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DERIVATION OF THE WORD GOGEBIC |  |
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DERIVATION OF THE WORD GOGEBIC | |
DERIVATION OF THE WORD GOGEBIC
By Bruce K. Cox The Gogebic Range takes its name from lake Gogebic, originally spelled Agogeebic or variants of that spelling. It is sometimes pronounced Go gee (as in geek) bic (as in Bic pen), and sometimes as Go-gibick. Many interpretations and explanations of meaning and origin have been offered over the years for this Ojibwa word. Jacob Houghton’s 1864 map of Upper Michigan showed lake Ago-gee-bic, later anglicised as Agogebic and Gogebic. It has been given numerous meanings: -----a rock growing out of another rock[1] -----a body of water hanging on high[2] -----falling leaves or the place of falling leaves[3] -----lake of the falling leaves[4] -----great rocky dividing water[5] -----rocky dividing lake[6] -----where trout rising make rings on the water[7] -----trembling ground[8] -----rocky or rocky shore[9] -----smooth rock[10] -----little fish[11] -----lake lying still or hidden[12] -----the bathing place[13] -----small bush having a red berry[14] -----obstructed by a hill made long ago by a manitou[15]
Even in the early 1880s, “no two people could give it the same meaning,” according to an account in the Ontonagon Miner. Some suggested Gogebic was derived from the following: -----A-god-jin and ni-bi = hanging water[16] -----A-go-ge-bink = roaring lake[17] -----Ago-gi-bi = a combination of A-god-jin and ni-bi[18] -----A-go-gib = an aquatic plant or elevated body of water[19] -----A-go-gi-bic = rocky[20] -----Agogebic = a body of water hanging on high[21] -----Agosi or Agnode = he or it hangs[22] -----Akog-bic = at the place of the great porcupine[23] -----A-go-je-bic = rocky shore[24] -----A-ko-jib, from A-ko-gi-bing = at, in, from , or to the lake[25] -----Gagogebec = porcupine lake[26] -----Gogebing = dividing lake[27] or diving water[28] or the jumping fish[29] -----Gogeebing = root under which the porcupine hides[30] -----Gen-e-big = snake[31] -----Gogibic or Gogebik = he dives into the water[32] -----Gogeebing = dividing lake or body of water hanging on high[33] -----Gogi = (or Kogi) he dives down[34] -----Go-gie = diving under the water; a diver who goes under the water[35] -----Googii = dive[36] -----Gugwageebic = place of diving[37] -----Gu-gwa-ga-bing = the place of dividing[38] -----Kogebing = diving or plunging place[39] -----Kokobig = a boggy place[40] -----Mah-ko-ge-bing = bears, water, lake (because the Indians supposedly saw many bears swim in the lake)[41] -----Totogan = a trembling piece of ground or a swamp[42] -----Ajibik or bic = rock[43]
In 1884 the Ontonagon Miner and other newspapers published an article about the derivation of Gogebic. At that time it was believed to be traceable to the Cree Indians: -----Ak-wa-ku-pi-sa-ka-hi-gan = green lake (covered or overspread with green growth). This was changed in the Ojibwa language to A-go-gi-bi, Sa-ga-i-gan. Sa-ga-i-gan was said to mean “inland lake”.[44] “The name Gogebic cannot be traced directly to any
language. Possibly it means
something in connection with the stone city [of the Mus-ko-tams]... as part of the name means ‘by the rock.’ ” The legendary city of the Mus-ko-tams, “ancestors of the Mus-to-tains”, is said to have occasionally come into view in the mist off “Mirage Point, a curiously shaped headland”, and was reportedly witnessed often up to the early nineteenth century, but its appearances grew “less and less year by year.” A man named George Francis wrote a letter telling of his experience in the year 1860 while on a journey through the area with a voyageur and trapper named Baptiste La Prairie from the vicinity of Mosinee, Wisconsin.[45] A local historian writing in 1921 said the “name of this lake was... Agogebic, the name of an Indian tribe that was supposed to have inhabited the banks of the lake. It is said that this tribe was attacked by another tribe and the Agogebic Indians were so good and saintly that the spirit of the lake swallowed them up, and it is also said that on certain days one can see a mirage half way down the lake that looks like their city, only inverted.”[46] The “A” was dropped by the time
Gogebic county was formed in 1887. The Ontonagon Miner reported, “We very much regret to see the very general custom of dropping the A before Gogebic... it certainly takes all the music, charm and meaning out of the word by dropping the A.”[47] “What the word means is not easily decided upon to the satisfaction of all, and probably never will be, as dead Indian languages are always exposed to contradictory interpretations.”[48]
[1] Ontonagon
Miner, 2 February 1884. [2] Vivian
M. Coleman, ed., History of
Bessemer, 1884-1984 (Bessemer, Mich.: Business &
Professional Womens’ Club, 1984), 18. [3] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [4] Gogebic County Historical Pageant, October 12, 1920
(Ironwood, Mich.: Globe Publishing Co., 1920), 1. [5] Wakefield
News, 23 May 1925, “The
Origin of Word ‘Gogebic’... ‘gogebing’ means ‘dividing
lake’ ” and “ ‘agojibic’ indicates ‘rock shores’ or
‘rocky shores’. ” From an article in Skillings’ Mining Review. [6]
Victor F. Lemmer, History of
Gogebic County, Michigan, Volume 2 (Iron Mountain, Mich.:
Mid-Peninsula Library, 1987), 3. [7] Go Happy-Go Often-Gogebic, Gogebic County, Michigan 1965
brochure. [8] Walter
Havighurst, Vein of Iron: The
Pickands Mather Story (Cleveland: The World Publishing Co.,
1958), 37; Rev. William Gagnieur, “Indian Place Names in the Upper
Peninsula and Their Interpretation,” in Michigan History Magazine 2 (1918): 545-46, from Totogan, meaning a
swamp or marsh. [9] Elijah
Middlebrook Haines, The
American Indian (Evansville, Ind.: Unigraphic, 1977), 706, says
Agogebic was an Iroquois word.
