Why Lake
p. 17 · Read in the full issue
Billy Mitchell?
ROES anyone know why the lake in the middle of Bougainville Island, New Guinea, is shown on some maps as “Lake Billy Mitchell?”
On the official New Guinea map, the lake (which is just about due west of Numa Numa plantation) is not named at all. The fact that it has been called after someone with an English name on other maps—in cluding the one in Pacific Publica tions’ Handbook of Papua-New Guinea —has intrigued some of our readers, and especially Mr. J Gervais, an American living in Las Vegas, Nevada. During the war he served as a major with the US Air Force.
Mr. Gervais would like to know who named the lake and when He says that General Billy Mitchell was an outspoken air pioneer who died m 1936 in the United States where there are a number of memorials to him. Was Bougainville’s lake named after him?
Our guess is that it was—un officially—during the Pacific War by some USAF airman flying missions out of Guadalcanal. We’ve heard of Joe Mitchell (and BP plantations on Bougainville might be regarded as monuments to him), but never of Dilly, Help, anyone?