Bill Evans: Drop the ‘h’ in Amherst

At a recent meeting of the Amherst Town Council, the issue of changing the name of Amherst was raised. And for good reason.

Lord Jeff was not a good guy, and we should not speak out against insensitive sports mascots and logos without examining the history of our namesake. The Inn did it, the college did it, the town should do it, too.

But, to what? I offer the following. Drop the “h” — AMERST. First of all, we don’t use the h, anyway. Secondly, everyone else will finally pronounce our name correctly. But most importantly, it will divorce us from Lord Jeff without confusing the rest of the world (and all of us!). People will misspell our name for a while, but eventually they will catch on.

Yes, it will still cost money to reprint everything, but if we are going to do it, let’s make it simple. Drop the “h.” And then we can give it to Northampton. They could use one.

Bill Evans

Amherst