On page 729 he states Gogebic is “supposed to be a
corruption of Agojebic, ‘rocky,’ or ‘rocky shore’ ” or
dividing lake; George
N. Fuller, Historic Michigan,
Land of the Great Lakes, Volume 1 (National Historical
Association, Inc., 1927), 484. [10] Peter
L. White, “The Iron Region of Lake Superior,” in Michigan
Pioneer and Historical Society 8 , 159; Basil Johnston, [Anishninaubee
Language Course Outline] Anishinaubaemowin
kikinowaezhiwaewin tchi w’kikaendumowaut oshki-kikinomaugununk
Anishinaubaek w’d’inawaewiniwauh (Cape Croker, Ont.: Winter Spirit Creations,
c2002), 81, 115, agid-aubik means “on top of the rock.” [11] John
W. Foster and Josiah D. Whitney, Report
on the Geology and Topography of a portion of the Lake Superior Land
District in the State of Michigan. Part 1, Copper Lands (Washington,
D.C.: Senate Document 69, 1850), 651, “ogibij”; Rev. William
Gagnieur, “Indian Place Names in the Upper Peninsula and Their
Interpretations,” in Michigan
History Magazine vol. 2 (1918), 546, calls this interpretation
“laughable”; Johnston, 44, geegoohn means “fish.” [12] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [13] Ibid. [14] Ibid. [15] Wakefield
News, 13 February 1959,
according to Dr. E. F. Greenman of the Museum of Anthropology,
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. [16] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [17] Lake Superior News, 19 September 1846, “as I had it interpreted to me by my Indian guide.” [18] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [19] Ontonagon
Press, 6 March 1886. [20] Lemmer,
Volume 3, 73. [21] Chrysostom
Verwyst, “Geographical Names In Wisconsin, Minnesota, And
Michigan, Having A Chippewa Origin,” in Collections
of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin vol. 12 (1892),
390-91. He mentions the spelling “Agogebic” and remarks “The
lake in question is situated on a considerable plateau, or
elevation.” Father
Verwyst was a Franciscan missionary and received help in his
research from three Ojibwa Indians named Vincent Roy, Antoine Gordon
(or Gaudin) and M. Gurnoe; Gagnieur, 545, “Agogibik”, said “bi”
or “bik” meant “water”, and “bik” or “abik” referred
to “metal rock”. [22] Verwyst,
391. [23] Helen
Longyear Paul, Landlooker in
the Upper Peninsula of Michigan: From the Reminiscences of John
Munro Longyear (Marquette: John M. Longyear Research Library,
1983), 73. [24] Lemmer,
Volume 2, 3. This can
be traced back to Haines; Gagnieur called this interpretation
laughable. [25] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884, and Ontonagon Miner, 6 March 1886; Lake
Superior News, 20 July 1847, mentioned “Akoghebe Lake.” [26] Fuller,
485; Gagnieur thought this interpretation was laughable; Johnston,
17, gauk(ook) means porcupine(s). [27] Lemmer,
Volume 3, 73; Gagnieur called this interpretation laughable. [28] Ashland
Press, 29 March 1884. [29] Ontonagon
Miner, 2 February 1884. [30] Fuller,
484; Gagnieur said some people interpreted Gogebic to mean a nest of
porcupines, but said this interpretation was laughable. [31] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [32] Gagnieur,
545; Ross, 180. [33] Fuller,
484. [34] Verwyst,
391. [35] George
Munroe Campbell, Campbell’s
Original Indian Dictionary of the Ojibway or Chippewa Language (Minneapolis:
Campbell Publishing Co., 1940), 50. [36] John
D. Nichols and Earl Nyholm, A
Concise Dictionary of Minnesota Ojibwe (Minneapolis:
University of Minnesota Press, 1995), 62. [37] Fuller,
484. [38] Lemmer,
Volume 2, 3. [39] Ashland
Press, 29 March 1884. [40] Gagnieur,
545, “I was told by two old Indians”. [41] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [42] Gagnieur,
546. [43] Fuller,
485. [44] Ashland
Press, 9 February 1884. [45] Montreal River Miner, 17 February 1887. [46] Edna May Launt , “History of Marenisco,” in Bessemer Herald (11 November 1921). [47] Ontonagon
Miner, 16 January 1886. [48] Ontonagon Miner, 27 September 1884. [1]
Gagnieur,
545, “I was told by two old Indians”. [1]
Ashland Press,
9 February 1884. [1]
Gagnieur,
546. [1]
Fuller, 485. [1]
Ashland Press,
9 February 1884. [1]
Montreal River Miner, 17 February 1887. [1] Edna May Launt , “History of Marenisco,” in Bessemer Herald (11 November 1921). [1]
Ontonagon Miner,
16 January 1886. [1]
Ontonagon Miner,
27 September 1884.
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