INTRODUCTION
Just when it was that Lewis A. McArthur became interested in the geographic names of his native state seems not to be known. Perhaps an editorial by Harvey W. Scott in the Portland Oregonian of December 18, 1904, gave the stimulus. This, under the caption, "A General Review of Local Titles," opened with these sentences: "An interesting subject is the study of Oregon's geographical nomenclature. The subject is a large one and a volume would be required to exhaust it."
McArthur had been a reporter on the Oregonian a few months before this editorial appeared. He was an admirer of Harvey Scott. The thought that his editor's words planted a seed seems not too far-fetched. At some time, at any rate, and in some manner, one was planted and it germinated and grew.
In 1907 Governor George E. Chamberlain created the Oregon Geographic Board. It, according to ex-Governor Oswald West, who succeeded Chamberlain, "appears to have died but was given new life in 1914–no doubt," West says, "at the instance of Tam McArthur." Whether or not this surmise is correct Tam McArthur's interest in the geographic names of Oregon must have been demonstrated for Governor West named him a member of the resuscitated Board.
The Oregon Geographic Board has no background in the statutes. It gained, however, the official recognition of a listing in the Oregon Blue Book, biennial publication of the Secretary of State, and in its first appearance, in the 1915–1916 issue, McArthur is recorded as a member of the Board. In 1916 he became its secretary and he continued in that office until 1949 when illness forced his retirement.
Proceeding thus from speculation to fact we can record that McArthur's study of Oregon geographic names began some forty years ago. It is evident too, that his undertaking to compile a record of the origin of those names began more than twenty-five years ago for in December, 1925, there appeared in the Oregon Historical Quarterly the first installment of his collection of names and their background. There were installments in the seven succeeding Quarterlies and then, all having been assembled, they were presented in February, 1928, in book form under the title they had carried in the magazine, "Oregon Geographic Names."
In the preface to the first of the Quarterly sections "the compiler" as McArthur called himself, interchangeably with "the writer," said that he had "for many years gathered notes on the origin of Oregon geographic names." David W. Hazen, reviewing the book, wrote that the collection
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