Long before flea baths and flea collars, native Californians had a foolproof way of getting rid of tiny, pesky, maddening fleas.

"And many times they would have a village and it would get so full of fleas, they would just move and burn the village down," says Randy Young, author of "Street Names of Pacific Palisades." The Palisades is a fancy neighborhood now ... but perhaps not back then. Young says one of those crude exterminations didn't work. The fleas stuck around.

"Obviously this was a village that hadn't been properly burned out, and so it was called 'the fleas.'"

Or, in Spanish, "las pulgas." No word on whether there's still a flea problem on that street in Pacific Palisades ... but they're still in the name: Las Pulgas Road.

(Airdate for this story: 9/22/07)