American Place Names: A Concise and Selective Dictionary for the Continental United States of America

The celebrated author of Names on the Land has here collected the histories of some 12,000 place-names--including the names of many notable places, chief rivers, cities, and states, as well as those that have special historical significance and that reflect early customs and dialects. The culmination of a lifetime of investigation, this book provides the linguistic meaning and derivation of each name, and often such information as the date and occasion of naming.