By Any Other Name?

You know that I am a student of history, sociology, and well, all things interesting. I recently undertook a study of all of the names of the counties of the 50 states. One aspect of this is the frequency of names and how that relates to the office of the president. Clearly many counties were named to honor our presidents. Here are the top 7 most frequently occurring names which cover 12 of the presidents:

1 WASHINGTON 31
2 JEFFERSON 26
3 (a tie) JACKSON & LINCOLN 24
4 MADISON 20
5 MONROE 17
6 GRANT 15
7 (a tie) ADAMS (& J. Q. ADAMS), POLK, JOHNSON (& L. B. JOHNSON)

In the last 5 you have two sets of the same name. Who's to say in such a quandary what's more significant to the outcome of an election: belief in a platform or association with a name? The next most prominent presidential name of counties is CLINTON. None actually named after President William Jefferson Clinton. But a name common to folks and therefore containing a certain bias. As a lover of Linguistics, wish I would have more time to delve into all of this!

The top 5 NON-Presidential County names are:

1 FRANKLIN 25
2 (a tie) CLAY, MONTGOMERY & UNION 18
3 MARION 17
4 WAYNE 15
5 (a tie) GREENE & WARREN

Outside of Benjamin Franklin these are military leaders (Generals). With the obvious exceptions of Union and Clay.