Following Energy in the Magnificent North West – Oregon

Your power is turning our darkness to dawn,

roll on, Columbia, roll on.

Woody Guthrie

Starting a fire with pine cones on a very cool night

Enjoying a view of snowy Mount Hood’s backside

From nature’s endless power to generate and regenerate to energy needed for driving or flying or producing energy from nuclear, geothermal or hydro, the NW has a bit of everything.  From this fire’s heat to the best energies of all – ingenuity, discovery and artistry.  Beautiful Oregon is an inspiration to be more, live more. 

Cave Junction:

Chateau at Oregon Caves, built in the Rustic Style in 1934

One of the Great Lodges of the National Parks

(two others in Oregon are Timberline and Crater Lake Lodges)

Lucky to see it as it will be closed for needed repair for two years

Unique siding made of flattened shaggy cedar bark to blend in with

nearby trees must be replaced in many worn-out areas

Original furnishings throughout, it has a high historic appeal

Small 1930’s style Cave’s Café inside, serving a la Norman Rockwell

Also called Marble Halls of Oregon

Discovered 1874, rare solutional cave of marble

Can visit via lantern lit tours, or normally lit tours

Each giving a very different feel and look

Six different rock types found within, two from each basic category:

Igneous, sedimentary, metamorphic

Between 41-44°F (5-7°C) all year round – dress warm

One of top ten caves to visit in USA

Sketch of the Oregon Caves system located in the Siskiyou Range

Considered a live (wet) cave, still growing new formations throughout

The Siskiyou Range in Southwestern Oregon contains one of the widest arrays of rocks in the world, including granites (igneous), argillites (sedimentary), and schists, greenstone, serpentinite, and the Oregon Caves marble (metamorphic). 

As a tourist destination, this cave had an interesting start.  The Oregon Caves Cavemen began in 1922 when a group of businessmen in Grants Pass, Oregon came up with a new way of promoting tourism in Josephine County. They did this by dressing up as cavemen, pretending to be descendants of the extinct Neanderthals. With their unusual attire, and screwball antics they attracted thousands of tourists to visit Oregon Caves.

Mr. Reingate was one of the original seven cavemen. He owned a grocery store, and when he donned his wig, skins and picked up his club he became a Caveman known as the Flame Watcher.

They also held a Caveman wedding in 1936, an event thought up by the president of the Redwood Empire, to promote tourism along the Redwood Highway from San Francisco, California to Grants Pass, Oregon.  This event, too, was a tremendous success, giving the Oregon Caves free nationwide news coverage.

From the National Park website:

Discovered first by Elijah Davidson while hunting, then explored further by men following a mountain stream disappearing into the ground in July 1879.  Three men, crawling found ‘a fairyland of weird grottoes and exquisite stone formations, pillars and spires, drapes, frozen waterfalls and grotesque forms, in shapes and sizes beyond their imaginations.’

The hunter's name was Elijah Davidson, and on that day in the Autumn of 1874, he became the first man known to have entered the hallowed walls of Oregon Caves. While it is likely that the Native Americans had found the cave or at least had known of its existence prior to Elijah's discovery, no evidence of that exists, or at least none has yet come to light. So, until Elijah Davidson lit a bundle of Chinese sulfur matches and illuminated the total darkness of these marble halls, the rocks and creatures of this gem in the Siskiyou Range of southwestern Oregon had possibly never known that light even existed.  Caves are therefore inside Mount Elijah.

In 1995, jaguar bones were discovered that were later dated as 38,600 years old. Grizzly bear bones were also discovered and dated at over 50,000 years old.

Throughout the world, caves loom large in the scope of history. Early man used them as dwelling and fortifications. Fugitives hid in them and thieves used them to cache their loot. Others have found them fine places to grow mushrooms. During the War of 1812 and the Civil War, Americans mined certain caves for saltpeter which was desperately needed to make gunpowder. Much of our knowledge of long extinct mammals has been gleaned from perfectly preserved remains, and even prehistoric drawings, uncovered by cave-probing scientists.

