Louden, in his " The Small Mouthed Black Bass," states that the early Jesuit missionaries used the word " achigan" as early as 1655 to designate the small mouthed black bass. The word corresponds with the French word " bas " meaning stocking and certainly these hardy fishers of men must have included " our " fish in their Friday menus. Robert Roosevelt found 101
the Chippewas of the Lake Superior Country still using the name " achigan " in the eighties.
The first small mouthed black bass recognized by science was a specimen described by Lacepede in 1801. It happened to be a mutilated specimen and as a result received the unfortunate generic name "microp-terus," meaning small fin.
