Towns names

Jonah Hex

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Hi writers,
how do you name the towns in your western stories?

I don't like to use real towns (unless my stories have a historical character) so I have a good time inventing new names for towns, rivers, canyons, and the like. I have a particular crush for spanish names like Tascosa, Tucumcari, Aguas Calientes, Mariposa... So my towns are called Arrojo Seco, Cascabel, Pozo Alto, Rio Rojo...

But I like english names too! My favorite is Blackwater and so I named the town of one of my stories as Blackstone.

I often use a great book as an help: "Arizona Place Names", since most of my tales take places in Arizona. It's a great reference book, with both english and spanish names. "Wyoming Place Names" and "Colorado Place Names" are pretty good too.
 
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blacbird

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Native American names are very common in the Western U.S., as well as elsewhere. Plus there are a lot of places named after people. And, just as a note, the name you suggested as "Arrojo Seco" should actually be spelled as "Arroyo Seco" (Dry Gulch or Dry Valley). To which I'd bet there is at least one place named that in the Southwest U.S.

caw
 

Brightdreamer

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When people mention town names, I think back to an anecdote I heard many years back about a dot-on-the-road town named after a pair of beetles fighting in the street: Bugtussle.

(I have never confirmed the existence of this town, but I believe it was somewhere in the South. One of those stories you hear at a party and never quite forget.)

As for naming Western towns, consider who might have settled there. You'll get more Spanish names in areas that historically were colonized by Spaniards (the Southwest), for instance. Others were named for prominent settlers or geographical features. Some were named for local industries around which the town was built (regardless of whether that industry lasted; locally, we have Black Diamond named for the now-closed coal industry, and a place called Mill Creek that clearly had lumber ties.) Native American names tended to be somewhat bent by translation into English; the chief for which a prominent Western city was named has been called Seattle or Sealth, for instance, and likely wasn't quite either. And some names are essentially random names that stuck, particularly boom town names.

You might also consider whether you want your town name to foreshadow events or reinforce a theme (perhaps ironically - a town called Heaven that's more like Hell on Earth, for instance.)
 
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Elenitsa

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I like real towns. The town settled by my characters (a convoy of Venetians) on the Mississippi is called Venice. And it exists - Venice, Illinois, part of Greater Saint Louis area. I have also touched the history of Saint Louis and its growing in parallel with my Venice (and what Chouteau-Laclede clan do to sabotage their rivals in business in emerging Venice after a few years). Another little settlement a bit higher up in Minnessotta is called Roxana, and it is named after my main character by her husband, on the territory where they used to keep the horses to graze.
 

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It has to feel organic, if you ask me. Sure, you could call a city X and it would be loyal to history, but it has to flow seamlessly in the setting. A place where Venice is ten miles away from Tenochticlan is jarring (or just your average game of Sid Meier's civilization), same as having an Arroyo Seco and Riviera inhabited by Jurgens and Toyotomis, so you'd kind of need to do a bit of mapping of the clusters and wider areas, all while coordinating them, or come with explanations of why this pastiche happens while not coming across as infodumping.
 

Jonah Hex

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Native American names are very common in the Western U.S., as well as elsewhere. Plus there are a lot of places named after people. And, just as a note, the name you suggested as "Arrojo Seco" should actually be spelled as "Arroyo Seco" (Dry Gulch or Dry Valley). To which I'd bet there is at least one place named that in the Southwest U.S.

caw
You're right, it was my mistake: it's Arroyo - with the 'y' -, not Arrojo. Thanks for the correction, blacbird.
 

Siri Kirpal

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Sat Nam! (literally "Truth Name"--a Sikh greeting)

Arroyo Seco is the name for a section of Pasadena, noted for its Greene and Greene Craftsman "bungalows." (In parentheses because some of them are huge.)

Blessings,

Siri Kirpal
 

Jondo_

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When people mention town names, I think back to an anecdote I heard many years back about a dot-on-the-road town named after a pair of beetles fighting in the street: Bugtussle.

(I have never confirmed the existence of this town, but I believe it was somewhere in the South. One of those stories you hear at a party and never quite forget.)

Well, I can clear this one up for you-- it's in Tennessee! I actually think I may have family near there.
 

Snowstorm

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I love coming up with character and town names. I use either true and known people from the era that the fictional town was "founded", or if there are clusters of towns I key off any local real ones. In my book #2 I used Colter for the town, named after mountain man John Colter. In book #3, I named my fictional village Placer City since two tiny nearby 1860s-era towns were gold mining-related settlements. Placer is a mining term.
 

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When people mention town names, I think back to an anecdote I heard many years back about a dot-on-the-road town named after a pair of beetles fighting in the street: Bugtussle.

(I have never confirmed the existence of this town, but I believe it was somewhere in the South. One of those stories you hear at a party and never quite forget.)

I know this thread is old, but since we're reviving it, I had to look this up. omg, it's real. AND there's ice cream involved. #BestCreationStory
 

Jerome Price

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Currently I'm writing a story that takes place near Deadwood Dakota Territory. My characters built a town calling it Purgatory. In two other stories, the protagonists also built their own towns naming them for themselves, "Deakstown," and Dymebox. There were dozens of towns in the old west now just dust and memories use your imagination. I can't remember right now but I always liked the name of that town in "High Plains Drifter."
 

RBEmerson

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Necro-posting but... Between Allentown and Harrisburg (closer to Allentown), Pennsylvania is the town "Rough and Ready". Out towards Lancaster, PA there's a large Amish area. The town names are ...ah... memorable. For example, "Bird In Hand", "Blue Ball", and of course every good Amish boy (and girl, I guess) knows you have to go through Intercourse to get to Paradise

Re: real places. I'm working with towns in modern day Navajo County (formerly part of Yavapai County). The town had to exist in 1873. Modern day Holbrook, AZ was, at the time, Horsehead Crossing (across the Little Colorado R). OTOH some town names remain unchanged (Clay Springs, Show Low). One is frustrating because it doesn't show up in time: Snowflake.

