Listening to a radio program tonight while tying flies, I heard a voice (two actually) from out of the past. It was Ethel Merman and Ray Bolger singing a song about a lake in western Massachusetts that I hadn’t heard in over fifty years but which was one I enjoyed singing when I was a kid. A song with the simple but tongue-twisting title of “Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg.” (In case you’re wondering, yes, I did have to look up the proper spelling). Just repeating this word over and over used to drive my parents crazy–which is probably one reason why I liked the song so much.
Another reason was that it reminded me of happy summer days fishing on this lake. This was, after all, where I had caught my first largemouth bass, first pickerel, and first horned pout (none on flies but that didn’t matter at the time). It was also where I learned to water-ski (well, sort of). It was a magical place with a magical name: Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg (also called Lake Webster by the phonetically challenged).
Thinking about this lake, I decided to do a little research. Here’s what I found; well, some of what I found. From Wikipedia:
Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg (pronounced: don’t even try), a 46-letter alternative name for this body of water, is often cited as the longest place name in the United States and 6th longest in the world. Its 15 uses of “g” are the most instances of any letter in a word. The name also contains 9 instances of the letter “a” (not including the “a” in “lake”), more than any word in the English language.
This longest name means approximately “Englishmen at Manchaug territory at the meeting and fishing place at the boundary” and was applied in the 19th century when White people built factories in the area. “Manchaug” is derived from the “Monuhchogoks”, a group of Nipmuck Indians that lived by the lakeshore. Spelling of the long name varies, even on official signs near the lake.
I’ll bet you didn’t know this. I’ll bet also that you didn’t know that it’s still another week or so away from the arrival of striped bass in the Boston Harbor area. As I sit here counting the days until I can get back to the salt–weather permitting, of course–I’m wondering if the largemouth bass are now preparing their spawning beds on Lake Chargoggagoggmanchauggagoggchaubunagungamaugg. I’ll bet that they are.