 It is named after Charles Melville Scammon Chief of Marine of the Western Union Telegraph Expedition by William Healey Dall in 1870.A local dish was also named after Scammon, which is a mixture of scrambled eggs and salmon, taking advantage of the abundance of the fish in the local waters.Popular folk etymology says that scammon is a portmanteau of "scrambled salmon", however that is incorrect as the name of the dish happened after the town was named.