State Says Hangman Creek Will Hang Onto Its Name County’s Bid To Rename Creek Runs Dry

Sat., Sept. 13, 1997

Virginia De Leon Staff writer

Talk about an identity crisis.

First it was Latah Creek, then Hangman, then Latah again.

Now, despite a Spokane County commissioners’ resolution in April, it’s back to Hangman, said members of the Washington State Board of Geographic Names.

During its quarterly meeting Friday in Olympia, board members addressed the commissioners’ resolution, which asked them to decree Latah as the stream’s name. But the board turned down the request.

“I’m not too sure a need has been demonstrated,” said Public Lands Commissioner Jennifer Belcher. “We don’t change existing names without very good documentation.”

The creek, which flows from the Idaho foothills into Spokane’s city limits, was called Latah until 1858. That’s when Col. George Wright’s men hanged several Indians near the stream. Since then, some people have referred to the stream as Hangman Creek.

In April, county commissioners weighed in on the issue by passing a resolution ordering that the creek be called Latah in all county documents.

Some, including Commissioner John Roskelley, disapproved of the name Hangman because it alludes to the murdered Indians. A more appropriate name, they said, would be Latah, a Nez Perce word meaning “jumping fish” or “place where we get food.”

Attempts to reach Roskelley were unsuccessful Friday.

The Board of Geographic Names used to prefer Latah, too. In 1959, however, it reversed itself because more people called the creek Hangman.

Federal maps also refer to the stream as Hangman Creek.

During the two-hour televised meeting, members of the Board of Geographic Names spent about 20 minutes discussing the issue. While a few members asked for more time in order to get feedback from Native American tribes, they all eventually voted to not consider renaming the stream.

“The word ‘Latah’ is a nice-sounding name,” said board member Grant Smith, who’s also an English professor at Eastern Washington University. “But it doesn’t pass the test of local usage … or local history.”

, DataTimes

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