President Donald Trump’s close attention to U.S. place names will shadow a federal panel of experts Thursday as they mull a proposal to rename an Arizona peak that currently commemorates one of the 19th century’s most influential geologists.
Citing geologist Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz’s racist views, some Flagstaff residents want the current Agassiz Peak in the state’s San Francisco Mountains renamed as Öo’mawki. The proposed new name is Hopi for “place of the clouds.”
“This name change is vital to protect sacred landmarks and correct this periodically inappropriate name due to its racist origin,” the renaming petition stated.
The proposal scheduled for consideration at the monthly meeting of the U.S. Board on Geographic Names’ Domestic Names Committee has been on the review list since early 2023. And though the proposal is not new, its consideration comes in a geographic nomenclature environment that has radically changed.
