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human
Eli5: Why are lakes names some times “Name Lake” and other times “Lake Name”?

I’m looking at a map of Washington State and I see lakes named Lake Washington, Lake Union and Lake Sammamish. And other names are Moses Lake, Deer Lake and Loon Lake. Is there a rationale for why some times the name precedes “lake” in the title and other times it follows?  Or was it random on the part of who picked the name originally and tradition just stuck.
gpt
In many cases, the order of the name doesn’t  meaning anything — it’s just random. *Generally* speaking, however, most lakes in the U.S. follow the pattern “Lake [Proper Noun]” or “[Adjective] Lake.”

So if you see, for example, *Lake Deer*, chances are it’s named after a person with the last name Deer. If you see *Deer Lake*, on the other hand, it probably got that name because there were/are lots of deer living around it. 

On a side note, it’s usually larger lakes that have a name like *Lake Name*, and smaller lakes with names of the form *Name Lake.* This isn’t intentional — it’s just more common to formally name the largest lakes after an important person or place.