By now we are all probably aware of the media flash-mob that has erupted over presidential candidate Rick Perry’s badly named hunting ranch leased plot near Haskell, Texas. There’s quite a story in the New York Times about it here.
Seeing the word used today, it reminded me of an odd experience in west Texas earlier this year where I heard the term used before. I had forgotten all about it until today. I hadn’t intended to write a story on this at all, but curiosity about that event led me down an interesting set of rabbit holes, so I thought I’d share what I learned about this ugly and offensive term and how surprising the wide and varied use of it is.
In the spring, I was at a conference/tradeshow in Oklahoma and Dallas where I showed some of our weather equipment. Reader may recall I blogged about the Japan earthquake and Tsunami while in a hotel room in Oklahoma City. The next week I was in Dallas. Shortly after the conference closed, I had the misfortune of driving along a stretch of lonely highway 82 between Dallas and Lubbock. I had to go through Lubbock because I needed to go to Muleshoe, TX, where there was an unsurveyed USHCN station I wanted to add to the surfacestations.org station database, and Muleshoe (only to discover later that Juan Slayton had added it already) was so that had to be my route so I could connect to Highway 388 which goes NW from Lubbock to Muleshoe, and then on to Fort Sumner NM where I wanted to verify a Google street view on an MMTS. My GPS, as GPS’s sometimes do had me going on some backroads, including Munday, TX which I thought had an odd name and I got turned around for a bit and found myself headed south on 277 to Haskell. Got that solved and headed west on 222 to connect to 82.
I found myself in a pickle when I reached Guthrie, TX because I was getting low on gas, and I hadn’t seen any gas stations. From the 82 bypass around Guthrie I spotted what looked to be a gas station, so I double back, took the exit and went into town. It was a gas station alright, long since closed and there was nothing else in town. I was afraid I’d find myself stranded in Guthrie. I was struck by the fact that I was in the middle of one of the biggest oil producing states, and there was not a drop of gasoline to be found. There was no cell service that would support web browsing on my phone either, so I couldn’t search for one.
So I drove around just a bit in Guthrie, until I spotted somebody I could ask. It was like a ghost town, but I finally found someone (actually they found me because parked and waited and he rode by on a bike) and I flagged the guy down and asked where I might find some gas. He thought a moment and said “There’s no gas here, nearest is either Ralls or Crosbyton”. I asked where those towns were and he said: “on 82 (pointing west) out past the niggerheads, and then past Dickens”. I said “What? Niggerhead? Is that a town? and he looked at me like I was from another planet (I didn’t tell him I was from California) and he said “no that’s the hills, you’ll see em, and then ya go through Dickens, and Crosbyton, and then Ralls. One of ‘em should have gas.”
I did find gas in Crosbyton, after driving west on 82 through the hills the man described which you can see here in Google maps.
The term “niggerheads” was puzzling and odd, but I figured it was just some local colloquialism, and I didn’t give it another thought…until today.
So after being bombarded with all the news stories about how offensive this term is, and noting that some of the same people doing reporting lambasting Perry over the name of a ranch called “niggerhead” have absolutely no trouble at all calling people like me and the readers of WUWT “deniers” (Think Progress, Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, among others) which is also an ugly and offensive term due to the connection to “holocaust deniers”.
So, I thought I’d see what I could find on it. I figured if it was some sort of local colloquial term when I heard it in Texas last spring, I’d find it in older books and maps.
So in my first Google search, amongst all the news stories about Perry, I found my first clue as to why I heard the term, in Wikipedia:
The term was once widely used for all sorts of things, including products such as soap and chewing tobacco, but most often for geographic features such as hills and rocks.[citation needed] In the U.S., more than hundred “Niggerheads” and other place names now considered racially offensive were changed in 1962 by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, but many local names remained unchanged.[1]
So that explained why the fellow I asked directions from used the term for the hills I’d drive through. The NYT article I cited above also mentions this.
I can understand how it is offensive, and I can certainly see removing it. But I think removing it is going to be a much bigger job than the bloodhounds in the mainstream media thinks. Just look at all the references to the word in science and engineering and geography:
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Nigger Head, an island in North Queensland, Australia
United States. Bureau of Fisheries – 1921 – Free Google eBook – Read
NIGGERHEAD GROUP. The shells of the niggerhead group distinguish themselves from all others of the Quadrula class by combining a … In buying mussels for button manufacture the price is often based upon the percentage of niggerheads.
Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen and Enginemen – 1911 – Free Google eBook – Read
One chamber casting (acting as a nigger head), is bolted centrally to the dry pipe in such a manner as to have the fingers … As the throttle is opened, steam is admitted through the dry pipe to the header which acts as a nigger head.
The vegetation of New Zealand – Page 157
books.google.com Leonard Cockayne – 1921 – 456 pages – Free Google eBook – Read
3- Niggerhead (Carex secta)-association. Here shock-headed masses of C. secta are dominant raised above the water on … Niggerhead -swamp contains many of the ordinary swamp-plants and many transitions occur between it and Phormium-
License my roving hands: poems and stories – Page 19
books.google.comJuanita Tobin – 2000 – 57 pages – Preview
NIGGERHEAD ROAD The squeaky, old doors have closed forever on a school, a drug store and train station with a telegraph office where matrimonial ads and baseball games were transmitted as well as business on the stock exchange and a …
International Association of Bridge, Structural, and Ornamental Iron Workers – 1905 – Free Google eBook – Read
THE MAN ON THE NIGGER HEAD. His legs are poor, he can’t go aloft, In the “bull” gang he is dead; But should the boss throw a line across He is first to the ” nigger head.” He keeps the line coiled neat and trim, But I have often heard it…
In the Alaskan wilderness – Google Books Result
books.google.com/books?id=BHUtAAAAYAAJ…George Byron Gordon – 1917 – Alaska – 247 pages
This is what is called nigger- head and muskeg in the language of the North. … on any map of Alaska), and prepared to do all the portaging ourselves. …
Highway to Alaska
books.google.com Herbert Charles Lanks – 1944 – 200 pages – Snippet view
16 Niggerhead and Horse Camp Lakes The next day I decided to explore ahead on foot, for there was no one in camp who seemed to know the condition of the road. They said that the last vehicle had got through way back in April, …
The Pennsylvania barn: its origin, evolution, and distribution in … – Page 263
books.google.com Robert F. Ensminger – 2003 – 348 pages – Preview
The development of the nigger head in central Pennsylvania was examined under ” Tying Joints and Bent Raisings” (see … The emergence of the nigger head may also result from a simplification of the double tie beam, which is commonly …
Journal of conchology: Volume 11 – Page 214
books.google.com Conchological Society of Great Britain and Ireland – 1906 – Free Google eBook – Read
Moreover the growth of the shells is very slow, the time required for a “nigger- head” to reach a size of three … The standard is the “niggerhead.” In 1897 the market value of this species in Muscatine ranged from 40 to 62 cents per …
The mineral resources of New South Wales – Page 402
books.google.com Geological Survey of New South Wales, Edward Fisher Pittman – 1901 – 487 pages – Free Google eBook – Read
There is another peculiar form common on the field, known as a nigger head. These nigger heads are usually oval or spherical masses of more or less opal- impregnated, fine grained silica ; they are of all sizes from 1 lb. to 1 cwt.,
California Place Names: The Origin and Etymology of Current … – Page 258
books.google.com Erwin G. Gudde, William Bright – 2004 – 460 pages – Preview
and Niggerhead Mountain [Los Angeles Co. ] (which probably reflect the now obsolete term “niggerhead” in the sense of … Note that the term “Niggerhead” in place names may refer not to the head of a Negro, but rather to a flanged drum …
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So clearly, the offensive term is well established in literature and placenames. It will take time and effort to remove it.
Remember the photo at the top of this story? Guess what the name of it was up until about a year ago.
Even politically correct California suffered (until recently) from a place called “Niggerhead Mountain” of which you can get an interactive map of right here at this link: http://californiamaps.org/place.php?county=Los+Angeles&feature=Niggerhead+Mountain
And while it still shows up in map databases, it too has recently been renamed:
History professor works to rename mountain in Los Angeles
Thanks to the work of a Moorpark College history professor, a Southern California mountain will be renamed to honor the man who first settled in the area and erase the original racial slur.