Cave’s humidity

Evaporation is important only near the surface. Deeper inside Oregon Caves the relative humidity averages 98 percent. Evaporation here is almost non-existent. Instead, loss of carbon dioxide becomes the chief agent of deposition. We have learned that vadose water contains 25 to 90 times the normal amount of carbon dioxide found in the atmosphere. Much of it, of course, unites with calcium carbonate to form calcium bicarbonate solution. When this mineralized water reaches the caverns, large quantities of carbon dioxide are able to escape into the air due to the difference in carbon dioxide amounts in the water and air. The chemical balance is upset. For each molecule of escaping carbon dioxide, an equivalent molecule of solid mineral is deposited.

An interesting side effect of the loss of carbon dioxide is experienced by the cave visitor. Although cave air is constantly replenished by outside air through natural exchange, it has a rather high carbon dioxide content due to release of this gas by vadose waters. This partly explains the heavy breathing you find necessary inside the cave, because the nerve centers which control our breathing are stimulated by a high percentage of carbon dioxide in the air we breathe. It also explains the odd ‘peroxide’ odor many people notice when they reach the exit. The odor is oxygen. We notice it because our senses have become adjusted to slightly lower oxygen percentages inside the cave.

Like early visitors, the tourists of today respond to ‘the lure of caves, to see the unseen and to know the unknown.’

McMinnville:

Clever bathroom signs at the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum

The most famous aircraft shown here is the 1947 Spruce Goose

However, the Hughes Flying Boat is mostly made of birch, not spruce!

Hughes detested the term Spruce Goose, it was the H-4 Hercules

With wingspan longer than a football field, 10 feet past both end zones

Nose and tail extending well into the spectator section

Tail span wider than wingspan of Boeing B-17 and as tall as eight stories

See the seemingly small helicopter against tail

Amazing war-planned, but never used for war, machine made of ‘Duramold’ (lightweight composite material developed in 1937 and made of laminated layers of birch veneer glued together under heat and pressure and 80% stronger than aluminum) due to aluminum shortage in WWII.  This plywood is so strong that if a piece is broken, it does not split along the glue lines.  Millions of nails (or seven tons) were used to shape and form the wooden pieces needed to create the ‘Flying Boat’.  Once the glue set, workers removed every single nail. 

Colorful common beach balls filled its floats, hundreds of them in empty spaces to ensure buoyancy in case of accident.  A tall man can walk upright inside the wings only needing to crawl at the very tip.  On its ONLY flight piloted by the man himself, Hughes, crew members were in the wings, as observers of engine operations. 

Built in the Long Beach, CA, area, the airplane was taken apart and brought to this Oregon museum by barge, train and truck.  The trip took 138 days.

Recognized as an amazingly powerful plane.  Hughes and his team achieved the greatest boost ratio ever installed on an aircraft.  For each pound of pressure exerted on the control yoke by the pilot, the elevator received 1,500 pounds of pressure to move it. 

Interesting information about the progression of time needed to travel across USA found in the museum:

            1860 – Stagecoach – 75 days

            1890 – Railroad – 11 days

            1925 – Auto – 6 days

            1930 – Plane-Train-Plane – 45 hours

            1935 – Prop Transport – 17 hours

            1975 – Wide Body Jet Transport – 5 hours

            1985 – SR-71 Blackbird (World’s fastest plane) – 1 hour

We just don’t know how good we have it today compare to 150 years ago!

The Spirit of St. Louis (replica)

The Spirit of St. Louis was named after a group of investors in St. Louis.  In 1919, a New York hotel owner, Raymond Orteig, offered $25,000 ($380,000 today’s value) to the first solo aviator to fly from NY to Paris nonstop.  Eight years later, the Spirit of St. Louis, dubbed Ryan NYP, a custom-built airplane with extremely large fuel (so large that Charles Lindbergh had no forward visibility and had to use a periscope to see ahead) attempted this feat in 1927.  Its Wright J-5C ‘whirlwind’ engine was critical to his success, thanks to a new self-lubrication system that could keep it running for 40+ consecutive hours.  Thankfully, the approximately 3,600 miles trip lasted less than that, 33 hours and 30 minutes.  

In memory of an unfortunately barely known man, Charles E. Taylor

From museum display:

Despite being one of the three men (yes three, not just two) who built the world’s first successful airplane, Charles Taylor’s contributions to aviation history are often overlooked.  Only the brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright are remembered.  A gifted mechanic ‘of exemplary and industrious habits’ Taylor produced the engine that propelled the Wrights’ 1903 Flyer into the air at Kill Devil Hills, NC, on 12/17/1903. 

