If you Google “Akron sucks,” you’ll get 8.5 million hits.Ouch.But if you Google “Akron Everywhere,” you’ll discover a guy who thinks those 8.5 million editorialists need to have their heads examined.Laurence Frese has created a Facebook page by that name, and on it he offers nothing but praise.“I live in Akron, Ohio,” he writes, “and I love my small town.”Frese created the page because, while surfing the Web, he was surprised to discover other places named Akron. He’s trying to get those places to interact.Obviously, Frese wasn’t reading the Beacon Journal back in 2003, when your favorite columnist visited all 12 of the towns named after ours.They’re scattered throughout the continental U.S.: Alabama, Colorado, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Missouri, Mississippi, Nebraska, New York and Pennsylvania.While researching the series, I traveled 9,400 miles, stayed at 16 motels, drove eight rental cars and took 22 airplane flights. The bean-counters were weeping.I discovered that the biggest little Akron — Akron, Pa. — had (and still has) a population of barely 4,000. The next biggest, in New York, near Buffalo, had 3,100 (now 3,000).You could put all 12 of the other Akrons together and the total population would be less than 10 percent of ours, even in our 2012, post-industrial, downsized form.A couple of the junior Akrons had withered to a handful of residents. In Akron, Kan., for instance, the population was 10 in the summer but fell 20 percent when two college kids went back to school.Things were so bad in one Akron that we had to perform last rites.After visiting 11 of the Akron Dozen, I simply couldn’t locate the 12th, despite wading through miles of rugged terrain in eastern Mississippi with photographer Ed Suba Jr.A couple of months later, a former resident of our Akron, Donald Hubele, chairman of the English department at Bellhaven College in Jackson, Miss., caught wind of our unsuccessful quest and turned it into an assignment for his Bibliography and Research class: track down the missing Akron and figure out what happened to it.After weeks of research, students trudging through the rear of a cornfield discovered the only remnants of the town: two concrete foundation blocks that once were part of Akron’s sawmill, built in 1917. In 1926, when all of the surrounding trees had been cut down, the mill moved, and so did most of the people.So Hubele organized a ceremony in which we dug a hole and buried a combination casket/time capsule, marking the official end of Akron, Miss. (Among the treasured items entombed in a big Rubbermaid container: a Goodyear-tire ashtray donated by Don Plusquellic.)In researching everything Akron, one of the more significant discoveries (Mr. Frese, take note) was this: Our name was derived from an ancient Greek word, acros, which meant “high.”That was not a reference to recreational drugs, despite present indications to the contrary. Rather, when the city was founded in 1825, it was the highest point on the Ohio & Erie Canal, which ran all the way from Lake Erie to the Ohio River.Railroads eventually replaced the canal as the primary means of long-distance transportation, and they were the key to spreading Akron’s name. As the Iron Horse carted more and more people westward, they took the name with them. Many of the early rail lines ran precisely east and west, which explains why five of the little Akrons are within one degree of our latitude.But all of the Akrons were named after ours, even those to the east. Example: Akron, Pa., was settled in the late 1700s by German immigrants. In the early 1800s, some of them headed west to help build the canal, and when the project was finished, they returned with a new word, which eventually supplanted the original name, New Berlin.In planning the Akron project, I chose to include only places that were a specific dot on the map. That ruled out townships (of which Minnesota has two).I also discovered beforehand that Akron, Ark., no longer existed.Obviously, we can now add Akron, Miss., to the list of the dearly departed.Which brings us to the fall of 2011, when Frese caught the Akron bug.In September, he wrote, “I thought it would be a great idea to see where the other Akrons are, and find out what’s going on in them.“Please tell me where your Akron is located, and any additional information about your Akron ... history, city government, school systems, unique features, landmarks. Please tell us what you do in your Akron.”The result: thud.As of late last week, only eight people were registered as “liking” the site, and none had commented.The problem: Who would ever think to Google “Akron Everywhere”? Frese needs to make some initial contacts in some other manner.Maybe this will help him get the rubber on the road.Bob Dyer can be reached at 330-996-3580 or bdyer@thebeaconjournal.com.