Family name origins & meanings
- French : topographic name denoting someone who lived by a flat field, from champ ‘field’ (see Champ) + plaine ‘level’.
- Samuel de Champlain, explorer, colonizer, and founder of Quebec city, was lieutenant governor of New France from 1619 to his death in 1635. He was buried in Quebec city. In 1609 he gave his name to the lake which lies between VT and NY.