All this week, NY1 is celebrating Staten Island with a special series for the borough weeks called "What's in a Name?" The series will take a closer look at the origins of neighborhoods and streets all over the city. Staten Island reporter Amanda Farinacci begins by taking a look at what used to be known officially as the Borough of Richmond.

There are Richmonds all over Staten Island: Richmond Avenue, Richmond Road, Richmond Hill Road. Not to mention Port Richmond, Richmond Terrace, and Historic Richmondtown, to name a few.

So why so many Richmonds? Well, it's for the Duke of Richmond, who had no direct connection to the island.

That the name appears so often was the work of early British settlers, who named streets and neighborhoods after important people and families with lots of property. The English arrived after the Dutch, who left their own indelible mark on the island. While the Dutch didn't make much progress actually settling here - they did leave behind one very important thing.

"Staten Island comes from the assembly in Amsterdam, the Staaten, is the name of the general governing body, and they named the colony in honor of that," explains Barnett Shepherd, a local historian.

The borough hasn't always been known as Staten Island. It got that name from original Dutch Settlers, until the English came along, and changed it to Richmond County. It was then called the Borough of Richmond, until 1975, when the city officially changed its name to the Borough of Staten Island.

The island's names don't always come from colonial history. Take College Avenue in Westerleigh. The pretty tree-lined street got its name from a college that once stood there. The avenue intersects with streets bearing the names of states. Those states weren't chosen randomly, though. They were named in honor of dry states during Prohibition.

"You're walking in history when you take a walk in your neighborhood," says Carlotta Defillo of Historic Richmondtown.

But not all names carry historical significance. Heartland Village is simply the name chosen by the developer who built it. Some were influenced by real estate brokers.

"When they put a house up for sale, what neighborhood is it in? They don't want to say Stapleton, so they say Mud Lane, which is Stapleton. Same thing with Wards Hill is Tompkinsville," says Staten Island Borough Historian Thomas Matteo.