PAID SUPPLEMENT
arvin Butte nestles at the edge of
Lost Valley, and the homes of the
community of Dexter are scattered
around its once forested slopes. The
butte has been silent witness to 30
million years of natural change, its
rocky crest sculpted by wind, rain
and ice. The Kalapuya camped along
the fl anks of the butte for over ten
thousand years, their presence marked by
stone bowls and obsidian points still nudged
from earth each year when plows turn the
soil. Lost Creek tumbles past the butte. It
rages in the winter, runs turbulent in spring
and gurgles peacefully through the warm
months of summer. This is the last free-fl ow-
ing spawning ground for Spring Chinook and
cutthroat trout before the Middle Fork of the
Willamette River meets the dams.
P
The names of roads and landmarks around
Dexter are the legacy of settlers that came to
the valley as part of the Lost Wagon Train of
1853. The butte is named after James Parvin,
who built his cabin overlooking the floodplain.
The first covered bridge across Lost Creek and
an early road into Lost Valley also bear his
name. Parvin bought the general store in 1883
and served as postmaster while his wife Selena
worked the counter. The cast iron woodstove
that warmed the store carried the brand name
“O. Dexter” across its door. The name of the
stove became the name of the town. Parvin
Butte is as significant to Dexter as Skinner
Butte is to Eugene.
Parvin Butte was acquired by the railroad in
about 1952. Twenty small farms surrounded
the butte in 1973 when Lane County zoned the
land for quarry mining. The railroad recently
sold the land to Greg Demers and the
McDougal Brothers under the name of Lost
Creek Rock Products. In 2010 the state agency
Department of Geology and Mining Industry
(DOGAMI) issued them a permit to remove
Parvin Butte from the Lane County landscape.
Selena and James Parvin