Delaware / Oklahoma
January 2012
Ebright Azimuth is the highest land point in Delaware. Some folks believe that Ebright Azimuth, a hefty stone’s throw from the border with Pennsylvania, or a distance that Cal McLish could throw a baseball, was chosen to pay tribute to someone whose name was Ebright Azimuth. This is not the case.
Cal McLish, eh? We are a country that has honored presidents with given names like Barack and Millard, a poet named Langston, an inventor named Buckminster and a sports hero named Yogi. Other great names of people we have revered and celebrated over the years, fore or aft, include Johns, philanthropist; Butkus, Bear; Picabo, skier; Grover, another president; Grover, blue muppet; Crapper, inventor of the ballcock — not the toilet as is widely believed — Stansfield, Navy officer; and the aforementioned Cal McLish, major league baseball pitcher whose full name was Calvin Coolidge Julius Caesar Tuskahoma McLish. His teammates called him “Buster.”
Don’t ask me why I chose Cal McLish to throw the ball from Pennsylvania into Delaware. He was born and died in Oklahoma. He had an arm like a catapult. Catapults are illegal in some states. Okay, I admit it. I chose Calvin McLish for his name.
In the interest of full disclosure, Thomas Crapper was not one of ours. He was a Brit, but I couldn’t resist slipping him in here for his name. Yes, he invented the ballcock. There is a little-known movement to change the name ballcock to ballhen. No there isn’t, I made that up.
Given the clear indication of unusual names like these, I ask you, why can’t we have a citizen named Ebright Azimuth!
Maybe we could, but we don’t. We do have two guys whose names were Ebright. They were James Ebright and brother Grant Ebright. The Ebrights owned this land when the property was first surveyed back in 1933. Therefore Ebright is half the name.
The other half of the high point name, Azimuth, did not come from a person’s personal handle. Rather, azimuth has several meanings, but in general, it indicates the direction of a celestial object from the observer standing on the planet. That is to say, up. It is obvious that the high point of any state is the part that is closest to the stars, the uppest, if you will.
What’s your name?