| This book is a direct descendant of the excellent Colorado Place Names, by George R Eichler (Boulder: Johnson Publishers, 1977). Most of the information in the present volume, and much of the actual wording, is drawn from Eichler's work. If he had lived to prepare a revised editionor a much larger reference work on Colorado places, as he hopedmy effort would not have been warranted. |
| The question arises of exactly what should be included in a dictionary of place names. Such a work is not the same as a gazetteer, which provides detailed geographical and historical information for each place listed. A place name dictionary seeks to give information not so much on the places as on the names: how they are pronounced, how they came to be, when they were assigned. Geographical information, such as location, population, historical facts, and the dates when communities were established and incorporated, are given for orientation and for background. I have not given all the historical information provided by Eichler; I wanted to include other types of information, and the book had to be kept within practical limits. |
| In fact, I have gone beyond a simple revision of my predecessor's book. Eichler listed towns, counties, peaks, and passes in separate sections; I have combined these in a single alphabetical order, and have added entries for rivers, creeks, lakes, valleys, parks, and other topographic features. In particular, I have given more information on pronunciation; and reflecting my own research in linguistics, I have given special attention to names of Spanish and American Indian origin. |
| To be sure, the list is still far from complete. There are eighteen streams in Colorado called Coal Creek; I have mentioned them as a group, and singled out only the one which gave its name to a town in Fremont County. Many communities formed in recent years have names invented by real estate developers, such as Mountain View or Sunnyside, concerning which little can be said. (Eichler appropriately referred to these as "generic names.") Apart from that, information is simply lacking about many places: given that a ghost town exists with the name of Johnsonville, it may not be possible to find out much about it except that it was |
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