Battle Names

For Little Rock Public Radio, this is Dan Boice, with Naming Arkansas.
While important Civil War battles were fought on Arkansas soil, several Arkansas towns have names referring to battles fought elsewhere. The town of Lepanto in Poinsett County commemorates the famous victory of the Venetian navy over the Ottoman Turks in 1571. Manila in Mississippi County was named in 1901 for a recent naval victory by Commodore George Dewey in the Spanish-American War. Another town’s battlefield name is less obvious. During World War I, many Americans of German descent experienced discrimination and sometimes even violence. Taking note of this, the German-Americans in the Saline County town of Germania determined to rename their town and avoid trouble. In their search to find an inoffensive name, town leaders picked a recent victory in France by Canadian troops near the town of Vimy Ridge, and so Arkansas has the only Vimy Ridge, not just in America but outside of France.
For the University of Arkansas at Monticello this is Dan Boice.