Obahbahmwawageezhagoquay

From the Odd Wisconsin Archives, one of the most amazing names ever:

"The Sound That Stars Make Rushing through the Sky."

Here's a taste of the contextual story:

"That evening the handful of Americans lay down with loaded rifles, expecting to be attacked. But during the night Susan Johnston, the Ojibwe wife of the fur trader at the Sault, John Johnston, visited the warriors' lodges. She was the daughter of Lake Superior chief Waubejeeg (White-fisher), had married John Johnston about 1790 on Madeline Island, and moved with him to the Sault in 1793. On the night of June 16-17, 1820, she persuaded the warriors that it would not be in their interests to attack U.S. officials. A few yards away, Doty recorded, "Every one lay with his fire arms beside him, but no disturbance was made." Without Johnston's diplomacy, it's likely that Cass, Doty, and the other members of the expedition would all have been killed before dawn.

Among them was Henry Rowe Schoolcraft (1793-1864), who would go on to be one of 19th-c. America's most popular writers on Indian life. Two years later he was appointed U.S. Indian agent at the Sault and became intimate with the Johnston family. Fur trader John Johnston was an Irish immigrant, and he sent his metis (mixed-race) daughters back to Europe for schooling. One of them was Obahbahmwawageezhagoquay, whose name meant "The Sound That Stars Make Rushing through the Sky." She was 20 years old at the time of the expedition's visit and had already traveled to London, Dublin, and Liverpool. In 1823 she and Schoolcraft married, and over the next two decades she and her mother supplied much of the information for his well-known books."

Schoolcraft's work would later be instrumental in shaping Longfellow's 'Hiawatha.'

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Hurricane Season on the Horizon

June 1 approaches.

Nobody (understandably) seems to have a reliable estimate on the number of storms, but the storm names at least are chiseled in stone:

Arthur | Bertha | Cristobal | Dolly | Edouard
Fay | Gustav | Hanna | Ike | Josephine
Kyle | Laura | Marco | Nana | Omar | Paloma
Rene | Sally | Teddy | Vicky | Wilfred

Several storm names have been retired this year as well:

The committee issues a list of potential names for tropical cyclones every six years and for 2013, Dean, Felix, and Noel have been replaced with Dorian, Fernand, and Nestor. Since tropical cyclones were first named in 1953, 70 names have been retired, the first two being Carol and Hazel in 1954.

These names will not be used again because of the wide spread destruction caused by these storms.

For anyone in Louisiana, remember this weekend is a tax holiday for purchasing hurricane preparedness items.

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Where did the Rodham go?

I guess that could mean multiple questions today, but the one I'm thinking of was raised by the use of Hillary Clinton's old name, Hillary Rodham Clinton, in a recent post.

I haven't heard or seen the Rodham for some time.

Where did it go?

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"Precious Slaughter"

A local person's name, from a photo caption in today's Times Picayune.

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