Why Do So Many Things in Battle Creek Have the Name “Minges”? There’s Minges Road, Minges Place, Minges Hills, Minges Hills Church, Minges Creek, Minges Brook Mall, Minges Elementary School, and Minges Creek Village. There are Minges apartments, Minges health clubs, and Minges chiropractic offices. Most new radio announcers that come to Battle Creek pronounce it “MIN-juzz”. We educate them as soon as possible. To tell the story of Battle Creek’s “Minges” connection, we have to go back to January 24, 1848. That’s when a guy named James Wilson Marshall found flakes of gold at Sutter’s Mill near Coloma, California. Word got around.