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Peak named for old miner Descendants of Ezra Arnold got USGS to change name of Lake Peak By BILL KETTLER A Josephine County peak has been renamed "Arnold Mountain" to reflect the family's long presence there. The U.S. Board on Geographic Names renamed Lake Peak in October after Vern Arnold documented his family's 80-year gold-mining history on the 6,648-foot mountain. The new name will be published in the agency's 1998 Decision List, which catalogs all the name changes for the year. "It's been a family gathering place," said Arnold, a retired credit union manager and history buff. "We used to hunt there. I used to go up there as a teenager during the summer and carry in my stuff and stay for a month." Arnold Mountain lies within the Rogue River National Forest, just west of the border between Jackson and Josephine counties, about a mile north of the California border. "It's usually rather difficult to change names," said Arnold, who serves as president of the Southern Oregon Historical Society. "Things just happened to click." Things clicked, in part, because the "Lake Peak" name was not commonly used, said Medford cartographer Stuart Allan. Allan serves on the Oregon Geographic Names Board, which advises the federal names board and recommended approval of the Arnold family's request. Allan said that the presence of another peak named Lake Mountain about six miles away at almost the same elevation provided another reason to rename Lake Peak. Having two landforms with similar names so close together could have made for confusion during emergencies. "To have a Lake Peak and a Lake Mountain so close together," said Allan, "is not a good idea." The Arnold family's long history in the Rogue Valley helped sway the names board, too. Vern Arnold's great-grandfather moved to Southern Oregon in the 1860s. His grandfather, Ezra Arnold, settled in the Applegate Valley and prospected for gold. Ezra Arnold staked a gold claim on Lake Peak in 1915 and worked the claim until he died in 1931. "Ezra was always wandering those hills looking for gold," said Vern Arnold. "They had prospected in those hills for years." Vern Arnold's father, Melvin, continued to work the mine as a hobby. Vern and other family members helped, too. Allan said the family mine, which was drawn on many maps for decades, also strengthened the family's case for renaming the mountain. "The Arnold mine had been operating on that mountain since 1915," said Allan. "Their request wasn't just (based on the notion that) `Grandpa was a great guy,' which would have gotten a very cold shoulder from the names board." Vern Arnold said filing for the name change was surprisingly simple. He completed a two-page form and mailed it to U.S. Board on Geographic Names and later wrote a supplementary letter explaining his family's connection with the mountain formerly known as Lake Peak. Then he waited. Before the request could reach the federal names board for consideration, it had to win approval from the U.S. Forest Service, Josephine County and the Oregon Geographic Names Board. The state names board reviews 30 to 40 name-change requests a year. "That doesn't mean we make name changes on that many," said Chet Orloff, secretary of the board. "Many are tossed up to us for consideration. We review them and pass them to the (federal) names board in Virginia. That's the only place where names can be changed. "All we can do is recommend name changes," said Orloff. "We cannot name things." The federal names board, a division of the U.S. Geological Survey, receives 400 to 500 naming requests per year. Roger Payne, the board's executive secretary, said the applications usually include approximately equal numbers of requests for new names and proposed names for un-named features. Payne said about 90 percent of the name-change requests are approved. "That's because a whole lot of work has been done behind the scenes before the requests get to the board." Allan said the mountain's new name may not appear on maps any time soon, because the change has to trickle down through all the map-makers that draw their data from USGS, the government's official map-maker. Arnold Peak's new name will appear in print whenever the USGS reproduces its quadrangle map for the area, said Allan, "and gradually the change will seep into the cartographic consciousness." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1998, Medford, Oregon USA