Ragged Ass Road is a well-known street in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories

Northwest Territories

The Northwest Territories is a federal territory of Canada.Located in northern Canada, the territory borders Canada's two other territories, Yukon to the west and Nunavut to the east, and three provinces: British Columbia to the southwest, and Alberta and Saskatchewan to the south...

; Tom Cochrane

Tom Cochrane

Tom Cochrane, OC Canadian musician and humanitarian, best known for his hit songs "Life Is a Highway", "Lunatic Fringe", "Human Race" and "I Wish You Well". Cochrane fronted the Canadian rock band Red Rider and has won seven Juno Awards...

 named his album Ragged Ass Road

Ragged Ass Road

Ragged Ass Road is the second solo album album by former Red Rider frontman Tom Cochrane, released in October of 1995. The album was named for Ragged Ass Road, a street in Yellowknife, Northwest Territories...

after it. The street itself was named by Lou Rocher and his friends after a season of hard work and no profit; they were sitting around one night, drinking and joking that they should call their street Ragged Ass Road, as the term "ragged ass" meant dirt poor, which is what they were after a long season of prospecting, so, jokingly, they made a sign and put it up on the street. The City of Yellowknife later officially adopted the name.

Ragged Ass Road is one of the most popular Yellowknife street names, and the street sign has been stolen

Street sign theft

Street sign theft occurs when street signs are stolen, often to be used as decorations, but also sometimes to avoid obeying the law by claiming later the sign was not there. Although the theft often seems arbitrary, signs that are unusual or amusing tend to be stolen more frequently...

 so many times it was eventually welded onto the signpost, and replica signs were made to be sold to tourists.

It was once known as Privy Road because there were many outhouse

Outhouse

An outhouse is a small structure separate from a main building which often contained a simple toilet and may possibly also be used for housing animals and storage.- Terminology :...

s on it. Back in the 1940s, Ragged Ass was the name of a mine situated on Hidden Lake, the Ragged Ass Mine, as well as a mining syndicate of the same name.