Hired by the Wright brothers in 1901, he fabricated a wind tunnel to test airfoil designs.  In six weeks and without any engineering education; he manufactured a 12HP, 4-cylinder engine from nothing more than crude sketches.  He assisted Cal Rogers 1911 first transcontinental flight in the Wright Ex Vin Fiz, 49-day flight.  He worked in the aeronautical field until 1945 yet died nearly destitute.

‘On December 3, 1902, the Wright brothers sent letters to almost a dozen automobile companies and gasoline engine manufacturers asking if they could produce or modify an engine that would develop eight to nine horsepower, weigh no more than 180 pounds, and be free from vibration. Most companies replied that they were too busy to undertake building such a special engine.

Falling back on their own mechanical experience, the Wright brothers decided to design and build their own engine. They estimated they could build a four-cylinder engine with four-inch stroke and four-inch bore, weighing no more than 200 pounds with accessories included. By their calculation, it would develop the horsepower necessary to power the glider in flight.

In a 1948 interview Charlie said that ‘He had always wanted to learn to fly, but never did.  The Wright brothers refused to teach me and tried to discourage the idea. They said they needed me in the shop to service their machines, and if I learned to fly, I’d be gadding about the country and maybe become an exhibition pilot, and then they’d never see me again.’

Taylor continued to work with the Wright brothers until 1911. At this time an adventurer and a pilot, Calbraith Perry Rodgers, wanted to make the first continental flight across the United States. He purchased an aircraft from the Wright brothers and enough parts to build two more aircraft.

Orville realized that the aircraft would not last more than 1,000 miles without proper maintenance so he lent Charlie to Rodgers knowing that he would be the only one that could keep the plane flying for that distance successfully.

Charlie sent his family ahead to California and got on the three-car train that was to accompany the flight. One car of the train was a repair car where the aircraft parts would be stored, and the aircraft repaired. It took Cal Rodgers 49 days to cross the United States. Only three days, ten hours of that was actual flying time. His longest single flight was 133 miles. He had 16 crashes and the aircraft was repaired so many times that at journey’s end only the vertical rudder, the engine drip pan, and a single strut of the original plane remained, a test to the skill which Charlie used in keeping the aircraft flying.

Charles E. Taylor was the last of the three that shrunk the world by building the first successful powered airplane, the mechanic who made the flight possible.  For complete article click here.

Today the Charles Taylor Master Mechanic Award is given to recognize the lifetime accomplishments of senior aviation mechanics.  

Rest in Peace Charles E. Taylor

Hoping more people get to know about your amazing talents

Portland:

Is it flat? Illusion, reality and the Richard Haas eight-story-mural

of Lewis and Clark on the Oregon Trail and Astor fur trade

On the Oregon History Center in the heart of the Portland Cultural District

The Washington Post describes it as such: ‘a curious border zone

between architecture and art, building and decoration.’

Portland Art Museum:

The oldest art museum in the Pacific Northwest, the Portland Art Museum was founded in late 1892.  It now has a collection consisting of some 42,000 objects.

Here I saw: The Shape of Speed: Streamlined Automobiles and Motorcycles, 1930-1942 as well as various works of art.  I am not a car fanatic, but these older vehicles were more like works of art than articles of transportation. 

‘During the Great Depression, the forward-leaning, beautiful designs of streamlined vehicles were aspirational, inspiring a sense of hope for the future. We look forward to bringing that excitement to Portland again.’ See for yourselves:

Stout Scarab, 1936.  Aircraft designer William Bushnell Stout

believed the use of lightweight; aircraft construction techniques

could result in a streamlined, futuristic, faster and more economical car.

The seats could be reconfigured; there was a folding table and a small divan.

 Stout Scarab anticipated the modern minivan

Airomobile, 1937

Another airplane influenced design

Compare that to today’s more uninteresting designs

Bugatti Aerolithe, 1935

More aeronautic inspiration (my favorite)

Keeping it super-light, using rivets, beautiful lines and color

The concept of streamlining has fascinated people for generations. Beginning in the 1930’s and extending until WWII, automotive designers embraced the challenge of styling and building truly streamlined cars that were fast and fuel-efficient. They were encouraged by the confluence of aircraft design with the sleek shapes of fast railroad locomotives; new advanced highways such as the Autobahns; and events like the 1939 New York City World’s Fair, which showcased futuristic design.

