Saint John and St. John's... Confusing?

[EnvisionSaintJohn]

Is it confusing that Saint John, New Brunswick and St. John's, Newfoundland, two of the oldest cities in Canada, both located in Atlantic Canada, have almost identical names?



St. John's, NL, founded 1583




Saint John, NB, founded 1604


Anyone have any funny or interesting stories and experiences regarding confusion between these two cities with nearly identical names? Or is there really no confusion at all, like some residents of both cities like to claim?

[le calmar]

I see how that could be confusing, especially for newcomers. I think most Canadians would be aware of the difference however. Just a note though, a city is generally considered "founded" when it becomes a permanent settlement. That happened in the 1630's in both cities. Otherwise we could say Toronto was founded in 1720 and Kingston in 1673 due to the temporary and/or military presence at the time, which is not accurate.

The information available on Wikipedia about the year of foundation is often wrong - for the longest time it was referencing the year 1497 as the year St. John's was founded, but I see someone finally edited it.

[Innsertnamehere]

I know the distinction fairly well as my mother grew up in Saint John so it was drilled into me as a kid.. but definitely, definitely confusing.

[MolsonExport]

Sainte (Ste.) Catherines (Famous Montreal Street).
Saint Catharines (Ontario).

Confusing? Nah. But hard to remember the correct spelling for the latter.

[ConundrumNL]

It could be even more confusing.

Pre-confederation you did see 'Saint John's' used, I know the MUN archive has a 1930s city map that calls it that. I assume 'St. John's' became standardized around Confederation.

[Ozabald]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Sainte (Ste.) Catherines (Famous Montreal Street).
Saint Catharines (Ontario).

Confusing? Nah. But hard to remember the correct spelling for the latter.

Not confusing. No different than Vancouver, BC vs. Vancouver, WA; Portland, ME vs. Portland, OR; Ottawa, ON vs. Ottawa, IL, etc.

[SignalHillHiker]

The airport in Vienna has a counter specifically for people who thought they were going to Australia.

There will always be people confused. We see an article every few years about some tourists having a great time in one city despite thinking they were visiting the other.

Most people have no issue. It could become an issue if Saint John became more individually well known outside of New Brunswick, or if New Brunswick likewise became more individually well known outside of the Maritimes, but for now it's fine. Its very rare that I encounter anything naming my city but intending to reference to New Brunswick.

[jonny24]

Not confusing IMO. Like, obviously a little more easier to confuse than Toronto vs Montreal, but not actually enough to cause any issues.

In written form, "St." vs "Saint" does the heavy lifting - the words look quite different.

In person... well, New Brunswickers will hate this, but Saint John has literally never once come up in my life for there to be an opportunity for confusion. I heard about it in school one time, when discussing Canadian Geography, and I've seen it on maps on the weather channel.

Which may be more to do with how much you hear about their respective provinces overall, rather than strictly the cities themselves.

[Acajack]

Some people have shown up at the airport in Sydney, Cape Breton, expecting to be in Sydney, Australia.

[Nouvellecosse]

I found it confusing until maybe the age of 7 or 8. But not until then. It would be more confusing if they were the same name (pronounced the same) or had the same spelling. But with the clear differences between then not so much. Assuming you've been educated as to what the differences are.

[EnvisionSaintJohn]

Originally Posted by le calmar

I see how that could be confusing, especially for newcomers. I think most Canadians would be aware of the difference however. Just a note though, a city is generally considered "founded" when it becomes a permanent settlement. That happened in the 1630's in both cities. Otherwise we could say Toronto was founded in 1720 and Kingston in 1673 due to the temporary and/or military presence at the time, which is not accurate.

The information available on Wikipedia about the year of foundation is often wrong - for the longest time it was referencing the year 1497 as the year St. John's was founded, but I see someone finally edited it.

It’s a little hard to pin down Saint John’s exact founding date, and a little harder to pin down St. John’s’s. I just went with what was listed on Wikipedia.

I think it’s mainly confusing for people outside of Atlantic Canada, which is a bit of an issue to say the least for a city that has been trying to prioritize tourism and immigration. Essentially, it’s a lingering branding and marketing issue.

Personally, I think it’s confusing why St. John, NB went through all of the trouble and cost of a name change to Saint John, NB, around the turn of the 20th century well before Newfoundland even joined Canada, instead of actually changing the name to something unique, and not just remove the abbreviation.

I think many Saint John area locals underestimate how confusing it is for many outside the region of Atlantic Canada, or rather more, just how little the rest of Canada cares about Saint John, New Brunswickers wanting them to fully spell out the name of their city to avoid being confused with St. John’s

[Arrdeeharharharbour]

I grew up in the Annapolis valley where we were much closer to Saint John than Halifax. Our tv and radio was primarily out of Saint John. Identifying the two cities is not confusing to me, but I suggest that many (or even most) Canadians who have never been in the region will think St. John's rather than Saint John whenever they hear or see either one of the cities mentioned because St. John's has a nation wide, if not world wide, identity whereas Saint John does not. I would see this as a problem if I were marketing Saint John.

