MovieChat Forums > M*A*S*H (1972) Discussion > Lt. Col. Donald Penobscott

Lt. Col. Donald Penobscott

posted 2 years ago by CarolTheDabbler (575)
3 replies | jump to latest

This character's name puzzles me, which distracts me from the show whenever he's mentioned. There's a river and a town in Maine called Penobscot (only one "t"), which are both named for a local Indian tribe. So it seems odd that the character would bear that name unless they specifically intended for him to be a Native American. But if so, it was never mentioned.

My best guess is that they saw the name on a map and thought it sounded snobbish, and would therefore be appropriate for a man who would appeal to Margaret.

[–] PaladinNJ (21524) 2 years ago

Makes sense. They probably just saw the name somewhere and never checked it's meaning. In Gilligan's Island, they just picked his name from the phone book.

[–] Otter (24464) 2 years ago

Yeah, my guess is that some writer picked the name because it sounded like "snob" and was associated with Maine vacation areas.

But maybe the character had hidden NA ancestry, or maybe his name was like mine or Don Corleones, a town name turned into a family name by a bureaucratic error. That happened a lot in the old days of mass immigration.

[–] CarolTheDabbler (575) 2 years ago

Also, it's not clear that there are any real-life people with the surname Penobscot(t). I've found 1 listing with the single T and two with the double T, but in each case the person has an "associated name" (basically an alias, maiden name, whatever) with a different surname. In one case the person used to live on a street named Penobscot. And none of them have relatives with the name. So I think those three listings are mix-ups.

Of course some fictional characters do have non-real-life names.