SPRINGFIELD, Va. – The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency implemented the presidentially-directed name change from Lake Ontario to Lake America in the U.S. Geographic Names Server, the official federal repository for foreign geographic names. 

This change was made following the President’s August 27 Executive Order, “Honoring the American History of the Great Lakes and Renaming Lake Ontario as Lake America.”

Lake America supports hundreds of thousands of U.S. jobs, drives billions in annual commerce and supplies critical water and power infrastructure. As an essential freight corridor for iron ore, energy and agriculture, it remains a cornerstone of American manufacturing and industry.

The GNS is the official repository of standard spellings of all foreign geographic names, sanctioned by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names. The server can be used for finding places, geospatial information system data, cartography and geospatial products. The geographic names in the GNS are provided for the guidance of and use by the federal government and for the information of the public. 

This change accompanies the Department of Interior’s update to the Geographic Names Information System, which is the official federal repository for all U.S. domestic geographic names for federal use. 

For more information on the GNS, visit: https://geonames.nga.mil.