Scotland.
And there’s “a speck of dirt” in Texas called Calgary.
FWIW, Banff, Alberta , is named after **Banff, Scotland **, which, circularly speaking, has a Banff Springs Hotel named for the Banff Springs Hotel in Banff, Alberta. I went in for lunch, so I could say I’ve dined in both.
I’ve dined in both.
Mt Jackson is on the southern end of NH’s Presidential mountain range, which has peaks named for Presidents Washington, Adams, Monroe, Madison, Jefferson, Eisenhower, and Pierce. But Mt Jackson was named for Charles Thomas Jackson, the stage geologist in the 1830’s.
About the ital on naming: I’m not being very helpful here, but philosophers have wrestled with this for ages. * PTSD survivor of philosophy of language semester *
Related in general to this mini-drift, my favorite, in France:
La Mort au Juifs, France (current Google map). Google Maps, citing Wiki, which must be true, says “[…] its name can be translated 'The Death of the Jews” or "Where Jews Died.’ " Anything can be translated to anything if you you don’t know a language or want to euphemize reality, but its translation from French is “Death to the Jews.”
But of course, some might rightly claim this is exactly counter-example to OP premise:
[ … In 2014 … ] Ms Secretand for the [town] council said: ‘Why change a name that goes back to the Middle Ages or even further? We should respect these old names.
‘A previous municipal council, at least 20 years ago, already refused to change the name of this hamlet, which consists of a farm and two houses.’[cite]
Arsenal in London was not named so because it had an arsenal there, but because of the football team. The team was originally sited in Woolwich, next to the arsenal there.
Several pubs (or orginally inns) in England gave their name to the areas around them rather than the other way round. The first two that spring to mind are Angel and Seven Sisters, both in London.
Stanford University is not named after founder Leland Stanford but rather he named it in honor of his only child Leland Jr., who died of typhoid fever at age 15.
Ahem a third time: there’s still an Earl of Atholl, though that title is subsumed into his higher one of Duke of Atholl. He’s the commander of the only legal private army in the UK, the Atholl Highlanders. Atholl was an ancient region of the eastern Highlands of Scotland.
“An elevated region of great natural beauty, imposing mountains, and limited fertility.”
Just don’t call her that to her face; she’s tired of the pun. :rolleyes:
