Michigan Map Shows Root Origin Of County Names

There are well over 50 counties in Michigan, with most of them being in the Lower Peninsula. The counties are to states what states are to America, counties are the smaller regions of land that the state are divided into. The cool thing about counties is that they are able to set their own laws, programs, and make other legal decisions that only affect that county but must still abide by the statewide laws, ordinances, and programs.

The Upper Peninsula, which is significantly smaller than the Lower Peninsula is home to only 15 counties while its neighbor to the south has more than 40 counties. Which makes a ton of sense considering that we only have the U.P because of the Toledo War. That's neither here nor there, have you ever read or said some of the country names and wondered where that came from? Yup, me too, and now we have found some answers as this map shows where each county got its name.

I would venture to say that some of these county names will have origins that we expect while others will throw us for a loop. It's no surprise that the indigenous community inhabited the land that is now known as America first, so this is where a large majority of these names come from. Other origin sources include Notable American's Name, Notable European's Name, Description of Place, Pseudo Native American, A french Word, or Named After Another Place.

At first glance there are two origin sources that are much more prevalent than the others, that would be Notable American's Name and Native American. It seems as if almost everything was given a Native American name but if they didn't like the name, they would just pick a Notable American and run with it. The remaining counties were okay to keep their Native American Names.

The two origin sources that are the least accounted for are French Words and Notable European's Name, which both of these make sense. As the Americans were trying to build their own identity, I'm sure they were looking to keep the Europeans, French, and British as far away as possible, so why name something after them right?

Lastly, being named after another place or being the description of the surrounding area was the least popular name origin source for the state of Michigan. I think both of these root origins come from a lack of a better name, so they just looked around and called out what they saw or said "hey, this place is cool, let's name it that."

If you've ever wondered how your county got its name, the wondering ends now. You can take a look at the Facebook post above and find your county's name roots.