Named after people who never came.
Plenty of American states are named after people. A surprising number of those people never set foot in the place that carries their name, and in one case the name went to the wrong member of the family.
The short version, from my channel. Watch it on YouTube.
Delaware: a governor who stayed in Virginia
In 1610 an English captain, Samuel Argall, sailed into a large bay and named it after the governor of the Virginia colony, Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr. The name passed to the river, to the Native people who lived along it, whom the English called the Delaware, and eventually to the state. Lord De La Warr himself never visited it.
Maryland: a queen who stayed in England
In 1632 King Charles I granted a charter for a new colony to the Calvert family. It was named Maryland, in honour of his wife, Queen Henrietta Maria, a French-born Catholic princess. The colony became a refuge for English Catholics. The queen never crossed the Atlantic to see it.
Pennsylvania: the wrong William Penn
In 1681 King Charles II granted a huge piece of land to William Penn, a Quaker, partly to settle a large debt the crown owed to Penn's late father, Admiral Sir William Penn. Penn suggested the name Sylvania, meaning woodland. The king added Penn in front, in honour of the admiral.
The younger Penn worried people would think he had named the colony after himself, and he objected, but the king would not change it. The admiral, whose name it carries, never saw Pennsylvania.
They are not alone
Virginia is named after Queen Elizabeth I, the "Virgin Queen", and Georgia after King George II. Neither of them ever visited America either.
- 1610 Delaware Bay named after Lord De La Warr
- 1632 Maryland's charter, named for Queen Henrietta Maria
- 1681 Pennsylvania's charter, named for Admiral Penn
Sources
- Thomas West, 3rd Baron De La Warr, Wikipedia
- Province of Maryland, Wikipedia
- Province of Pennsylvania, Wikipedia