Naming Canada: Stories about Canadian Place Names - Softcover

Rayburn, Alan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0802082939 ISBN 13: 9780802082930

Publisher: University of Toronto Press, Scholarly Publishing Division, 2001

Synopsis

This wonderful collection of 76 essays explores the fascinating origin and meaning of the names of some of the towns, villages, cities, islands, mountains, and rivers that make up one of the world's largest countries. This new edition includes fifteen more essays, and updates the previous essays to include changes, corrections and new names to the year 2000.

Discover how some of Canada's most unusual place names came to be; unearth the Aboriginal roots of names such as Miramichi, Klondike, Iqaluit, Toronto, and Ottawa; learn the origin of such playful and mellifluous names as Medicine Hat, Twillingate, Flin Flon, Cupids, or Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! From Bonavista and Port au Choix in the east, to Malaspina Strait and Port Alberni in the west, this book also reveals the rich Portuguese, Spanish, and Basque contributions to Canada's toponymic heritage. Naming Canada tells us about place names that became undesirable and had to be changed for reasons of perceived political impropriety. The former Stalin Township, for example, was renamed after Rick Hansen, the renowned Man in Motion, who promoted research in spinal cord injuries. The book also discusses Canadian names that have been exported abroad, such as Quebec in England and Toronto in Australia. One new essay explores the nicknames used for Canadian places, and focuses on Hogtown as an alternative for Toronto.

This collection is the best single source, in an engaging essay format, on the origin and meaning of hundreds of Canadian place names. Alan Rayburn has had over 35 years' experience in researching Canada's toponymic roots and in writing about the authentic backgrounds behind thousands of names, from Toronto in the south to Tukyoyaktuk in the north, and from Labrador in the east to Juan de Fuca Strait in the west.

About this title

About the Author:

Alan Rayburn is the former executive secretary of the Canadian Permanent Committee on Geographical Names. He has written some 150 books, papers and articles in the toponymic field.

Review:

'Naming Canada is a bathroom book in the best tradition of the term. But much much more than that, it is also a book that informs and entertains...'

(Laird Rankin The Beaver)

'Alan Rayburn succeeds in bringing to life an unsuspected wealth of geographical names, associating them with their background and linking them to their history, thus providing the reader with an incredibly rich palette of Canadiana.'

(Andre Lapierre Onomastica Canadiana)

'Naming Canada will be enjoyed and valued as a resource by everyone with an interest in place names or the geography of Canada.'

(H. Gardiner Barnum The Canadian Geographer)

'This little book is full of entertaining stories. It is hard to put down once you start reading it. The stories are entertaining and give us some of the real cultural history of Canada.'

(R.J. Love Fredericton Daily Gleaner)

'A ramble through Naming Canada by Alan Rayburn turns up a wonderful variety of names.'

(Lew Gloin Toronto Star)

'Alan Rayburn is the Map Guy. Always has been.'

(Marke Andrews Vancouver Sun)

'This isn't your garden-variety let's-poke-fun at Dildo, Nfld. Author Rayburn looks at the origins of the place-names and how - and why - they've been altered by local tongue.'

(Halifax Daily News)

'Enjoyable and informative at the same time.'

(Nova Scotia Historical Review)

'The book is more than just names and numbers, Rayburn has also tried to seek out the whys and wherefore's that have been involved in how places in this country were named.'

(George Bentley Regina Leader Post)

'Nothing acts as a mirror for the social and cultural fabric of a country more than place names. Steeped in our past, they linger long after those who named them.'

(Rosalie Hodson Montreal Gazette)

About this edition

• Publisher: University of Toronto Press, Scholarly Publishing Division
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0802082939
• ISBN 13: 9780802082930
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 360