how would this school have gotten named?

Presumably it's not in Harrogate. Perhaps it is based on the principles of an educator named Harrogate.

It might have been named for an old battle ground or some famous war time thing.

It might be named for a famous medical/science discovery.

You didn't say what time period or what area this is located. Is this a real place?

It might be named for some famous ship.

It's your story. Named it for what ever you want.

What genre are you writing? It would help your fellow writers to come up with ideas.

The area was once a broad, fenced-in field, used in the 1700's as a hayfield, and even further back as pasturage. It was purchased by a wealthy man in the early 1800's who intended to build his home on the plot. However, upon digging the foundation, workers found an ancient relic in an underground pit.

Though some historians questioned exactly what it was - a slightly curved and polished, ten foot oaken plank embedded with over 100 pieces of sharp flint - the closest anyone could guess is that it was some type of ancient harrow, a farming tool used for breaking up clumps of soil prior to planting. (It resembled similarly-named ancient tools found in the south of Spain.)

Whatever it was, it was definitely an object of curiosity, and after cleaning, was hung in the solarium where the owner often entertained guests.

At an evening soiree about a year after the man finished building his great house, a visiting actress inquired why the house and estate were yet to be named. The owner replied he hadn't thought of a proper name, at which time the woman further inquired what the odd-looking and even dangerous thing was which hung inside the solarium. When told it was an ancient harrow, perhaps dating as far back as the Romans (or the earliest settlement of the colonies) the actress laughed and said then why not call the estate Harro(w)gate?

Because he was besotted with the woman, that's what he did.

However, the man, whose name is unimportant, died years later unmarried and without heir. In his will, he designated that the estate, along with what funds he had amassed, become a museum, or perhaps a school. It became the latter, though the original, ancient harrow is now gone. Lost, stolen or removed, it disappeared from the solarium shortly after Mr. -- passed away.

If it's a former manor house, I explained how it got its name. Maybe it was a private home up until the 1980's.

Anyhow, I got carried away, hehe.

Cuz I am a writer.

Secretly funded by Bruce Wayne, he did NOT want it named the Bruce Wayne Academy. The unconfirmed rumor that Mr Wayne founded it came out after his death (though it was pretty much verified by a young aspiring reporter for the Daily Planet who checked wills and estate records and followed the money), but there's no explanation for why he wanted it named Harrogate.

The founder's mam was born in Harrogate. Sorted.

^ LOL - was going to say almost exactly the same thing - that the founder was from Harrogate. Easy enough.

Aren't there a lot of towns etc in Mass. named after english towns? The whole colonial naming etc? It's fair to assume that the name would be picked out at random, or be the name of an old township etc that no longer exists.

Or it could be a surname.

Ot just a name someone pulled out of their ass, so to speak. You should hear what some of the schools around me are called.

The founder needed the support of a local politician, and so agreed to name the school after her (him).

Harrogate was a spa town, back in the day. Maybe the school has a hot spring.

I vote for dead astronaut or maybe an X-man.

There's a National Police Training Academy in Harrogate North Yorkshire, England. Could he have gone there?

Found this interesting tidbit:

"
Etymology

Possibly meaning place at the road to the cairn or heap of stones from the Old Norse haugr plus gata.[2]"


Website: http://dictionary.sensagent.com/harrogate+(borough)/en-en/ (beware the popup window if you don't have the auto-block on)

I like jaksen's explanation.

In Philadelphia there's a house whose owner resisted naming it. After a particularly lively conversation on the topic, the owner shouted out the first nonsense he could think of.

I believe that Grumblethorpe is open to the public for tours.

Could also be a corruption of an older name, 'Hallow's Gate' which marked it as a place where criminals were hung. (Hallow is sometimes another name for gallo or gallows or hanging post.) A local with a speech impediment started calling it Harrogate, and so the name stuck.

(Or maybe the locals didn't like the hanging-association and changed the pronunciation.)

Plus it was hard selling a property that supposedly had a lot of ghosts hanging around with nooses around their necks.

*The school could've gotten a significant donation from someone who either was named Harrogate or suggested the name for their own personal reasons (known or unknown). Glassboro State College was renamed Rowan College (then University) due to such a donation.

*It was named or renamed Harrogate after a famous person/graduate. Think of all the streets, schools, and other public works named after John F./Robert Kennedy and/or Martin Luther King Jr.