From the year I began teaching folk music in junior high and
middle school General Music classes, I have been obsessed with
surnames. J. N. Hook’s book, Family Names: The Origins,
Meanings, Mutations, and History of more than 2800 American
Names [Collier MacMillan Publishers, 1982] allowed me to
discover with the students the meanings and origins of their
names.
At the time of Mr. Hook’s research,
over 1,286, 556 different surnames of Americans existed. He
categorized them in four ways:
PLACES – Onnie Hill, William Lake.
PATRONYMS BASED ON PERSONAL NAMES – Phebe George, Doresia
Johnson.
OCCUPATIONS – Vernon Farmer, Sarah Baker.
And DESCRIPTIVES – Obeta Rich, Mada Wise. [These
examples came from my journaled lists.]
Mr. Hook’s name is a place name. A hook is
a “sharp bend in a stream or peninsula or some odd little corner
of land.”
Soon, I began notating –as I read– all the descriptive
surnames I came across in newspapers, books and magazines.
Nouns, adjectives, verbs, etc. Of course, the obituaries held
acres of those diamond.
The parameters I set for myself in the use
of these words were:
- They will not be used as surnames in the story, poem or essay.
- Various forms of the words— -ses, -ings, -tions, are allowed.
- The word can piggyback with another one.
- For the first
draft, the words selected from the list will be italicized. This
way, the writer can see the extent of his/ her creativity in
pulling together a disparate group of words into a cohesive
unit.
- There is no minimum number of these words that “must”
be used. For the second chapter of a story I used only three.
A list––and a poem built around
it––follows. [List has been alphabetized.]
Agnes, Banks, Bernard, Bird, Blocker, Booth, Bowling,
Brand, Brittle, Brooks, Brown, Bruno, Burns, Bush, Carpenter,
Childs, Clay, Clement, Comb, Coopwood, Day, Duke, Files,
French, Fry, Gates, Gist, Glaze, Gray, Green, Greensage,
Hall, Halter, Hammer, Heard, Loon, March, Missouri, Moody,
Painter, Piper, Potter, Prime, Prince, Reed, Rider, Rose, Roy,
Sally, Salter, Sample, Session, Shore, Short, Small,
Son, Stark, Stone, Tracy, Treat, Victor, Wall, Waters, Weaver,
West, White, Wills, Woods, Yielding, Young.
(top)
And here’s the poem:
Twilight
Caramel haze glazes
the waters of the lake,
serene with keening loons
and other nightbird calls.
Further inland, whippoorwills.
Spring peepers
serenade the graying sky.
Shore-bound, clay kiln-fired
wind chimes
play Olly-Olly-in-Free
with hollow reeds and stones
banked in shadowy willows.
A carpenter, who’d combed
the woods for a clearing
small enough to build
a secluded nest, lays down
hammer and paint brush,
and treats himself
to nature’s nightfall ambience,
its bedding-down
before the rose light fades.
[© lovepat press 2010]
Another day’s list of surnames:
[alphabetized] Ashley, Archuleta, Bell, Black, Brown, Bullion,
Bumpers, Cannon, Cash, Ceasar, Chase, Christ, Dare, Day, Dodge,
Eno, Fielder, Forte, Fountain, Getter, Godfrey, Gray, Gross,
Gudge, Hall, Happy, Hawks, Henry, House, James, Jolly, Joyne,
Keith, Little, Marie, Martelle, May, Mayor, Millepied,
Morissette, Noel, Page, Popper, Quash, Reed, Sharp, Small,
Steed, Stell, Swan, Tester, Vest, Vines, West, Whisker, White,
Wonder, Wood and Young.
Still another day’s list of surnames: [unalphabetized]
Bale, Green, Cook, Paisley, Swift, Urban, Crow, Savage, Stein,
Todd, Huff, Thurman, Henry, Perry, Craft, Sabathia, Swisher,
Hall Bell, Layne, Files, Halter, Wood, Rhoda, Stone, Keith, Ply,
Whisker, Case, West, Mills, Hooks, Fudge, Moody, Chambers, Mace,
Waddle, Bright, Farmer, Vales, Horn, Roy, Catching, Pettypool,
Friday, Treat, Brooks, Argue, Cook, May, Stamps, Hunt, Bores,
White, Dial, Amerine, Frank, Hill, Parsons, Sparks and Rice.
Just think what a great story, poem or essay you could
(ahem) “cook” up using one the lists above. I dare you to try
your hand at it. I will if you will.