Not having any contemporary maps or building names, such as the Grand Hotel, or Wally's Dew Drop Inn, I grabbed plausible names and said "close enough". MC and his bride spent a brief honeymoon in "Abbot's hotel" - no hurt, no foul. Contemporary maps for Prescott, AZ are available. They include many names in addition to street names. I appropriated Pacific Brewery. MC says they produced a particularly fine lager. Dunno about the "particularly fine" part, but lagers were everywhere. PDF copes of The Arizona Weekly Miner, a four page, single sheet newspaper, can be found on-line in the Library of Congress. I even found when the editor got married (Sept. of '73).

I invented a whistle stop where an existing railroad crosses a significant north-south trail. The MC, in his foreword, says "some rail enthusiast may object to my reference to the whistle stop near Cottonwood Tank. All I can say is I never saw them present when I got on or off there." (Cottonwood Tank exists).

Point being, there's plenty of material available. As long as someone doesn't write "Ah, wonderful Weasletown, where the men are men, and the sheep are nervous", don't sweat it.
 
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InkFinger

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I name towns for their geography and history - Bald Gap, Dead Water, Captain's Gulch, Standards Bridge. That sort of thing.
 
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RBEmerson

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Keep in mind a lot of towns are tied to someone's name - Smithville, Coochs Bridge (Delaware - Rev. War battle fought there), Marleys Corners (Marley set up a store, saloon, whatever at a cross road), Chadds Ford (Chadd took over a river crossing). Start the town, pick the name. Biblical names - Caanan - fills up, someone is made unwelcome, whatever and there's New Caanan. Place looks like where settlers came from - New York, New Amsterdam. Don't quite want to give up the old name - Boston.

We stayed in an AZ state park called Dead Horse Ranch State Park. Family from the upper Midwest decided, in the late 1940's - early 50's to move to AZ. The family drove around, looking for a place to buy. The short list had had three or four names. Dad says OK, which one, and one of the kids said they liked the one with the dead horse (don't ask why there was a dead horse). There's the ranch's name. One thing and another, the family decides to give the ranch to the Arizona State Park system. IF the state kept the name - Dead Horse Ranch State Park, near Cottonwood, AZ, east of Prescott, along the Rio Verde (Green River). Look it up.

Phoenix. There was a try at a settlement, but it didn't go so well. But the location is along the Salt River (dunno why Salt) and it's not a bad place for planting (the Anasazi planted there thousand plus years ago). Someone got the clever idea to try starting a new settlement west of the old settlement, in the ashes of the old town. The new settlement arose from the ashes of the first try. Rose like a Phoenix from the ashes.
 
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RBEmerson

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I kind of like "Hell on Earth" for a town name. I might have to use that one.

caw
Keep in mind that a name like that stands out to the point it becomes almost a character. Harrisburg is just a backdrop. No critique here, just a "think about it when writing".

It's like names. My mother swore (well, affirmed) that she went to school with an Irma May Jones (whatever) who married a John Popp - hello, Irma May Popp.

For that matter, don't forget Johnny Cash's "A Boy Named Sue". Along that line, a WIP's MC is born, in Philadelphia, Walter De La Mare. A name like that in any school is a problem. In a city school? MC enlists in an infantry regiment as Jack Wilson. Wonder why... For those who remember that far back, Wally (among other names) happens to resemble Clint Walker. Walter generally dissuades his classmates, and others, from abusing his name.
 
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Helix

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Keep in mind that a name like that stands out to the point it becomes almost a character. Harrisburg is just a backdrop. No critique here, just a "think about it when writing".

It's like names. My mother swore (well, affirmed) that she went to school with an Irma May Jones (whatever) who married a John Popp - hello, Irma May Popp.

For that matter, don't forget Johnny Cash's "A Boy Named Sue". Along that line, a WIP's MC is born, in Philadelphia, Walter De La Mare. A name like that in any school is a problem. In a city school? MC enlists in an infantry regiment as Jack Wilson. Wonder why... For those who remember that far back, Wally (among other names) happens to resemble Clint Walker. Walter generally dissuades his classmates, and others, from abusing his name.


Somewhat disappointed that you're almost certainly not referring to Walter de la Mare the English poet or Clinton Walker the Australian writer.
 
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RBEmerson

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Somewhat disappointed that you're almost certainly not referring to Walter de la Mare the English poet or Clinton Walker the Australian writer.

Y'know, there are times I think I've come with name known "only if you Google it". And Walter De La Mare pops up. OTOH the Mr. Walker I had in mind is this one.
 
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RBEmerson

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Further, instead of worrying about the poet (don't ask me what he wrote - total blank), I worried about Debussy's La Mare. Go figure.

I spent 3-4 days working in Mt. Gilead, North Carolina (on the - no joke - Pee Dee River). That's Gilead as in GILL-Ed <- the name "Ed".

Recalling the name brought a joke to mind - it may be old, it may be copyright, but... Man walks into the Gilead convenience store, complaining about chapped lips. "Oh, sir! I am so sorry but there is no balm in Gilead." (Rickety-boom-boom)
 
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RBEmerson

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The writer I currently like to pick on (rant saved for another day), Louis L'Amour, seems to have a fondness for Tascosa, Mobeetie to name two_Over and over, there they are. Point being, except for writing a series using a common setting (or settings), and excepting big places (if needed), "different stories, different place". That how I see it. [/ BIG GRIN]
 
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