Ah yes Lazarus Creek, now I had seen it.

For many years Lazarus Creek had been quietly, persistently positioning itself to receive the gift of my photographic gaze, and now at last it could stop doing that.

 

According to the U.S. federal government's Geographic Names Information System, there is but one stream in the U.S. named Lazarus Creek: It's this one.

 

I asked ChatGPT if it could find evidence of any other streams by that name in the various other nations of the world. After searching and thinking for a minute and twelve seconds, it said it hadn't, aside from a reference to a "San Lazarus Creek" in New Mexico, and offered: "If you want, I can also run a country-by-country sweep of foreign gazetteers for 'Lazarus Creek' variants, but as of now: no other exact matches found." By that time I had lost interest, and I decided not to pursue the matter.

 

"Lazarus" is a comical name to me because I associate it with the now-defunct Lazarus department store chain and its TV ads such as this one from 1989, which includes a musical accompaniment that is bizarrely unsuited to its Mother's Day theme, and a clumsily-edited transition from sex lingerie to grandma jewelry.

 

I am aware that there is a Jesus story involving a man named Lazarus, and I do not care about it at all.

 

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In Providence Township in Lac qui Parle County, Minnesota, on August 14th, 2025, was Lazarus Creek as viewed from the north side of a road on the boundary of Lac qui Parle County and Yellow Medicine, numbered 100th Street in the former and 280th Avenue in the latter, between U.S. Route 75 and 230th Avenue.

 

Lazarus Creek flows to the Lac qui Parle River, which flows to the Minnesota River, which flows to the Mississippi River.

 

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Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names terms:

• Lac qui Parle (county) (2001035)

• Lazarus Creek (2485692)

• Minnesota (7007521)

 

Art & Architecture Thesaurus terms:

• boundaries (300055590)

• cropland (300132443)

• cultural landscapes (300008932)

• culverts (300006116)

• riverine landscapes (300435110)

• rivers (300008707)

• rural areas (300229355)

• summer (season) (300133099)

 

Wikidata items:

• 14 August 2025 (Q69307631)

• August 14 (Q2775)

• August 2025 (Q61313037)

• Central tall grasslands (Q5062159)

• county line (Q97644453)

• Des Moines Lobe (Q135894673)

• Lazarus Creek (Q136030643)

• Minnesota River drainage basin (Q47254493)

• Mississippi River drainage basin (Q2887546)

• Providence Township (Q1911655)

• Treaty of Traverse des Sioux (Q7837264)

• Western Corn Belt Plains (Q96414546)

 

Library of Congress Subject Headings:

• Country life (sh85033462)

• Rivers—Minnesota (sh85114344)

Done