The Shape of Speed presents a select group of rare automobiles and motorcycles that demonstrate how auto designers translated the concept of aerodynamic efficiency into exciting machines that in many cases, looked as though they were moving while at rest.

In contrast with the decades following WWII, when advanced aircraft and rocket designs propelled car makers toward fanciful and impractical designs, the automobile designs in the pre-war period were more organic, emulating the classic teardrop shape thought, at that time, to be perfect for cheating the wind. The results were brought to life in cars with then-startling shapes that looked as though they were ready to be embraced and caressed. Even if they weren’t noticeably faster than their predecessors, they looked fast.  In a few cases, the conservative public balked.  Sales of well-known brands slipped, then recovered as consumers tentatively embraced and then accepted this brave new look.

The design influence of streamlining was felt far beyond automobile styling in this period.  The school of architecture now known as Streamline Moderne influenced the shape of radios, appliances, transport trucks, and railroad locomotives, along with such disparate items as table flatware, water pitchers, toasters, pencil sharpeners, and cocktail shakers.  ‘The Shape of Speed celebrates great design that moves us.’  Brian Ferriso

The art portion at the Portland Art Museum: 

Diane Jacobs, Global Inversion, 2008.

Hair, wool, paper pulp.

Hair = our humanity and socially taboo, as it comes from the body.

A world literally upside-down turns right-side up when

viewed through a suspended acrylic ball.

‘The inequity between nations and individuals based

on their position in life is insurmountable unless we make a radical shift.

I am talking about flipping the world upside down and leveling the playing field. 

People of privilege must give up their position. 

For that to happen we need to look in the mirror and instigate radical change.’

As a weaver too, I especially appreciate the two following masterpieces:

DNA Robe by Teri Rofkar, 2014

Look for DNA strands on either side of the robe

Tlingit scientist and historian from Sitka, Alaska

Use of ancient traditional materials in her masterful works

Over 900 hours of weaving to complete

Weaving these textiles takes months of preparation, including harvesting cedar bark and processing wild mountain goat hair. The weavers spin earth and animal together by hand for more than six weeks to create the 1,000 yards of warp needed to weave ceremonial robes. Robes are woven on an upright loom, with all tension controlled by the weaver’s fingers. Most robes take more than a year to finish.

‘A woman who maintains the continuity of weaving values the way of life and what it means to be a true descendant of a Master Chilkat Weaver.  We are propelled to engage in a dialogue that re-evaluates a system that largely overlooks or underappreciates Native women artists of the Northwest Coast.’

This is one of the most complex art form in North America and one of the most underappreciated.

Honoring our Teachers, Lineage Robe by Lily Hope, 2017

Tlingit from Juneau, Alaska

Not counting the preparation, it took over 1,700 hours to weave

From the exhibit: The Art of Resilience, The Continuum of Tlingit Art

Portland’s Broadway Bridge, 1939

Part of Minor White’s evocative Oregon photos

In 1935, the Works Progress Administration (WPA), a federal worker assistance program employed more than 8 million people during the great depression.  Construction of roads, buildings, bridges, and hiking trails.  Invitation to writers, musicians, actors, historians, visual artists across the country to produce work, teach at federal arts centers, and perform.  Even Diego Rivera took part in this program in times of need. 

Mr. Minor White from Oregon was the only photographer in the program.  Called the Oregon Art Project.

In 1937, after traveling to Portland from Minnesota and taking up residence at the downtown YMCA, White joined the Oregon Camera Club, using its darkroom and library to hone his photography skills. He instituted a darkroom, education, and exhibition program at the YMCA, and in 1938, was hired as a creative photographer for the Oregon Art Project, a division of the federal government’s Works Progress Administration. Charged with documenting the Front Avenue buildings slated for demolition as well as the waterfront factories, he captured the beauty of iron-front facades, the distinct forms of industrial architecture, and the cultural undercurrents of a city under transition. 

The autonomous and the dependent, Deborah Horrell, 2000

Pâté de verre glass.

Handbag, Canadian, Marilyn Levine, 1988

Can you believe this is ceramic?

It looks like leather

Birch bark Biting

One of the oldest Woodlands art forms

Art of dentally perforating designs

on finely folded sheets of paper-thin birch bark.

