Friday, February 6, 2009

Let's just call it "Lake C"

Lake Chaubunagungamaug, also known as "Webster Lake", is a lake in the town of Webster, Massachusetts, United States. It is located near the Connecticut border and has a surface area of 1,442 acres (5.83 km²).

Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, a 45-letter alternative name for this body of water, is often cited as the longest place name in the United States and one of the longest in the world. Today, "Webster Lake" may be the name most used, but some (including many residents of Webster), take pride in reeling off the longer versions.

This lake has several alternative names, but Lake Chaubunagungamaug is the name of the lake as recognized by the U.S. Department of the Interior. Nonetheless, many area residents, as well as the official website of the town of Webster, prefer the longer version.

The name comes from the language of the local Nipmuck people and means something close to "fishing place at the boundary". The lake was an important fishing spot on the borders of several tribal territories and lay at the nexus of many local paths of the Great Trail system. For these reasons the lake was often used as a meeting place.

Algonquian-speaking peoples had several different names for the lake as recorded on old maps and historical records. However, all of these were similar in part and had almost the same translation. Among other early names were "Chabanaguncamogue" and "Chaubanagogum".

A map of 1795, showing the town of Dudley, indicated the name as "Chargoggaggoggmanchoggagogg". A survey of the lake done in 1830 lists the name as Chaubunagungamaugg, the older name. The following year, both Dudley and Oxford, which adjoined the lake, filed maps listing the name as "Chargoggagoggmanchoggagogg".

Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg, the extra-long version of the name, is the longest place name in the United States and 6th longest in the world. Its 15 uses of "g" are the most instances of any letter in a word. The name also contains 9 instances of the letter "a" (not including the "a" in "lake"), more than any word in the English language.

This longest name means approximately "Englishmen at Manchaug at the fishing place at the boundary" and was applied in the 19th century when White people built factories in the area. "Manchaug" is derived from the "Monuhchogoks", a group of Nipmuck that lived by the lakeshore. Spelling of the long name varies, even on official signs near the lake. Webster schools use this long form of the name in various capacities.

Larry Daly, editor of The Webster Times, wrote a humorous article in the 1920s about the lake and the disputes concerning the meaning of its name. He proposed the tongue-in-cheek translation "You Fish on Your Side, I Fish on My Side, Nobody Fish in the Middle". It has met with so much popular acceptance that relatively little attention has been paid to the actual translation.

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