Five winters ago, I conceived and organized a community bonfire in Frisco, Colorado, known as “Spontaneous Combustion,” which, I am happy to report, was enough of a resounding success that the town government has now taken it over and made it an annual event. (I mean, beer and fire … how can you go wrong?) As part of the planning process for the first-ever Spontaneous Combustion, I decided to pen a speech, the construction of which took me a surprisingly long time because of a mental tête-à-tête that had been transpiring between my ears over the very beginning of my oration, the part that referenced the residential pedigree of those in attendance.

I had struggled whether, after welcoming the teetering throng to Frisco, I should ask: “How many of your are from Frisco?” Then, to ask: “How many of you drove down from Breckenridge?” How many are up here from the Front Range? Etc., etc., until I covered pretty much the rest of the globe, just in case we had any visitors from Papua New Guinea. But, I found myself wallowing for the millionth time in the eternal New-West place-based quandary: What does it mean to be FROM a town?” Does it mean you were born and raised there? Lived there since you were three? Graduated from the local high school? Moved there heart and soul 20 years ago with the intention of never leaving? Own a second home there and “hope to one day move up full time”?

So, what I decided to ask instead was: “How many of you are Frisco-ites?” Then: “How many of you are Breckies?” “Dillonites?” “Vailites?” “We got any Plumies over here?” “Any Pb-ers?” There were definitely some furrowed brows. “Plumies?” I could see scrunched-up foreheads wondering. “What the hell’s a Plumie?” (That would be someone from Silver Plume.) And who but folks from Leadville would know that a Pb-er is one who hails from the Cloud City, rather than one who is a devotee of Pabst?

What I had stumbled upon was a thing called a “demonym,” which, to make a very long-and-winding lexicographic tale somewhat more brevitous, is basically the way one describes oneself based upon where one is from.

Though there are certainly conceptual overlaps between saying one is, for example, “from” Aspen, and saying one is an “Aspenite,” there are simultaneously differences that clearly transcend the location of one’s mailing address. When one begins describing oneself by way of the place where one dwells, that indicates a Great Big Something that seems deeper, better and more committal than even saying, “I am from this town, or this county or this state.” Rather, you are saying “I am part of this place, and it is part of me.”

Is any of this important on any level in a place as inherently transient as Mountain Country? In an attempt to begin to address that question, I contacted literally 70 Colorado municipalities with the goal of simply asking whoever picked up the phone what people from Glenwood Springs and Walden and Cortez call themselves. It was a sobering lesson in New-West social dynamics, because the three most-common responses I received were: 1) “I haven’t lived here long enough to know, let me ask someone down the hall.” 2) “I don’t live in [whatever town]; I just work here.” 3) “We just call ourselves ‘locals’.” After several weeks of phone calls and emails on this quixotic quest, I found it easy to lament the fact that the people from at least four Colorado municipalities apparently do not have a way of describing themselves via the town in which they live. (Idaho Springs, Winter Park, Parachute and Silt, the last two of which are ripe for creative demonyming.) But I found it even easier to celebrate the fact that the good people from Basalt proudly call themselves “Basaltines.” (“We’ve always been a bit crackers,” I was told.) And that the people from the little Denver suburb of Bow Mar proudly are “Bowmartians.” And that those from Alma, more often than they call themselves “Almanites,” call themselves “Al-Maniacs.” And that, though Nederland apparently does not have a formal demonym (“Nederlanders” would seem obvious), the folks of that lovely hamlet in Boulder County have enough of a community-based sense of humor that they often refer to themselves “Nedheads.” Ditto Crested Buttians, who can crack a smile at the thought of being “Crusty Butts.” And that Central Citians know themselves as “Zeeks,” after the old ZK license plates. And that folks from lofty Montezuma are “Zuman Beings.” And that there are still people with enough functioning brain cells who remember when “Vailites” were known as “Vailians.” Ditto Durangoans and Ouray-ites who remember the days of “Durangatans” and “Ourangatans.”

I fully understand that in a part of the world where the public dialogue is justifiably dominated by sprawl, traffic, out-ofreach real estate prices and wildlife habitat being crushed by second-home-based developments and goddamned golf courses, the subject of demonyms isn’t exactly cause for additional heartburn among mountain dwellers. But, maybe, just maybe, if more people considered themselves one in the same with the place they call home, then, maybe, just maybe, a lot of the problems we face would at least be faced together with a sense of unity that is not often found in towns where people have to ask someone down the hall the answer to the question, “What do people from here call themselves?”

PS: I got an email from the clerk of a Colorado town so small I can’t even find it on a map called Crook. “We don’t have a name for ourselves,” she wrote. “Who wants to be called a ‘Crook’?” I about jumped out of my chair. If only I could find Crook, I would move there JUST SO, I could call myself “A Crook.” Or “Crooked.” Which leads me to this: If you know of any cool demonyms, please fire them off to me, even if they are totally made-up. To whit: I’m not sure if there are enough of them to merit a demonym, but, if I hailed from Riddle, Idaho, I would revel in being a “Riddler.” Ditto Nonpareil, Oregon. I would pay money to be a “Nonpareilian.” The business card opportunities alone would be worth the move.

Anyhow, anything amusing along these demonymic lines — fact, fiction, conjecture or speculation — fire them off to mjfayhee@mountaingazette.com