Adopted 5 May 1925 on Geological Survey map 2068, Kamloops, and on Ottawa file OBF 0924. Also McConnell Hill.

Source: BC place name cards, or correspondence to/from BC's Chief Geographer or BC Geographical Names Office

"By letter of 18 February 1918 to Deville, Surveyor General of Canada, the Managing Director of the Adams River Lumber Company of Chase, BC, advised that the lake was named by one of their timber cruisers in honour of Mr. Archibald McConnell, a merchant in Chase, who was a member of the cruising party. McConnell arrived in BC in 1862, worked for a time as a blacksmith in the Cariboo, then settled near Knutsford to ranch; Water Rights Branch issued a licence to Archibald McConnell in 1884. Horse breeding and racing was his passion, often riding himself; he won many races including the 1862 BC Derby in Victoria. In 1899, age 65 he shot himself in an accident at home. The skeletal remains of his Knutsford home are still standing, known to generations of Kamloops children as the haunted house."

Source: Lean, Pat; Nicola Valley Place Names; unpublished manuscript, 1993