Earlier this month, the Nevada State Board of Geographic Names voted to indefinitely shelve a plan to rename a cove at the lake after the famous American writer, who got his publishing start at the Territorial Enterprise in Virginia City, following a complaint from the Washoe Tribe. A representative of the Native Americans noted in a letter to the board that Twain some 150 or so years ago had referred to the tribe in terms now considered derogatory and racially insensitive. Which, frankly, seems like an awfully long time to carry a grudge.

In a missive to the board, tribal official Darrel Cruz wrote, “Samuel Clemens had racist views on the native people of this country and has captured those views in his literature. Therefore we cannot support the notion of giving a place name in Lake Tahoe to Samuel Clemens.”

Lining the shores of the lake with casinos, shopping centers, the mansions of billionaires and an endless snaking of exhaust-belching automobiles is one thing. Naming a small stretch of geography after the man William Dean Howells called “the Lincoln of our Literature,” well, that’s beyond the pale.

Wait until folks find out we named the state capital after legendary guide and prolific Indian killer Christopher “Kit” Carson. They’ll really be steamed.