The Wombat File Is Yours to Keep: The Friday Quiz: A Question of Origins

Far away from our usual haunts today, the Wombat will be only able to check in on your progress from time to time. But nevertheless, here's today's lame-ass attempt to amuse and bemuse:

The earliest recorded use of this proper name was in a 1765 petition by one Robert Rogers to the Kingdom of Great Britain, asking for money. The following year, a man named Jonathan Carver, working from a commission given to him by Rogers, used the name in his account of his labors. It shows up half a century later in a famous narrative poem, and it was that use which helped establish in regular usage, and ushered it on to its increasingly official and legitimate life.

Some scholars of its origin(i.e., where Rogers picked it up) suggest a mis-transcription of an early French attempt to spell the local name of the Wisconsin river; this has gained more credence than the suggestion that it is the corruption of the French for "hurricane." Another, more recent theory advanced is that Rogers used one of two similar-sounding Algonquian words, both meaning essentially "good and beautiful."

What is the name, still in official use today? For a bonus point, what was the famous poem?

First correct answer posted to comments gets a very poor digital image of the recent lunar eclipse, marred in particular by an unfortunately placed streetlamp. No Googling or casting your shadow on the surface of the moon, a feat impressive but useless for the generation of witty and entertaining comments. Comment as often as the will to comment lives on in your upright and commentful soul, yet give forth with only one answer per comment, lest your comments as a whole be seen to be corrupted and cast into the pit of unrighteous comments.

Comments

Hiawatha

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 07:27 AM

Minnesota

Posted by: herbivorous | February 22, 2008 08:21 AM

Huh. In Ojibwe, sipi is river, mino is good and miiko is beautiful. Mississippi River sounds close and borders Wisconsin. Unfair advantage taken by a student of Anishinaabemowin.

Posted by: shananan | February 22, 2008 09:06 AM

It seems incredible to me that Mississippi would not have been in common use until a poem ~1815.

Besides, is there not a Mississippi tribe?

I like herbivorous' Minnesota guess. "Minne" means water in the language where "Minnihaha" means "laughing waters."

Thanks to Wayne's World and Alice Cooper, I know Milwaukee means...well, I can't remember but I do know its etymology is not in doubt.

So what's left to guess? I'll try "Missouri" although I think that's pretty weak, and besides, Mississippi and Missouri obviously share an etymology, so weird theories about "French for hurricane" could be dismissed out of hand.

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 10:52 AM

Channelling G. Lightfoot, and with no good idea how to spell it, I just wanna say GITCHEE GOOMEE!

Posted by: hackly_fracture | February 22, 2008 11:40 AM

Nothing yet...the poem is not by Longfellow...

Posted by: lewombat | February 22, 2008 01:21 PM

Winnebago?

Posted by: Scraps | February 22, 2008 02:53 PM

Oshkosh?

Posted by: Scraps | February 22, 2008 02:54 PM

Waukegan?

Posted by: Scraps | February 22, 2008 03:04 PM

Kenosha?

Posted by: Scraps | February 22, 2008 03:06 PM

Sheboygan?

Posted by: Scraps | February 22, 2008 03:08 PM

BJ: Longfellow did not know his Algonquin and that poem is full of mistakes. Nipi means water in Algonquin. Minnesota comes from the Dakota (Siouan language), the original inhabitants.

Posted by: shananan | February 22, 2008 03:26 PM

Duluth

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 04:27 PM

Huron

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 04:31 PM

Minnesota comes from Sioux, but still means "water," right?

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 06:03 PM

That is, the root "Minne" means "water," right?

Posted by: boxjam | February 22, 2008 06:04 PM

KALAMAZOO!

If that's not the right answer, Kalamazoo damned well better be the right answer to some excellent question sometime real soon.

Posted by: boxjam | February 24, 2008 05:02 PM