Cannon Beach took its name from a carronade found buried nearby in the sand, one of three cannons affixed to part of the USS Shark’s deck that washed ashore after the vessel wrecked at the mouth of the Columbia River on September 10, 1846. The USS Shark had arrived there in July 1846 so its crew could gather information and show the flag in support of the rapidly growing number of American settlers in the region, but in September its captain, Lt. Neil Howison, USN, tried to cross the bar at the river’s mouth, and the ship struck bottom, broke up, and sank, though all crew members survived. Soon afterward, a USS Shark crewmember learned from Tillamook Indians that part of the deck had washed ashore south of what is now Cannon Beach, and Midshipman Simes and others moved one cannon farther ashore near the mouth of Austin Creek. Mail carrier John Luce found it there in June 1898 and, with help, brought it ashore, after which it stood for many years in front of the Post Office. In 2008, Miranda Petrone found another of the Shark’s cannons while walking along the beach at Arch Cape, and another visitor soon found the third nearby. After five years of conservation treatment at Texas A&M, two cannons went on display in 2014 at the Columbia River Maritime Museum in Astoria, and the first cannon, found in 1898, was stabilized and returned to the Cannon Beach History Center in 2017. The place name also shifted along the coast: in 1912 one community gave up the name Cannon Beach and became Arch Cape, while in 1922 the town of Ecola adopted the name Cannon Beach after mail for Ecola was often misdirected to Eola in Polk County 75 miles away.