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I think you've said it ...things get named for all sorts of reasons and from all sorts of people. Sometimes lousy nicknames stick and become a source of pride (i.e. 'Tiny' Nate Archibald) and sometimes people just forget what the original meaning was.

But I think you stated correctly that the town of the "lispers" (if that's a word?) probably was named by outsiders who thought the locals spoke funny. Eventually they were all either merged, overridden by others or whatever ...but the name stuck.

I'd say it's not a huge percentage, but certainly many names come from what would have originally been perceived as a negative connotation.