[EnvisionSaintJohn]

Originally Posted by Ozabald

Not confusing. No different than Vancouver, BC vs. Vancouver, WA; Portland, ME vs. Portland, OR; Ottawa, ON vs. Ottawa, IL, etc.

Don’t forget Ontario, CA.

Vancouver, BC and Vancouver, WA is absolutely confusing, though.


As for the confusion between St. John’s and Saint John, here's a relevant google search given the very name of this forum: St. John's Skyline. I even went incognito and turned on my VPN to a US location to try and make the results less influenced by my location and search history... notice the results are mostly images of the Saint John, NB skyline?

If that's what the results are from the most sophisticated search engine in human history, a literal machine, what do you think the average person west of New Brunswick thinks when they hear Saint John and St. John's? You really don't think there’s no confusion resulting from two relatively small, Atlantic Canadian cities with nearly identical names? Come on now…

[lio45]

In southern Quebec those two can’t possibly be confused, because if you just say St-Jean it means St-Jean(-sur-Richelieu), a city of like 100k now, therefore whenever you want to refer to any of these other two, you always have to say St-Jean-Nouveau-Brunswick or St-Jean de Terre-Neuve, it’s impossible to refer to either city without automatically eliminating the possible confusion with the other.

Well, I guess it’s not impossible, one COULD be saying “not St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, I mean the one in Atlantic Canada!” but no one would ever do that, makes no sense

[lio45]

Originally Posted by EnvisionSaintJohn

Don’t forget Ontario, CA.

Vancouver, BC and Vancouver, WA is absolutely confusing, though.


As for the confusion between St. John’s and Saint John, here's a relevant google search given the very name of this forum: St. John's Skyline. I even went incognito and turned on my VPN to a US location to try and make the results less influenced by my location and search history... notice the results are mostly images of the Saint John, NB skyline?

If that's what the results are from the most sophisticated search engine in human history, a literal machine, what do you think the average person west of New Brunswick thinks when they hear Saint John and St. John's? You really don't think there’s no confusion resulting from two relatively small, Atlantic Canadian cities with nearly identical names? Come on now…

Reminds me of the time SignalHillHiker posted a pic of the surprisingly beefy skyline of New Brunswick, NJ as “not sure which one of Moncton, Freddy or Saint-John but it’s impressive”

[MonkeyRonin]

We're a bunch of Canadian geography nerds, so of course we're attuned to the minor differences between the two names - as would any locals; but to everyone else they're absolutely going to cause confusion. Especially when the names are used phonetically. If I were say, cornering someone at a party and telling them all about Saint John's tallest buildings, the unfortunate listener in that conversation would have no way to tell whether I was referring to the city in New Brunswick or the one in Newfoundland.

[Nashe]

Originally Posted by EnvisionSaintJohn

Personally, I think it’s confusing why St. John, NB went through all of the trouble and cost of a name change to Saint John, NB, around the turn of the 20th century well before Newfoundland even joined Canada, instead of actually changing the name to something unique, and not just remove the abbreviation.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by lio45

Reminds me of the time SignalHillHiker posted a pic of the surprisingly beefy skyline of New Brunswick, NJ as “not sure which one of Moncton, Freddy or Saint-John but it’s impressive”

Nice urbanity in New Brunswick. There are also renderings that look even nicer (a few new shiny towers are planned for the area!)

Soon the tallest building in New Brunswick will be outside the province (if it’s not the case already)

[hipster duck]

Not at all confusing. One is Saint John, NB, postal code starts with E, the other is St. John's, NL, postal code starts with A.

Most of the world has stuff like this. In Germany, within the state of Bavaria alone, there are 6 Neustadts:

Neustadt an der Aisch,
Neustadt bei Coburg
Neustadt an der Donau
Neustadt am Kulm
Neustadt am Main
Neustadt an der Waldnaab

How many Springfields are there in the US? Many of them are bigger than either St. John's or Saint John, such as Springfield MA and Springfield IL. If you spend hundreds of dollars to fly to Portland OR and end up in Portland ME, that's on you.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Not at all confusing. One is Saint John, NB, postal code starts with E, the other is St. John's, NL, postal code starts with A.

Most of the world has stuff like this. In Germany, within the state of Bavaria alone, there are 6 Neustadts:

Neustadt an der Aisch,
Neustadt bei Coburg
Neustadt an der Donau
Neustadt am Kulm
Neustadt am Main
Neustadt an der Waldnaab

How many Springfields are there in the US? Many of them are bigger than either St. John's or Saint John, such as Springfield MA and Springfield IL.

I have land in Columbia NH and whenever needing to find it on a list of suggestions (say, landwatch.com for a search) I always have to go through like ten other Columbias (including at least one state capital)