when the post office was established, December 22, 1896, it was called Promise on that account. Thomas C. Miller was first postmaster.
PROSPECT, Jackson County. This place was once called Deskins. The post office was established with the name Deskins on July 5, 1882, and with Harvey P. Deskins first postmaster. The name was changed to Prospect on November 9, 1889, because local settlers were optimistic about the future of the community.
PROSPER, Coos County. Prosper post office was established August 8, 1893, with Adam Pershbaker postmaster. The name was apparently selected because of hopes that the locality would be prosperous. The office was discontinued in June, 1928.
PROUTY GLACIER, Deschutes County. Prouty Glacier was named for Harley H. Prouty who was born in Vermont June 26, 1857, of distinguished New England family. He was engaged for a time in the lumbering business after he came to Oregon. Later he retired from active business and devoted much time to mountaineering, and was president of the Mazamas. He died September 11, 1916, and it was his wish that his remains be buried in the Cascade Range. As a result of this a party of Mazamas took his ashes to Obsidian Cliff, near the Three Sisters, and placed them in a cairn. Nearby is placed a bronze tablet bearing a suitable inscription. Prouty may have been the first man to climb the North Sister and one of the spires or pinnacles at the top of the mountain is known as Prouty Pinnacle. A short biography appears in the Mazama of 1916, and information about the bronze plate is in Mazama for 1917.
PROVIDENCE CREEK, Douglas County. Providence Creek flows into Umpqua River west of Reedsport. The name perpetuates a settlement called Providence, established in the early '50s, but gone long ago. The compiler has been unable to get the history of the place, by whom it was settled and why it was named. In June, 1944, Mrs. Alice B. Maloney told the compiler that she had found an interview with C. C. Mann in the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley. Mann was a member of the Samuel Roberts party visiting Umpqua River in July, 1850. He stressed the fact that he was a graduate of Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island. It is possible this is the genesis of the name, but the evidence is of course rather tenuous. Provolt, Jackson County. This post office was named for a pioneer family of the community. The office was established April 29, 1895, with Mary E. Provolt postmaster. It was then in Josephine County. Proxy Point, Lane County. Proxy Point is just west of the Three Sisters. It was named by USGS surveyors during the time when the triangulation net was being extended along the Cascade Range. This point and Substitute Point were both selected for possible stations, where but one was to be occupied.
PRYOR, Lane County. Pryor, a station on the Cascade line of the Southern Pacific Company, was named for a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition, Nathaniel Pryor.
PUDDING RIVER, Clackamas and Marion counties. This stream rises in the Waldo Hills, east of Salem, and joins Molalla River just before that stream flows into the Willamette. Little Pudding River drains an area to the west of Pudding River, and joins that stream just west of Mount Angel. Pudding River is a name that originated in the days of