Good for him, it is the right thing to do. But it just goes to demonstrate that the current inhabitants of a place often get stuck with unfortunate names of the past, and that doesn’t necessarily make somebody who lives by that mountain in Los Angeles county a racist.
It also doesn’t make the people of Queensland, Australia, who have an island named “niggerhead”, racist. Wikipedia says:
Nigger Head is a small island in the Northern part of Shelburne Bay in far north Queensland, Australia about 30km North of Cape Grenville, Cape York Peninsula in the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Queensland, Australia.[1] It is so named because it is an isolated coral outcrop; such outcrops were previously known as Niggerheads by British sailors.
And here it is, currently in the Australian Government Geoscience page:
I wonder if any Australian political candidates ever go fishing or diving near that island? Wow, wouldn’t that be a bombshell?
So clearly, with all the citations of “niggerhead” I found in books, maps, placenames, and professional journals, there’s a lot of work to do to erase the ugly and insensitive term. There’s also a lot of places where the term is used and there’s no outrage (yet).
In light of this, I think we all should cut Rick Perry some slack, because the one presidential candidate who would be the most offended by the term, Herman Cain, isn’t. From CBS News:
Cain said he is “done with that issue,” making the following comment in response to reporters’ questions: “Was I satisfied with Governor Perry’s explanation about the name of the ranch where he went hunting? And I said, ‘Yes I am. Next question.”
I suspect Perry told him some of the same things I learned about placenames and geography.
Now if we can just get those same reporters in the MSM to stop labeling skeptics with another ugly and offensive term “deniers” like Andy Revkin’s recent NYT story where he even goes so far as to promote a map, “A Map of Organized Climate Change Denial“, I and many others will feel far less offended.
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Note to commenters and moderators – I will NOT tolerate anything offensive related to this story in comments. All such responses will be deleted. – Anthony
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Jon Stewart Daily Show skit on Perry’s niggerhead.
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/jon-stewart-explores-racist-place-names-in-light-of-rick-perrys-nggergate-scandal/
Scroll down to the bottom for the video.
Looks like it’s being called Niggergate already.
The state of Minnesota decided that “squaw” was a perjorative term and ordered that all place names containing that term must be renamed.
One locality took advantage of the opportunity and renamed their Squaw Lake to Lake Wahbegon.
Best place name ‘Uck’
Best road sign ‘No Ucking U-Turns’.
[SNIP: Sorry you don’t like the moderation policies. Feel free to create your own blog and run it as you wish. REP]
Paul Coppin says:
October 4, 2011 at 5:07 am
“What then, are we to do with the Caucasus Mountains….?”
I suggest we whitewash the problem….
Necro – classic Greek with a connotation of dead.
Niger – Latin ,the color of black, niger nigra nigrum
Negro – Spanish masculine black
Ebony – Greek ebeninos (perhaps Egyptian), Latin ebeninus
Negr – Russian black
Nigeria, river, Republic of Niger.
Neger – 1550 Scottish
Negre – French
Physical Anthropology – ‘race Reconciled re-debunked’. Why use the old time ‘outdated’ race classification. PC is and will be for at least for the next 100 years a genuflect of religious cultism.The use of bare bone analysis in forensic evidence classification without the use of DNA machinery. And there is a debate within Climate study-prophecy today?
What is a word worth? Redneck 1750 North American Colony of New Hampshire or Massachusetts. One that tills his own land, hoe in hand with a bowed back, hair bunned on head top (unless treating for head lice) for cooling, exposing the white neck to sun burning. Term used mostly as a class position by a Barron of large land holding usually with conservative loyalty to the King.
I wonder why some PC types haven’t gotten Grand Teton National Park renamed, or the Grand Tetons range renamed…
Also I grew up in a predominately black area of Georgia in the 70’s-80’s. We called Brazil Nuts, Nigger Toes… oddly enough so did every black person I knew in that area, and they were so marked in grocery stores. Why wasn’t that an offensive term at the time? Why was our local color for “are you kidding me” (niggah please) not offensive then or now as it is still used by people today? This is just silly.
