The olallieberry (pronounced oh-la-leh, sometimes spelled ollalieberry, olallaberry, olalliberry, ollalaberry or ollaliberry) is a cross between the loganberry and the youngberry, each of which is itself a cross between blackberry and another berry (raspberry and dewberry, respectively).
The original cross was made in 1935 by George F. Waldo with the United States Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service, who ran the cooperative blackberry breeding program between the USDA-ARS and Oregon State University cooperative breeding program. Selected in 1937 and tested in Oregon, Washington and California as "Oregon 609", it was renamed "Olallie" and released in 1950. While primarily developed in Oregon, it has never been very productive there and is therefore primarily grown in California.
Formally named "Olallie", it has usually been marketed as olallieberry, just as "Marion" is sold as marionberry.
"Olallie" means berry in the Chinook Jargon.
Olallieberries are tart and very popular in pies in Southern California. The season is very short and some pie restaurants do not advertise having fresh olallieberry pie available, as the entire stock sells out via word of mouth. The best times, if not the only times, to order an olallieberry pie in these restaurants are the first two to three weeks of June. In coastal areas of Northern California, the olallieberry season lasts from mid-June to mid-July. More recently, olallieberries have become available frozen, making them buyable most of the year.
Olallie Lake in Oregon's Cascade mountains is named after the Chinook term due to the abundance of berries in that area.