Seattle Post Intelligencer, February 20, 2010
A peak previously known as Negrohead Mountain in Southern California’s Santa Monica range was officially renamed Saturday in honor of a black pioneer who settled the area in the 19th Century.
The 2,031-foot mountain near Malibu, the highest peak in the area, became Ballard Mountain after John Ballard, a blacksmith and former slave who bought land on the mountain in 1880.
The name originally contained a vulgar racial slur that even appeared on federal maps, but it was changed to “negro” in the 1960s.
About 90 people including some two dozen Ballard descendants attended the renaming ceremony Saturday at the site where Ballard owned a 320-acre homestead near what is now the community of Seminole Hot Springs.
“I don’t know what it means to Los Angeles as a whole, but it means a lot to me,” Ballard’s 85-year-old great-grandson Reggie Ballard, a retired LA Fire Department captain, told the Los Angeles Times.
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“It’s not often you get a chance to right an historical wrong,” Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who made the name-change motion, said at the ceremony Saturday.
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Original article
(Posted on February 22, 2010)
Comments
“It’s not often that you get a chance to right a historical wrong”.
The Blacks slaughtered all of the Whites living in Haiti. How do you propose to ‘right’ that historical wrong, Mr. Yaroslavsky? Reparations to white people?
This is just ‘Black Privilege’ all over again.
While they’re at it, why don’t they rename “Cracker jacks”? That name is clearly offensive to whites.
Do you see how far we’ve come from the intrinsic racial solidarity the West had when we were ascendant. Recognize Diworsity, End the Multicultural Empire.
For all we know the name may have originally been meant as a compliment, as the new name, we are told, is meant to be a compliment.
100 years from now are whites going to be apologizing for the new name they’re giving the mountain now?
Why wasn’t this renamed after Barrack Obama?
My guess is Spaniards named this? Mount Blackhead. So racist, to use the word black.
I stand corrected, the mountain was not named by a Spaniard. (Did I just offend someone by writing Spaniard?)
Oh my Lord! There’s one in Australia, too! Mt. (word that dare not speak its name)head.
The one in California was (worst word in the whole history of humanity)head Mountain.
And the name was about to be changed: but the Aborigines are protesting it, because the new name offends them, too.
I guess there are two things to be learned here: One) There’s no pleasing some people. Two) You can learn the darndest things, googling around.
Why didn’t they just re-name it “Blackhead Mountain?” ;)
These hyper-sensitive, neurotic geniuses should’ve renamed it “African-American head mountain.” After all, a name like would roll off the tongue very easily and would be so pleasant to the ear!
How ‘bout naming it ‘Amber Lamps’ mountain?
““It’s not often you get a chance to right an historical wrong,” Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, who made the name-change motion, said at the ceremony Saturday.”
Isn’t that telling! Note who considers it an ‘historical wrong’ and what his ethnicity is.
I, as a Celtic-American, am not bothered by the old name at all. If it was “Mickhead Mountain” I would look at it with pride. But then, that’s the difference. As a white male, I am one of the least numerically resident inhabitants on planet earth, which SHOULD qualify me as a ‘minority.’ But not in these people’s play books.
One law for me, another law for thee….
“Different mountain, different God” - John Guilgud in “Chariots of Fire”
