Everytime I drive north through Mississippi on my trip to KY for the holidays, it seems that it takes forever to get through that long northward haul on I-55 from one end of the state to the other. But when I cross the Tallahatchie River, I know I'm close to the end. However, I always end up singing the song, "Ode To Billy Joe" for about five minutes after I see the name of the bridge. Can't help it.
Anyway, I also noticed a river called the Loosahatchie in Mississippi. This got me thinking -- what does the root word "hatchie" mean? I rationalized that it might mean "river" and was probably an Indian term. Of course, there's also the Chattahoochee River and I thought maybe "hoochee" (git yer minds out of the gutter...this one's spelled differently) might be a variation of "hatchie" and might also mean "river."
So, I finally remembered to look it up. http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=hatchi ... fl=0&x=wrt I hit on several links that verify "hatchie" means "river." However, according to http://georgiatrails.com/trails/horsetrough.html , "hoochee" means "painted" or "colored" and "chatta" means "rock" so it's "rock of many colors."
I thought it was interesting since I've known that song since I was a child and finally now know where that famous river is (after having driven over it for the past few years).
