Olympic National Park in Washington State gets its name from the famous Mount Olympus in Greece.
English explorer Captain John Meares traveled into the area in 1788 and named the tallest mountain on the peninsula Mount Olympus because “it seemed to him a veritable home of the gods,” according to the National Park Service. The mountain’s name then extended to the peninsula itself, and eventually, to the national park.
Of course, many tribes lived in the area for thousands of years before European explorers arrived. Many of the tribes’ names are memorialized in the names of landmarks, rivers, or locations around the peninsula, including Elwha, Skokomish, Quinault, Hoh, Quileute and Makah.
