2025.13.01

Meanderings What's In a Name By Kirke White When I was a schoolboy, I spent my entire summers at my grandmother's cottage on Gay Street. Gay Street was a dead end two-rut road off the north end of Butler Street and named for the village founder, William Gay Butler. In about 1971 the village fathers decided to honor long term public works superintendant Harry Newnham with a street and renamed Gay Street Newnham Street. I remember Harry in his pith helmet doing everything needing done, including the water system (before Kal Lake Authority). Much more recently, Elizabeth Street caused confusion. The section along the Mildred Peterson Preserve was considered an extension of Elizabeth Street farther up the hill, but it was in no way aligned or connected. The city fathers decided to end that confusion by honoring long time public works director Bruce Simonson and renaming the lower section Simonson Drive. We now have two streets named after long-time public works directors. But I couldn't end this tale without mentioning another street name change. When I was young, the road along the other side of the river was called River Avenue. Apparently this caused some confusion with Water Street on this side of the river, so River Avenue was renamed Park Street quite a while ago. The only problem with this was we already had a Park Street. It was a little short block that ran down from Holland Street to the now Simonson Drive. Since the Maury Herbert family lived on the corner at that time, the old Park Street was renamed Herbert Street. Now many years later, Bruce had just retired and Scott Herbert has replaced him as public works director. I kid Scott that two of his predecessors had to work for many years to get a street named after them, but he got one automatically. I found out from Scott that Maury Herbert, an adult I had known when I was little, was his great-grandfather. What's in a name!

Transportation: highway and road infrastructure

Winthers, Sally

04/28/2025

04/28/2025