Free of knots and separated into thin sheets, the bark is folded two or more times and bitten using eye teeth and moving from center outwards.  (A bit like cutting snowflakes with scissors). Practiced by Ojibwa (Chippewa), Cree, and Algonquian groups who used it extensively in fabricating domestic containers, architectural coverings, canoes and pictographic scrolls.  It was a means of experimenting with designs that might be later translated into porcupine quill or bead appliqués. 

By the very nature of the process the resulting images are balanced and symmetrical, and no two works are ever the same.  The varying bite intensities, repetitions, and folds make each birch bark biting unique.  The technique was practiced as a form of recreation and friendly competition.  Today, it is taught to kids to reinvigorate the art.

Ledger Art

The American Dream Again, Dwayne Wilcox, 2014

Ledger Art

Captive Audience, Dwayne Wilcox, 2014

Ledger Art in Plains History.  Ledger drawing flowered in the Northern and Southern Great Plains from about 1860 to 1900.  It was a transitional art form corresponding to and partly shaped by the destruction of buffalo herds and forced tribal relocation to reservations. 

Lakota, Cheyenne, Kiowa and other plains Indians known for pictographic artistry switched from bone and stick brushes to pencils, crayons and occasionally watercolors, and from the now scarce buffalo hide to muslin and paper.  Readily available from traders and Indian agents, standard issue ledgers and lined accounting books became the most common source of paper. 

Ledger drawings recorded history from a preliterate Indian perspective.  Great communicator of humanity, it often contained humor.  For example, a depiction of a man falling from a horse whimsically challenged the stereotype of the stoic Indian.  Expressing native oppression, autonomy, history, few were drawn for monetary trades and many are still sought-out today.  

Dancing in the Wind, Lillian Pitt, 1998

Her Native American name is Wak’amu (camas root)

Warm Springs Reservation

Lillian Pitt, very well-known artist who ‘gives voice to her ancestors’.  The focus of her work draws on over 12,000 years of Native American history and tradition of the Columbia River region.  She creates contemporary fine art pieces that delight art lovers, and at the same time, honor the history and legends of her people.

Portion of Artifact Panel, William Morris, 2000

Hand blown glass objects that have become uncanny replicas

of other substances: bone, clay, stone, wood, or horn. 

With 399 unique pieces!

Artifact Panel, William Morris, 2000

By mounting each piece in a rectilinear pattern, Morris evokes an archaeological installation that suggests that ‘The sum of the panel is greater than any individual component.’  Mysterious assemblage of vessels, shells, tools, bones, horns, fossils, made of glass that could not look less like glass.  Morris thrives on paradox, using cutting edge glass making technique to tap into an ancient world.  Fascinated by the beauty and complexity of the natural world.  He alludes to tenuous connections between human beings and other living species. 

Astoria:

Columbia River Maritime Museum:

Each small boat represents a wreck at the mouth of the mighty Columbia River

Of the 2,000 or so, only fewer than 100 are represented here…

Named Graveyard of the Pacific for a reason!

Since 1792, approximately 2,000 vessels (including 200 large ships) have sunk at the Columbia River Bar and more than 700 people have lost their lives at sea.  A combination of high seas, a mighty river, and shallow, shifting sandbars make the Columbia River bar one of the most dangerous crossing in the world or the Graveyard of the Pacific.  

Old shipwreck at the mouth of the Columbia River – photo in museum

Need I say more?

Each ship that approaches the Columbia River Bar is required to take on a bar pilot to guide them through the 17-mile danger zone.  Bar pilots pass the nation’s most rigorous sailing standards for pilotage.  ‘It is no place for the timid or the faint of heart’ says Captain Robert Johnson, Bar Pilot.  Ocean currents build underwater sandbars, 5 to 10 feet high each year. As a result, the geography of the bar is constantly changing, and millions of dollars are spent yearly on dredging to keep the channels open.  The US Army Corps of Engineers removes 5-6 million cubic yards or the equivalent of 500,000 dump trucks/year. 

Of the total 88,533 miles of US Coastline, only this area is considered ‘especially hazardous’.  Enormous, swift-moving river, flowing like water from a fire hose, collides with immense power of the Pacific Ocean.  The two forces slam into each other at the entrance, creating the worse wave conditions on the planet. 

