So I don’t often write place name stories without knowing the meaning of the place name.

But Selkirk is one where I’m going to take a shot anyway.

I used to live on Oil Creek Rd. and, from time to time, we’d drive through the bustling metropolis of Selkirk. (Look it up on a map if you have no idea what I’m talking about.)

I remember the road — Selkirk Rd. — coming down the hill to this relatively open area, a village of Selkirk sign and a few houses. That was that.

My family moved to this area from northeast Ohio so we would kinda chuckle at the fact that the place had a name… but very few occupants.

As we’ve been writing these stories over the last couple years, that was one I always had in the back of my mind because, frankly, I still have no idea where the name came from.

Our go-to place name source says the place was once called “Wheedale.”

Identified as a former village in Eldred Township, the name “was concocted from the two names Wheelock and Martindale, joint owners of the lumber mill located at this side.

“There was a post office here from August of 1886 to December of 1891, at which time the name of the place was changed to Selkirk and the post office continued into 1902 after which mail was routed to Grand Valley.”

That’s where that source ends.

Michelle Gray, the Warren County Historical Society’s executive director, said the on;y “information that I can find on Selkirk is an early Stepping Stones and it notes that ‘Selkirk, a booming town in lumber and oil days (is) but just a crossroads now.”

She told me — as I would expect to be the case — that the name likely came from a person or family.

So I went to Wikipedia… Alexander Selkirk was a Scottish castaway who was the basis for the novel Robinson Crusoe, Scottish peerage has a “Earl of Selkirk” and a “Selkirk” is identified in Kansas, Missouri and New York (they even miss the Pa. Selkirk!) as well as several in Canada, three in the UK and one in Chile.

So does anyone know where this Selkirk got its name? If you do, send me an email at jcotton@timesobserver.com.