“Freedom Creek” is a crap name - it’s so generic it refers to nothing. “Free At Last Creek” or “Fuck Slavery Creek” would be much better.
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If the event referenced happened AFTER the Civil War, the escapee(s) was/were not slaves. They may have been prisoners of some unreconstructed Confederate, but - by law - slavery was no longer legal.
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Tennessee still “boasts” a community called Darkey Springs.
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While I understand and can admire the reasonable debate around the creek name I think it is hilarious we are having a serious discussion half joking around not naming a creek righteously enough
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there’s a creek that runs through some of my family’s property which is called, on the usgs topographic map for the area issued in the 70s, “negro creek.” on the usgs topographic map issued in the 50s it was called “n****r creek” which is what the locals older than 60 call it by now.
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Likewise, very near where I grew up, there was a sandbar “Negro Bar” separated from the rest of Long Island by “Negro Bar Channel.” The first word of the names was always pronounced, ‘n****r’. It was finally renamed this past October. I understand that the discussion to rename it was … delicate. Trump wanted to veto the bill because Schumer had introduced it and ostensibly for no other reason. In the end, he signed the bill, and ‘Joseph Sanford Channel’ that water became.
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Also because so many maps (and databases that the maps are produced from) are managed by the Federal government, notably the US Geologic Survey,
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Old white men will buy anything if you name it freedom, patriot, liberty, etc. Just don’t try to put those concepts into practice.
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Good move, though it took a while. Perhaps now we can do something about the street in Brooklyn honoring Robert E. Lee.
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We’ll be back
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So it begins …
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The original name was changed in 1906 by the United Daughters of the Confederacy. The original Runaway Negro Creek was in a different area of Savannah and was renamed Habersham Creek in 1875 during the Reconstruction era of US History.
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Note: Runaway Pond in Glover, Vermont, is not named after a runaway person, enslaved or otherwise. It’s called that because the pond itself ran away.
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Wait, so they named a pond that’s not there anymore?
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There’s a river near me named after a army guy from the 1700s who took a war party and slaughtered a Pemigewasset village either because they were frustrated they missed a large battle or in order to get a bounty. The river was named after him because he successfully murdered so many people. Now his name shows up on everything because we live in the x-river valley. That a-hole’s name is even in my work’s domain name.
There’s occasionally some effort to change the name back to what it was called before (Asquamchumauke), which may seem like a mouthful, but lots of natural features around here have their original name.
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I am white but have a couple of black ancestors who ran away and had children/grandchildren who successfully “passed”. I refer to these runaways (and to the many times great-aunt who was caught and whipped to death) as freedom fighters.
Why not Freedom Fighter Creek/
FDR had many geographic features renamed, including numerous Piss Creeks (now Pistol in TN) and Titty Peaks.
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But the heritage! Won’t someone think of the heritage?
Self-emancipation Creek would be closer to the original.
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Yeah thought the same.
Perhaps we should rename Dachau to Happy Fun Time City and Mauthausen to Tolerance Town. /s
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People could get used to it. They don’t complain that the Asquamchumauke flows from the slopes of Mount Moosilauke.
Sometimes I miss NH.
I think the name now refers to the swamp (occasionally a pond if it’s rained) where the pond used to be.
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