Local native tribes developed a very keen awareness of the river’s traits.  Early fur trade vessels employed them as the first pilots over the Bar. 

Astoria became the first permanent U.S. settlement west of the Rockies.  By the 1880’s, fishermen and packers had put the town on the map as the ‘Salmon Canning Capital of the World.’

Dozens of labels for Astoria salmon cans

When salmon was king, more than 16 million/year would go upriver.  In 1904, more than 2,500 gill netters or 545 miles of net, if put end to end, lined the mighty Columbia. 

Canning was largely done by Asian immigrants, most from China.  Conditions were cold, wet, and miserable, with low pay, long hours, and brutal discrimination.  It was a dangerous, bloody, repetitive job that nobody else wanted.  In 1880, there were 2,000 Chinese in Astoria. 

They also canned livers from dogfish and soupfin sharks, an abundant natural source rich in vitamin A.  When full, it was sent to a lab to determine the oil and vitamin content.  Sold for $320/can then ($4,200 today).  In 1948, they filled 731,313# or 18,000 cans (or over $75.6M in today’s dollars)!  Urgently needed for pilot’s night vision in WWII. In 1949, synthetic vitamin A killed the industry.

Of the 7,055 residents of Clatsop County in 1880, 2,045 (nearly 30%) were Chinese immigrants and most of them worked in canneries.  They were extremely efficient; some individuals could clean a 40-pound salmon in 45 seconds or 1,700 fish in an 11-hour day.  To gut a fish and remove its head and tail required fast hands and a sharp knife.  Each packer hired a Chinese contractor who recruited men to work in the cannery.  The contractor was responsible for seeing that the cannery’s quotas were met.

By the middle of the 19^th century, people from all over the world were coming to settle and work in the Pacific NW.  The 1880 census counted 1,293 fishermen in Clatsop County, 91% of them were single, only 13% had been born in the US.  Most came from countries in the North Atlantic, where herring and cod fisheries had collapsed from overfishing.  Scots, Newfoundlanders, and New Englanders.  Many others came from Austria, Italy, and Yugoslavia, but most of these newcomers came from Scandinavia.

Along with a spirit of cooperation among the many cultural and professional groups involved in fishing on the Columbia, there was also a strong undercurrent of competition.  Fishermen’s incomes were tied to the buying power of the canneries.  If canneries did not buy the fish, fishermen had nowhere to sell their catch, so the canneries thought they could pay fishermen low prices.  The fishermen saw things differently.  If they didn’t supply the canneries, there would be no fish for the market.  The two sides found themselves in continual conflict over prices and working conditions.

Whale tooth scrimshaw

The art of scrimshaw = engraving or carving using sail needles, knives and sometimes saws and files. Typically refers to artwork created by whalers, who, usually, had a lot of time on their hands.  It was most commonly made from the bones and teeth of sperm whales, baleen, or walrus tusks.   Scrimshandering is done by scrimshanders.  It became rare in the late 19^th century, but some revival is happening in the 20^th. 

They created common tools, whistles, game boards, ring boxes, buttons, miniature animals, pendants, bracelets, knife handles, utensil handles, powder horns, bodkins, etc. 

Early scrimshaw was done with crude needles, and the movement of the ship, as well as the skill of the artist, produced drawings of varying levels of detail and artistry. Originally, candle black, soot or tobacco juice would have been used to bring the etched design into view. Also, ink was used that the sailors would bring on before the voyage.

Tsunami Boat Saishomaru

This abalone and sea urchin fishing boat was swept out to sea

during the massive 2011 tsunami in Japan.

Amazingly, two years later, after floating more than 5,000 miles at sea,

it washed ashore in Washington at Cape Disappointment.

The boat’s owner was contacted with the assistance of the Japanese Consulate. 

Mr. Katuo Saito, 72 years old, was very pleased to hear his boat was found,

but did not wish to have it returned to him. 

The museum is honored to be able to display this boat and share its story.

Timberline Lodge:

At the base of Mount Hood, Timberline Lodge is an architectural gem atop a natural wonder and acknowledged as a living museum (even has a curator on staff). 

