The township of Gilboa
I was browsing Google maps the other day and I my eye caught this place: The township of Gilboa.
Which would probably won’t seem all that remarkable, but I was raised at the foot of the Gilboa mountain, and was educated in Gilboa educational institute (a Kibutz’s high school).
Gilboa is a mountain in the northern part of Israel, and is mentioned in the bible at several important occasions (most notable is the battle where Saul is being killed).
So apparently some Christian folks read the name off their Bible, and – probably having no idea what the name of the place actually represented – decided to name their town by it. The United States is filled with these names, which at best were taken from ancient scriptures (The Bible is just the most common source, but not the only one), other cities around the world (close by to Gilboa, one can find “Cairo”, “Athens” and “New Lisbon”) or just any word that comes to mind (Go visit “Hunter” or “Catskill”).
Being incredibly unimaginative is not a fatal flow, but it does result in annoying occurrences, such as 17 towns and cities in the US alone called “London”.