Mt. Winchell

Thu, Aug 5, 2004

With: Michael Graupe

Matthew Holliman

Mark Thomas

Michele Peot

Joe Dawson

Etymology

Mt. Winchell (13,775 ft.)

Named by Elisha Winchell in 1868

"Alexander Winchell (1824-1891), for many years the state geologist of Michigan and professor at the University of Michigan. (Farquhar.)

In 1868 Elisha C. Winchell, Alexander's cousin, honored him by giving the name 'Mount Winchell' to what is now named 'Lookout Point.' Unaware of that naming, Lil A. Winchell, the son of Elisha, in 1879 gave the same name to a peak south of the Palisades. (Letter, L. A. Winchell to T. S. Solomons, 1896, in Farquhar papers, BL.) The name 'Mount Winchell' apparently was transferred to its present location by the USGS during the survey for the Mt. Goddard 30' map, although J. N. LeConte contradicts L. A. Winchell by saying that it was Winchell who applied the name to the present Mount Winchell. (SCB 5, no. 1, Jan. 1904: 3.)"
- Peter Browning, Place Names of the Sierra Nevada

"Alexander Winchell was a professor of geology and paleontology at the University of Michigan He also served as director of the Michigan Geological Survey and chancellor of Syracuse University. In his day he was a popular lecturer and writer on scientific topics. His views on race and ethnicity, though rejected today, were very much in fashion at the time. His collection includes correspondence, diaries, field notes, drafts of publications and lectures, poems, reference files, scrapbooks, and visual materials relating to his research and writing in the fields of geology, paleontology, evolutionary biology, and other fields of natural history, and to his career as educator and state geologist."
- From the University of Michigan