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KIRO Newsradio historian Feliks Banel delivers his All Over The Map feature Friday mornings on Seattle's Morning News

All Over The Map

Detail from 1940 topographic map shows South Bend, county seat of Pacific County in southwest Washington. (USGS Archives)

Pacific County is in the southwest corner of Washington and is named for the Pacific Ocean; detail is from a 1953 topographic map. (USGS Archives)

Topographic map from 1897 shows Tacoma, county seat of Pierce County; note boundary with King County just north of Tacoma - several miles south of the current boundary. (USGS Archives)

Detail from 1958 topographic map shows much of Pierce County. (USGS Archives)

Newport, seen in this detail from a 1936 topographic map, is county seat of Pend Oreille County in northeast Washington. (USGS Archives)

Ponderay, Idaho is situated on Lake Pend Oreille. The town's name was spelled phonetically to differentiate from a nearby community of Pend Oreille; this detail from a 1958 topographic map also shows Lake Pend Oreille. (USGS Archives)

How were Pacific, Pend Oreille and Pierce counties named?