It is a shame that certain liberal pressure groups have banned the Latin word for ‘black’. Perhaps they shall ban the colour ‘green’ next. So our traffic lights will now go: “red, orange, and **!!**!* “. Arrest that man immediately…..!
Just to add fuel to the fire, my neighbour’s Christian name is Coon. Apparently, it is a common name in Holland, and he is fed up of people trying to ban his name. I have been advised that Mark and John are the next names that are going to be banned by the liberal media.
.
>>Leon
>>Trivia note:
>>Forecastle is not pronounced the way it’s spelled … it’s more
>>like folksuhl.
Trivia, trivia note:
It may be pronounced as ‘folksuhl’, but it actually does mean ‘forecastle’ – it is the castle at the front of the ship. (Traditional ships had two fortifications, one at the front and one at the back.)
Just goes to show how pronunciation slips with time.
.
Wayne Ward (truthsword) says:
October 4, 2011 at 7:48 am
I wonder why some PC types haven’t gotten Grand Teton National Park renamed, or the Grand Tetons range renamed…
The name should be changed. From Wikipedia: The most common explanation is that “Grand Teton” means “large teat” in French …
Frankentits might be a more politically correct name? However, the Tetons are natural, while excessively large enhancements are not.
It’s my understanding that Language is the communication device. With intonations and body language to accent the true meanings of the words. I believe that Politically Correct is an unjustifiable argument to the first amendment. Everyone knows that you can’t please all the people all the time. It’s impossible. In this context, as an American Citizen I suggest we change the Title of all Americans to be American first. A born in this country American should be identified as such. American African, American Jewish, American French etc… Not the other way around. Just my opinion.
By the way, I have two stories I want to share from my trip to E3 in Atlanta in 1997… I know, but…
I was at Subway, asking for black olives. The black girl behind the counter told me they don’t call them black, they’re “ripe”. So I asked for ripe black olives. The reaction was about what you’d expect.
And, I was at KFC ordering a thigh and a leg. Without even a hint of evil intent in my head, I advised her that I prefer dark meat. It actually took me several seconds of looking at her horrified expression to even realize that the phrase meant something else in Georgia than at home…
@Leon Brozyna
Well said, sir. All this elephantine straining over very little has almost completely avoided the word “etymology”. Turns out ignorance is not bliss.
Robroy says:
October 4, 2011 at 6:35 am
“One day at work, (1990′s) I happened into a conversation between a white co-worker and a black co-worker about how whites should never use the N word. I said “black people say it all the time”.
I was set upon by my black friend in a suprising (to me) fashion ” Finger pointing in my face: “that’s our word. you can’t use it. If I ever hear you say it I’ll beat your ass” After that threat of violence, I did not consider him a friend anymore.”
The idea that a group of people can own a word is relatively rare though I have run into it. Not long ago someone argued to me that “lynching” is a word that belongs to African-Americans because the word was created to describe this unique way of killing African-Americans in the old days. Producing a historical record that referred to the lynching of one of my ancestors in 1650 was of no avail in this argument.
“Shillelagh” might be a word that belongs to the Irish or maybe all Celts on the British Isles. But in this case the claim that the word belongs to one contemporary group is simply amusing.
In the mid-70s I did field work for uranium and base metal exploration in the Northwest Territories of Canada, above tree-line some 100 kilometers or so from the Arctic Ocean. The tundra up there is permafrost less than a meter down, so water does not seep deep into the ground. On flats you get streams and ponds, and on the hillsides you get swampy ground. Freeze-thaw cycles push dirt up and, where the ground is higher and not sodden, greater-than-average grass growth. The result is a patch of grassy slopes that looks smooth from a distance but is actually humps of grass and earth about 30 cm in diameter separated by wet lows about 30 cm deep. Walking through these is brutal, as you slip off the mounds and twist your ankle or walk in freezing water between the mounds … and twist you ankle. I was laid up for 3 days once.
