Los Angeles can be abbreviated to a two-letter-long abbreviation, "L.A." However, the city's original name was quite long. It was "El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Angeles de Porciuncula", which means "The Village of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels of 'Little Portion'" in Spanish. (source)

The longest place name in the world is the name of a hill in New Zealand, Tuamatawhataktankihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukuokaiwhenuakitanatahu, which means "the place where Tamateakokai-whenua—the man with the big knees who slid, climbed, and swallowed mountains, known as land eater—played his flute to his loved one." (source)

"Idaho", the name of one of the states in the United States of America, doesn't mean anything in any language. (source)

The Canary Islands got their name not from canaries but from the wild dogs that the Romans found when they landed there. They called the island Insulae Canariae, which means "Island of the Dogs." (source)

The word "uptown" was in use before the word "downtown" was. Both words were originally used to describe parts of Manhattan. (source)

New England was originally on the west coast of North America, not the east. When Francis Drake claimed that area for Queen Elizabeth I, he named the area Novus Albion (New England) because he thought the white cliffs near Point Reyes resembled the chalk cliffs near Dover. (source)

Nome, Alaska, got its name from nearby Cape Nome. The cape, however, got its name in a rather curious fashion. When a chart of the Alaskan coast was being prepared on board the British ship Herald, it was discovered that the cape had no name. It was indicated by ? Name, to indicate that the name was unknown. A draughtsman erroneously copied it as Cape Name, but the a in Name was rather indistinct and the word was read in London as Nome. (source)

The place-name Washington, which honours George Washington, can be found as the name of a state, the only state named after an American, the capital of the United States, 29 counties, and 33 towns. (source)

There are several Christmas-related unusual place names in the United States of America. They include Christmas, Florida, North Pole, Alaska, Santa Claus, Indiana, Santa Claus, Georgia, Noel, Missouri, and Snowflake, Arizona. (source)

The modern country of Ghana is not the same as ancient Ghana. Today's Ghana was formerly known as the Gold Coast, on the Gulf of Guinea in West Africa. Ancient Ghana, which lasted until around 1240, occupied parts of what are now Mali and Mauritania, between the Senegal and Niger rivers. The word "ghana" was a title meaning "war chief", and the area got its name from Africans from the north who would trade with "ghana".

Some more unusual place names in the United States are Romance, Arkansas, Toad Suck, Arkansas, Sleeping Giant, Connecticut, Coffee Pot Rapids, Idaho, Young America, Indiana, Monkey's Eyebrow, Kentucky, Boring, Maryland, Frankenstein, Missouri, River Styx, Ohio, Kremlin, Oklahoma, Fearnot, Pennsylvania, Panic, Pennsylvania, Looneyville, West Virginia, and Dull Center, Wyoming.

The words calico, cantaloupe, cashmere, champagne, cherry, coach, cologne, copper, and currant are derived from place names (for example, currant is derived from Corinth, and calico from Calcutta). There are many other words derived from place names that start with the other 25 letters of the alphabet as well. (source)

U.S. census reports indicate that a disproportionately large number of people live in places with names similar to their first names. For example, there are more Georges in Georgia, or Virginias in Virginia, or Louises in Louisiana, than would be expected by chance. This effect also applies to names of cities or towns. It appears to be caused by people with certain names moving to places with similar names (as opposed to parents naming their children after their place of birth). (source)

New River Canyon.

The oldest river in the Western Hemisphere is called, curiously enough, the New River. It is located in West Virginia.

The name of the city of Portland, Oregon, was decided by the flip of a coin. Amos Lovejoy and Francis Pettigrove, owners of the tract that would become the city, disagreed on what to call the townsite: Pettigrove, who had lived in Maine, preferred Portland, while Lovejoy, who had lived in Massachusetts, preferred Boston. They decided to flip a coin, with heads for Portland and tails for Boston, and heads came up. (source)