Shawangunk, New York  Shawangunk is a town in southwestern Ulster County, New York, USA. The population was 14,332 at the 2010 census. Like the neighboring mountain range, for which it is named, it is pronounced either as the Munsee Lenape, Shawangunk , or as the colonial Shongum by local residents. (See Shawangunk Ridge.) Shawangunk was first settled by Europeans around 1670. The region was organized as a precinct in 1743, and became the town of Shawangunk in 1788. The town's name comes from the Dutch translation of the Munsee Lenape. The Lenape pronunciation for the town was "Scha-WAN-gunk." In Lenape, "Schawan," means "it is smokey air." This was given as referring to the nearby Catskill Mountains which were known as the "hidden mountains." The mountain ridge that runs from southwest to northeast creates a heavy humidified atmosphere that would make the Lenape believe the area had smokey air. A Lenape linguist, Raymond Whritenour, suggests that the name comes from the burning of a Munsee fort by the Dutch in the year 1663. This fort was nearby a creek later known as the Shawangunk Kill and also what is now known as Old Fort Road. The burning of the fort signaled the end of the Second Esopus War and helped spread the name to the nearby ridge by the early 1700s. Present-day citizens of Shawangunk refer to themselves as living in particular hamlets such as Wallkill or Pine Bush rather than the town as a whole; this has been in part due to the large size and growing population of the town and the fact that Wallkill is the designation for the local post office. According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , of which, of it is land and of it (0.55%) is water. The south town line and half of the east town line is the border of Orange County, New York. The Wallkill River flows through the eastern half of town and lends its name to the hamlet, which it flows through. The western part of the town, including Walker Valley, climbs the slopes of the eponymous mountains. As of 2009, there were 12,652 people, 4,333 households, and 2,557 families residing in the town. The population density was 225 people per square mile . There were 3,754 housing units at an average density of 66.8 per square mile (25.8/km²).