Page:Oregon Geographic Names, third edition.djvu/168



berpages 73. the form ston's map unknown origin, probably Indian, but with French spelling. The French word means a shell. Scoquel appears in the Oregonian, January 7, 1854, in an advertisement of the Coose Bay Company. The name is there said to be Indian for "eel." Coquette appears on a map of John B. Preston, surveyor-general of Oregon, 1851, probably intended for Coquelle. It appears Coquille in Preston's map of 1856. Canadian-French fur traders may have left the form of name among the Indians. See OHQ, volume

XIX, pages 73-74, by Leslie M. Scott, and also the Oregonian for September 3, 1907, where Harvey W. Scott makes some comments on the pronunciation of the name. Captain William Tichenor in Pioneer History of Coos and Curry Counties, page 29, says the Indian name of this stream was Nes-sa-til-cut, but gives no further information. In an article in the Coos Bay Times, November 29, 1943, Mary M. Randleman, Coos County pioneer, says the word is of Indian origin and cites a number of early uses of the style Coquelle and Coquel. The Handbook of American Indians, volume I, page 871, lists the Mishikhwutmetunne Indians, who lived along the Coquille, and says that the Chetco names for some of these Indians was Ku-kwil tunne, and Kiguel is a form listed as being used as early as 1846. This seems to indicate an Indian origin of the name. On October 25, 1938, the Oregonian printed on its editorial page an interesting letter from Sam Van Pelt, an aged Indian living at Brookings, who recounted the difficulties of spelling Indian names with "English" letters. "Coquilth" was the result of his efforts to produce the correct sound, but no interpretation of the word was furnished. The letter and accompanying editorial are well worth reading. Interesting information about the founding of the town of Coquille is given in an article in Coquille Valley Sentinel for November 20, 1941. In Coos County there have for many years been spirited differences of opinion about the pronunciation of the name Coquille. See editorial in the Oregonian, October 17, 1938, as well as editorial mentioned above.

COQUILLE Point, Lincoln County. Coquille Point is on the east shore of Yaquina Bay about a half mile north of Yaquina community. The place is said to have been named for some Indian families who lived there many years ago and were supposed to have been members of the Coquille tribe of Coos County. The writer does not know how they became settled at Yaquina Bay.

CORBETT, Multnomah County. This post office and station on the Union Pacific Railroad, as well as Corbett Heights upon the Columbia River Highway above, were named for Senator Henry Winslow Corbett, one of Oregon's prominent pioneer citizens, for many years a resident of Portland. Mr. Corbett owned a farm near the post office. For a concise biography of Mr. Corbett, see Carey's History of Oregon, volume II, page 305. Scott's History of the Oregon Country has biographical information about Senator Corbett in volume I, pages 108 and 280, and Harvey W. Scott's tribute, volume V, page 183.

CORBIN, Curry County. Walter F. Riley wrote the compiler from San Jose, California, in March, 1947, that Corbin was named for a man interested in the operations of a sawmill in the locality. Corbin was on Mussel Creek, about fifteen miles south of Port Orford, and when the

USGS map of the Port Orford quadrangle was made in 1897-98, the place was about a mile east of the old coast road between Port Orford and Gold Beach. Corbin post office was established May 8, 1901, with li