Oregon's Highest Peaks

Jeff Howbert published Oregon 100 Highest Peaks in the May 1996 issue of Pack & Paddle magazine. He selected peaks for his list with at least 500 feet of prominence, sorted by elevation and region. He used the USGS topographic maps available at the time to determine elevation and prominence. Many of these peaks were not named on on the maps, so Jeff chose to name those peaks after the name of their adjacent drainages.

Jeff's Oregon 100 Highest Peaks motivated me and many other mountain climbers to explore more of Oregon than they had previously. Consequently peakbagger.com added Howbert's list to its peak lists. As maps were revised elevation and prominence data was updated on that site. Sometimes a peak was shifted in the list, added to the list, or removed from the list to limit the list to 100 peaks.

Most recently, peakbagger.com has updated its peak database to use LiDAR data. It is good, I think, for more accurate data to be used. However, this has resulted in major changes to the "Oregon 100 Highest Peaks" list, with a higher concentration of peaks in the Wallowa Mountains and fewer elsewhere in the state.

I now screen for Oregon peaks with 7500 feet of elevation and at least 340 feet of prominence. These are noted in the map below. Many of these peaks lie in the Wallowa Mountains with access too remote for my current ambitions. But this screening has alerted me to many candidate peaks elsewhere in Oregon that might have interest to me. In this way my exploration of Oregon continues as my ambitions wane.

Oregon's Highest Peaks

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I have obtained the peak data from peakbagger.com. If you hover over a peak map marker the name of the peak should appear. If you click a marker a new browser tab should open displaying the description page for that peak on peakbagger.com.

Sources

The Northwest Peakbaggers Asylum
Peakbagger.com: Paul's Western Oregon 7500x340-foot Peaks
Peakbagger.com: Paul's Eastern Oregon 7500x340-foot Peaks

References

1. Bond, Barbara I., 75 Scrambles in Oregon: best non-technical ascents, The Mountaineers Books, 2005.
2. Sullivan, William L., 100 Hikes/Travel Guide: Eastern Oregon, Navillus Press, 2002.
3. Sullivan, William L., 100 Hikes in the Central Oregon Cascades, third edition, Navillus Press, 2005.
4. Thomas, Jeff, Oregon High: A Climbing Guide, Keep Climbing Press, 1991.