Cascading renaming

Well, Mt. Evans is no more. And few if any are shedding tears. The peak is henceforth Mt. Blue Sky, certainly one of the most poetic place names in Colorado (and one that GG finds some joy in just typing its name. Blue Sky…yeah, that feels right).

Now there is recognition that the Mt. Evans Wilderness does not contain a peak named Mt. Evans and so needs renaming too (not that lacking a central peak of the same name is unprecedented; for a long time Denali National Park had no peak formally named Denali within it as the peak’s name was Mt. McKinley…which thankfully was retired in 2015 over the objections of Ohioans). Anyways, that renaming of the Wilderness helps to remind us that peak names often drift into other corners. And one of those corners is geology.

Go to the National Geologic Map Database’s Geolex tool and enter Evans and you find there is the Mt. Evans Granodiorite. There is also the informal (but reasonably widespread) “Mt. Evans batholith” term. Logically these should be renamed…but who does this, and given the relatively glacial turnover of geologic literature, when might it happen and how might it confuse the literature?

The first question’s answer would appear (in the U.S.) to be the North American Commission on Stratigraphic Nomenclature (which is not a governmental body). And Mt. Evans isn’t that high on their to-do list: the western US is peppered with, for instance, Squaw this and Squaw that, which is officially considered to be offensive today by the Department of the Interior as well as the state of California (though some, curiously, are fighting to keep the name in some places). Perhaps amazingly, this is in fact being rectified not only in the place names (which was something directly under government control on public lands) but this appears to be quickly affecting geologic names. The USGS, which maintains the Geolex tool, notes a number of name changes if you search for squaw. While this is driven by the government, the NACSN also appears to be moving forward, as changes proposed in a 2022 article by some Canadian scientists would change the rules used in determining and changing geologic names to make it quick and easy to adjust problematic geologic names. (At present the code online does not have this change in place; it might have come up at their annual meeting a week ago; GG is not part of that world).

In a way this is kind of odd that this is only reaching NACSN now. The Interior memo ending the use of squaw notes that other terms (e.g., a certain N word) have been dropped from geographic names as long ago as 1962 (and thankfully do not show up any more in the Geolex tool). Presumably they will accept the USGS renaming that seems to be anticipating NACSN action.

Will the renaming of Mt. Evans similarly translate to geologic units? This is a bit less clear as the term itself is not derogatory; it is instead honoring somebody we don’t want to honor anymore. The proposed changes to the stratigraphic code suggest abandoning terms that are “offensive or inappropriate with respect to any group or class of people.” Does this apply to Mt. Evans granodiorite? GG is unsure. As we revisit the history associated with a number of geographic names, this is probably not going to be the final case that could affect geologic nomenclature. Frankly there are a ton of features named for some white guy (often in an attempt to curry favor with a government official); many of these could be replaced, and at least some will have been incorporated into some geologic names.

What we will probably come to need is a tool to keep track of name changes so that the older literature can still be used. The science itself wasn’t problematic, so this isn’t like retracting papers. Right now Geolex does provide pointers, but one suspects those will go away as the Sq word follows the N word into unacceptable public usage.