The mounds were called niggerheads. Clearly of a racially motivated origin, but since then simply a difficult type of high latitude, wet ground topology. When I first was there I was appalled. After a while it slipped into the vernacular. Like all the cursing we were doing, if you do it enough it loses its original meaning and becomes offensive only to the new fellows.
I don’t know what to actually call these features, but I certainly wouldn’t use the term now.
I’m surprised Perry didn’t do something about the ranch name. Duh.
Years ago I bought canned oysters under the brand “Niggerhead”. That was later changed to “Negro Head”. I don’t know what the brand is nowadays, since I haven’t bought canned oysters for years. Nowadays I go down to Gilhooleys for barbecued oysters on the half shell. If you want a shrimp on top of each, order the Shrimphooleys. In Bacliff south of Kemah, TX.
Doug in Seattle says:
October 4, 2011 at 6:26 am
“Has anyone read Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn?? It would make PC heads explode.”
What about “Blazing Saddles?” In that day, 1975 or so, the cultural context was so very different. Everybody on the Left embraced the movie as hip and cool. I think the culture wars were far less hysterical in those days.
By the way, “Huckleberry Finn” is a masterpiece of dialect among other things.
@Philip Bradley (October 3, 2011 at 11:07 pm) – Don’t forget the Idle Working Mens club near Bradford.
@frank Kotler says (October 4, 2011 at 4:48 am) – “Politically Correct” is pretty much an offensive terms already. It’s definately a joke now a days. To be called PC is to be called an authoritarian fascist. The term is used in newspapers to highlight stupid stories where authority gets it wrong – like a recent case where Guy Fawkes night (Nov 5) in a London borough is going to be called “The Colour Thief: A Winter Extravaganza”.
Years ago I worked on a large greenfield construction project doing the cost accounting. The guys doing the civil work said they were ordering a load of niggerheads. Everyone seemed to know what they were talking about except me so I asked. It turns out they were talking about oversized hunks of gravel (think larger than a softball) used for fill. They also used concrete vibrators which excited my secretary. So did the peckerheads that the electricians kept talking about. It’s a weird world.
Prediction: the more vociferous the left/PCists in banning a word or attitude, the more it will be flaunted and embraced by the counter-culture.
C-Rap is actually Convict/Gangsta Rap, prison chants of the densest concentration of offensive words and ideas possible, to both insult and drive out those “in charge”. Celebration of oversize XL pants and shirts, issued by (men’s) prison admins not up to the logistics of fitting, not to mention tracking (hip-huggers suggests women’s prisons chose the opposite size solution), is more of the same.
Every toddler learns the power of defiance in garnering and manipulating attention. The PC response is like removing every source of irritation a 2-yr old can find. Good luck with that.
****
George Turner says:
October 3, 2011 at 11:00 pm
Even when things are less colorful, it still causes upset. Driving through Western Maryland I sometimes have to cross Negro Mountain, which is named for a free black who fought heroically on the mountain during the French and Indian War. And like the turning of the seasons, there’s always a new generation that reacts in mock horror and wants to rename it. The latest bill was earlier this year.
*****
George, I’m very near Polish mountain (it’s a beautiful area). I like the comment by the Cumberland guy in your link that says “I’m Irish. I’d love to have a mountain named Irish mountain….”
I suppose I should be offended by the Caucasus mountains in east Asia….. (Oops, I see others already mentioned this)
Hey Anthony – it was not Rick Perry’s hunting lodge. He did not own it, he rented it. I think you should correct your post.
REPLY: Added “leased plot” to make that clear – Anthony
I often used a geologic map of the Blue Ridge that had a mountain named “Negro Mountain”. Wanna bet that wasn’t always its name?
Out in the Rockies there is a high point with the official name of “Mollys Nipple”, surely someone can be outraged at that.
There are entire countries that are named this way.
Nigeria and Republic of Niger are two examples that come to mind.
Is it possible for our mainstream media to be any more silly and puerile?
It’s interesting how many posters defend the use of this word on various pretexts. Hey! they are only words eh!. I wonder if they are just as happy to have the word “denier” used against them?