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Beyond Manhattan: A Gazetteer of Delaware Indian History

Robert S. Grumet (2014) 800 words

[Robert S. Grumet (2014)] Susquehanna River. and Gibsonia, and streets in the cities of Harrisburg and Philadelphia. MAUNATOME (Susquehanna County). Although it may appear Delaware, the name of Maunatome Mountain, located just east of NAMANOCK (Monroe County). Namanock Trail (see Namanock the Borough of Hallstead at the Great Bend of the Susquehanna in New Jersey North in Part 1 above) is one of the many imported River, is another of many transplanted place names from New Eng- Delaware Indian place names in the Arrowhead Lake development. land brought to the region during the last decades of the eighteenth century. Maunatome is a somewhat respelled version of NAY-AUG (Lackawanna County). Local tradition (Donehoo Miantonomo, the name of a prominent seventeenth-century Rhode 1928:126) holds that Nay-Aug Park and the Nay-Aug Gorge within Island Narragansett sachem. its borders in the City of Scranton both bear the Indian name of Roaring Brook. The brook runs through Nay-Aug Park as it courses MAXATAWNY (Monroe County). Maxatawny Drive is one of the from its headwaters just across from the upper reaches of the West many Delaware Indian place names imported from other locales in Branch of the Lehigh River atop Moosic Mountain (see above in Pennsylvania relocated to the Arrowhead Lake development. Pennsylvania North in Part 1) north and west to its junction with the Lackawanna River (see above in Pennsylvania Central in Part MINEOLA (Monroe County). Local traditions hold that Mineola 2) in Scranton at the Steamtown National Historic Site. is a shortened version of the name of a Delaware chief named Miniolagameka. Meniolagameka (Whritenour suggests it is a Munsee NETCONG (Monroe County). Roads named Netcong Circle and word for “oasis,” earlier translated by Heckewelder as a Delaware Netcong Drive bear a name imported from New Jersey located in word for a “rich or good spot within that which is bad or barren”) the Arrowhead Lake Community in Coolbaugh Township. was actually a mostly Munsee Delaware Indian town in a part of the Lehigh Valley that they were forced to abandon after violence NEVERSINK (Berks County). This much-traveled Delaware Inbrought on by the final French and Indian War struck the area in dian place name from New York began its first journey a few years 1755. The locale subsequently became a popular tourist destination before it appeared in Gordon’s (1832:377) gazetteer as Neversink during the 1830s. Lake Mineola (a glacial kettle hole) and the Mountain at the south end of the City of Reading. Neversink Mounnearby hamlet of Neola in the Poconos still mark the places where tain became the site of a popular mountaintop resort that was served New Yorkers from Hempstead first discovered the name they later by an inclined railroad that operated from 1884 to 1930. Today, the adopted for their community. As mentioned earlier, Mineola is a Berks County Conservancy manages a 500-acre section of former Lakota word meaning “many waters.” resort land as the Neversink Mountain Preserve. The name also continues to grace the Neversink Reservoir to the west of the preserve, MINISINK (Monroe County). The name Minisink, given to a court the hamlet of Neversink to its southwest, and several streets and 215 SHESHEQUIN (Monroe County). Sheshequin Drive is one of the TOMHICKON (Monroe County). Tomhickon Trail is one of the many Delaware Indian place names from other parts of Pennsylva- many imported Delaware Indian place names from other parts of nia imported to the Arrowhead Lake development. Pennsylvania in the Arrowhead Lake development. SING SING (Union County). Sing Sing Road in the Borough of TOMICO (Monroe County). Although Lake Tomico in the Mifflinburg bears this notable New York Delaware Indian place Poconos bears the identically spelled surname of a Munsee family name. in Ontario, it is more probably a respelling of Lake Tomiko, the Chippewa name of a popular resort imported from the province into SKIPPACK (Monroe County). Skippack Court and slightly differ- Pennsylvania. ently spelled Kippack Path are among the many Delaware Indian place names from elsewhere in Pennsylvania transferred to the Ar- TOWAMENSING (Carbon County). Towamensing had already rowhead Lake development. been moved north from its original location of Towamencin north of the City of Philadelphia in Montgomery County by the time SUCCESS (Allegheny County). Success Street is located in the Nicholas Scull noted Toamensing on his 1759 map in the area that City of Pittsburgh. Zinzendorf had called St. Anthony’s Wilderness. William Scull noted Toamensong in the same place in his 1770 revision of his faTAMMANY (Monroe County). Tammany Drive in the Arrowhead ther’s map. Today, the name adorns the Township of Towamensing Lake development bears the name of the Delaware River valley established as a district in 1768, and the Township of Lower Towasachem. mensing, which split off from Towamensing in 1841. TANKHANNEN (Bucks County). Tankhannen Road, a country lane in Tinicum Township (see below), bears a variant