Commissioner Jones defends Swastika Lake

A pair of petitions seek to rename it, but Jones said the name could be used to teach history and suggested those seeking the name-change are communists. A local historical society supports renaming.

The Albany County Commission will decide next week if they’re going to back a proposed name-change for a local body of water with an unfortunate moniker: Swastika Lake.

There’s no record of how or why the lake was given its name, but its naming does predate the Nazi party’s infamous use of the bent-cross symbol. The symbol itself long predates the Nazi party, as Lindsy Sanders told commissioners during their meeting last week.

“The swastika emerged as an ancient symbol used by cultures to symbolize well-being and good fortune,” she said. “When Hitler decided to make it the symbol for the Nazi party, the swastika became one of the most significant symbols of hate, anti-semitism and infamy in much of the world outside Asia.”

Sanders has submitted a petition to rename the body of water “Fortune Lake” — a reference to the symbol’s original meaning that removes any connection to the genocidal Nazi regime of the last century.

“Although Swastika Ranch, Swastika Store and the Ladies’ Swastika Club existed in Albany County, those names were all changed during or after World War II — yet the name of Swastika Lake remains,” she said. “Today, anti-semitism and anti-semitic incidents throughout the United States are at the highest levels ever recorded. The swastika symbol is often present in those instances as the most effective way to communicate hatred for Jews.”

Commission Chair Pete Gosar gave the petition a warm reception and voiced his support for renaming the lake. But Commissioner Terri Jones, the board’s only Republican, took issue with the idea.

Jones cited the symbol’s long use by Hindus, Buddhists, Jains and the Navajo people. (The Navajo once used the symbol that most would recognize today as a Swastika, but they never used the word Swastika to describe it and have resisted comparisons to the symbol used by the Nazis.)

“Why would we remove the teaching opportunity to explain the history of the swastika, both good and bad?” Jone said. “The bad was very bad. However, the good predated the bad by eons. And the good is truly good and represents hope and goodwill.”

The bad was indeed very bad. In the United States, the swastika is overwhelmingly associated with Hitler’s regime — a regime that launched the deadliest conflict in human history and murdered more than six million Jews across its short-lived empire, many of whom were tortured and starved in death camps. Today, the swastika is used most frequently by white supremacists.

But Jones suggested the people pushing for the name change were being overly sensitive, trying to erase history, and even pushing a “communist” agenda.

“We should not change names to suit sensitive people,” Jones said. “An educated person should be able to speak to both sides of the issue, but you must know that there are two sides of the coin to address. Limiting knowledge and removing history are the calling cards of communism. I believe that Swastika Lake should remain Swastika Lake.”

In pushing to keep the name of the lake as a “teaching opportunity” to explain history, Jones finds herself in opposition to the Albany County Historical Society, which is submitting its own name-change petition.

The historical society echoes Sanders’ concerns about the current name, but is suggesting an alternate designation: Knight Lake.

“We believe the name should be something that is more closely associated with Albany County,” Historical Society Secretary Kim Viner told the commissioners. “Therefore we’re going to submit a (petition) that changes the name to Knight Lake — in honor of longtime resident Samuel Howell Knight. For those of us of a certain age, we still remember how prominent he was in Albany County. In fact, he was named Wyoming’s ‘Citizen of the Century’ in 1999 by the American Heritage Center, and citizen of the year for health, technology and science.”

Knight was a nationally renowned geologist who worked and taught for decades at the University of Wyoming. He reconstructed the apatosaurus now standing in UW’s Geology Museum and built the T-Rex statue outside. He also has a special connection to the National Forest land where Swastika Lake is located.

“He founded the University of Wyoming Science Camp, which is about a half-mile from Swastika Lake,” Viner said. “Thousands of college students from across the United States have studied the ecology of the Swastika Lake area.”

Because the lake is in the national forest, any name change must be approved by the U.S Board on Geographic Names. That federal board will vote on a name change only after the relevant state and the National Forest Service have weighed in.

The commission’s endorsement of a particular name change would also carry weight.

“We'll look to the commissioners as the elected body speaking for the people who have an interest in the name,” said Matthew O’Donnell of the U.S. Board on Geographic Names.

The commission tabled the topic until its next meeting on June 20. On that date, the commission could endorse either Sanders’ petition or the Albany County Historical Society’s petition. They could also choose to endorse neither.