For awhile now I have been wondering how the name of this creek should be pronounced and was referring to it as Pyoo-tah Creek. But it finally occurred to me to seek the answer on my own bookshelf, in a book titled “Historic California: Its Colorful Names and How It Got Them,” by Alton Pryor (originally published in 2002). Thus I’ve now learned that the name of the stream is pronounced poo-ta, which was “a branch of the Patwin Indians who once dwelt on its banks.”