High Desert Town Takes Name from Indian Celebrity

There’s an unincorporated community situated at 4,511 feet elevation in the high desert of South Central Oregon that goes by the name of Plush.  Plush had a population of 52 in July 2015, a grocery store and a one-teacher K-8 school with fewer than 10 students.
Somehow, the word “plush” appears a little out of sync with the town’s demographics and surrounding sagebrush-covered rangeland and high mountains.
How the tiny town, a 40-mile drive east of Lakeview, got its unusual name is a surprise.  Lewis A. McArthur’s authoritative book titled Oregon Geographic Namessays the town was named after one of its residents, a Piute Indian celebrity named Plush. 
So where did the Indian get his name?  McArthur continues, “This was the result of a card game that he got into.  The game was a frame-up.  The Indian was dealt a flush by another member of the party, who held a better one.  (The Indian) … could not pronounce the word ‘flush’ and called it ‘plush,’ and that was the name he subsequently went by.”
Today, visitors come to Plush seeking good hang-gliding sites, collecting semi-precious Sunstones or on their way to the nearby Hart Mountain Antelope Refuge.
 
Sources: McArthur, Lewis A., and Lewis L. McArthur. Oregon Geographic Names. 4thth ed. Portland, Ore.: Oregon Historical Society, 1974. 591-92. Print; "Hart Mountain Cabin." Hart Mountain Cabin. Hart Mountain Enterprises, 2016. Web. 26 Mar. 2016. https://hartmountaincabin.com/Contact-Us.php; "Plush, OR Profile: Facts, Map & Data." OR HomeTownLocator. HTL, Inc., 2016. Web. 26 Mar. 2016. http://oregon.hometownlocator.com/or/lake/plush.cfm>.