Beloved To Both Canadians & Americans, Lake Ontario Is Told To Scrap Its Native American Name

COPPER RIVER COUNTRY JOURNAL 

There Goes The Neighborhood 

Lake Ontario is mentioned in this song of a vanished ship on Lake Superior. 

'Lake Ontario' Is A Native American Name Considered In Need Of Changing By The United States Government 

The Reason? Like 'Denali,' it’s Not ‘American’ Enough. 

The U.S. Government, concerned that the Native name ‘Lake Ontario’ is not ‘American’ enough, is attempting to change this, one of the five Great Lakes, to ‘Lake America.’ The U.S. president just signed an executive order to that effect at the end of August, 2026.  

Technically, though, ‘Ontario’ is already an American name. And, if you’re going to be true to fact, the word ‘America’ is not. It’s Italian. 

The word ‘America’ stems from the first name of a man called Amerigo Vespucci, a navigator from the Republic of Florence, in Italy. 

All the Great Lakes, of course, originally had local indigenous names, given to them by the Native Americans who lived near them.

Ontario is a Native American word which means ‘lake of shining waters.’ 

Lake Superior was called Gichigami in Ojibwe, which means ‘big water.’ Lake Michigan was also an Ojibwe word – Michigami - and translated to ‘long body of water.’ Lake Huron was a Wyandot word – Karegnondi – which means ‘lake of many shores.’ And Lake Erie, was also Native American – Erielhonan – which meant ‘long tale.’ 

The U.S. and Canada are tied to the big freshwater lakes. The two countries share a storied, emotional history of hard maritime work and deadly beauty on the waters. 

The plaintive, tragic ballad, ‘Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’, by Canadian songwriter Gordon Lightfoot in the 1970s, had strong meaning for both countries.  The song tells the story of an American cargo ship going down in a terrible winter gale, killing everyone on board. But, throughout the song, you can feel the draw of Canada. This tale of dead Americans is just as much a tale of sorrow for Canadians as it is for us. 

In Alaska, ‘Denali’, the name of the great mountain near the Parks Highway, is a Native American name. But, in its stated attempt to make the name of the mountain more  ‘American’, too, Denali's name has been changed back by the U.S. government to ‘McKinley’.

However, like the word 'America,' the word 'McKinley' is not really tied meaningfully to the North American continent. The word McKinley is a clan name, and comes from the distant lands of the Scots and the Irish – in Europe. 

Interestingly, the word America comes from another faraway, very different body of water than the fresh waters of Lake Ontario. Italy is in the large and salty European Mediterranean, where the nearest country across the sea is not Canada, but the African nations of Algeria, Tunisia and Libya.