Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg and Its Supposed Fish-on-Your-Side Translation

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, my name is Jason Johnson. I’m from Wakefield, Michigan.

Hi, Jason. How are you doing?

Good. Pretty good. How about yourself?

All right. What do you do in Wakefield?

I’m actually a web designer. I work from home.

What’s your language question today, Jason?

I actually have a question about the word lake.

I’ve often wondered why some lakes are named with the proper noun before the word lake, and some are named after.

We have a small lake in our town called Sunday Lake, and then, of course, north of us is the large lake called Lake Superior.

And I guess I would assume that the larger the lake, the word lake is before it.

But I’m wondering if there’s any specific rule or if it’s just up to the person that actually names the lake.

I can think of a number of examples right off the bat, like Lake Champlain or Lake Victoria.

Yet, you know, you have Lake Victoria, but you don’t say Falls Victoria.

You say Victoria Falls.

Right. Right.

Rivers, I believe, are the same way as well.

For example, what, Jason?

Isn’t the River Kwai?

Oh, yeah.

And most rivers are, you know, Mississippi River.

Yeah. Yeah.

Well, you know, it’s interesting, Jason.

I once ran this question past a professor at the University of Louisville, which is my hometown, named Frank Nessel, and he belongs to something called the American Names Society.

These are people who study onomastics. Yes?

Oh, I know these people.

They actually have their conference every year at the same time as the American Dialect Society, and I actually sit in on their session.

They’re some of the best papers I’ve ever seen.

Oh, really? Really?

Well, Dr. Nessel has written on the topic of onomastics, of course, a great deal.

And I actually asked him this question once, and he said there aren’t any hard and fast rules about this, but in general, as you suggested, Jason, the smaller lakes tend to have their specific name first and then the word lake.

And with bigger lakes, it’s the other way around.

So that was a good conjecture on your part.

And by the way, speaking of great big, Jason, did you know there’s a lake in Massachusetts with a name that is 46 letters long?

Oh, I did not know that. That’s got to be a record.

Yeah, it is. It is. It’s great.

It’s this Indian name, and I’m talking 46 letters long.

That’s almost two alphabets in length, right?

Let’s hear it.

It is called Lake Chargagagagmanchagagchabunagungamug.

What do the locals call it?

Actually, the locals do sometimes call it Webster Lake.

But the name Lake Chargagagagmanchagagchabunagungamug is supposedly an Indian name that means you fish on your side, I’ll fish on my side, nobody fish in the middle.

Oh, right. I have heard that one.

That is the story that’s been put out, but you know what?

Etymologists have traced that back, and the reporter who made it up was just joking.

So I think it means something like neutral fishing ground.

Jason, I have a question for you, though.

I mean, if we grow up with something like Lake Superior being the proper name, when you say Superior Lake, it really doesn’t stick for you, right?

Right, but I mean, like, I always thought the lake in my town, the small Sunday Lake, Lake Sunday sounds fine as well.

And there’s a lot of them, I believe, that could be changed either way, and they don’t sound too bad.

Yeah, but you wouldn’t want Lake Great Salt.

No, that’s true.

Lake Great Salt.

Right.

I also noticed, I looked on Wikipedia, all the different names in the U.S. of lakes, and it’s usually the ones with two words are almost always followed by the word lake, no matter how big they are.

Oh, yeah?

Well, that’s interesting.

I did notice that, yes.

Well, maybe you want to join the American Name Society.

Oh, I hope we’ve helped, Jason.

The rule is there’s no hard and fast rule.

Okay, that’s kind of what I figured.

But your hunch is correct, yeah.

Yeah.

All right, well, thank you for the call, Jason.

All right, bye-bye.

Best of luck.

Bye now.

Grant, you know what we should do?

What?

I know a place on the Internet where you can see a picture of the sign with the name of Lake Chargagamag, Manchagagag, Charbonagungamug.

We’ll post that right on the website, then.

We’ll post it on the website, and this is the best part.

I’ve saved the best part for last.

There is audio at this site that has a song by a guy who lives there near Webster Lake who was trying to teach his kid how to say the name of the lake.

That’s how I know the name of the lake.

And so we can link to the audio for that song.

Excellent.

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In my pajamas.