In early 1936 as the Great Depression raged, the Works Progress Administration undertook what many would call a ‘make-work’ project to build a lodge on the south side of Mt. Hood in Northern Oregon. In retrospect, history has shown us that the Timberline Lodge was a ‘make-art’ project.  The Timberline Lodge, a hand-made wonder, is certainly a state, if not a national, treasure!  Timberline Lodge is a showplace of superb craftsmanship, both old and new. 

This project was seen as a symbol of recovery for a nation weary of recession.

Partial view of Timberline Lodge (One of the Great Lodges of the National Parks)

Built 1936-38 at the base of Mount Hood where skiing continues year-round

Timberline’s logo, a 750# bronze snow goose weather vane on top of head house

Above the 6,000-foot tree line, the head house is flanked by two uneven wings.

Mount Hood’s summit is 3.6 miles away at 11,245 feet.

Average snow depth at the lodge is 21 feet. 

Served as the exterior of the Overlook Hotel in the 1980 movie The Shining

Dedicated on 9/28/1937 by President Franklin D. Roosevelt

mere hours after he dedicated the massive Bonneville Dam

The lodge was designed with three themes in mind: Native American, pioneer life, native flora and fauna motifs.  Paintings, carvings, metal work and textiles displayed these topics.

The tall, steep roofs of the Lodge are intended to mimic the surrounding mountains, and the pyramidal form of the Head House roof obviously is a likeness of Mt. Hood.

Six massive ponderosa pines support the head house.  Each had to be hand-hewn with broadax and adze and the requirements were that they weren’t to be more than 6” difference in diameter from top to bottom on nearly 90 feet tall!  Paid $20/piece for this colossal work!

With entrance doors weighing just under a ton… Everything is built to withstand harsh high mountain conditions and rowdy skiers. 

Originally each room had a theme, with drapes, bedspreads and rugs all matching that theme. For ease of maintenance the rooms now have a single common theme, except for the upscale ‘fireplace suites’ which still have unique themes. The drapes in each room are still hand-made and are duplicates of the original patterns used in the lodge.

Ground floor main foyer with six-sided 800,000-pound great stone chimney

Abstract art carved in stone from Tenino People

Three fireplace openings on main floor, three more on first floor

Small tables and lamps are also six-sided, couches are similarly angled

To save money, they cleverly used anything local they could find

Fire screens made from tire chains

Andirons and other ironwork forged from old railroad rails

Newel posts made from discarded cedar utility poles,

Strips of old CCC uniforms and blankets turned into

 hooked rugs, upholstery, curtains, and bedspreads

In the photo above, you see one of three petroglyphs chiseled into the stones on the chimney in the center of the Head House. This is the easiest of the three to spot and is called the Four Directions or Working Hands.

Very few women were hired under the WPA (Works Progress Administration) regulations. Since only one member of a family could be employed under the WPA, the women who were working were mostly unmarried, divorced or widowed.

Metal Workers by Howard S Sewall, 1937

Stylized depiction of metal work at the Lodge

Built, furnished and decorated by local artisans during the Great Depression

At the time it was built it was the longest ski lift in the world, hence its name, The Magic Mile.  It was the second chair lift ever built anywhere and it was the first ski lift to use metal towers. 

Found throughout the lodge, the famous Timberline Arch

Design with somewhat of a flattened top – but with many variations

In mirrors, fireplace, doorways, gates, back of chairs

Due to high wear and tear of ski boots, the lodge is now only a hotel

Skiers get to go inside a more modern building below the lodge

All in the name of preservation

Pioneer Life, Douglas Lynch (designer of the Portland City flag), 1937

Carved and colored scrap linoleum murals around the Barlow Room dining hall

Again, a cheap durable way to decorate the lodge

Rediscovered after spending years hidden among mattresses,

Probably what saved them

Restoration was done by flooring company!

The ‘Calendar of Mountain Sports’ nine panels were created in 1937 using scrap linoleum as the medium. First carved with a knife to give it texture, the panels were then painted using oil paint mixed with shellac and applied in multiple layers, giving them a certain depth.  They are very different from anything I have ever seen before.

Vista House, Crown Point State Scenic Corridor

‘I have adopted the Tudor Gothic, which, better than any other type

lends itself to the calm effect of broad surfaces in connection

with the massive prominence of its parts, analogous to the cliffs themselves.’ 

Edgar Lazarus, Architect, 1915

‘The Vista House is an architectural gem.  Singular in its octagonal form, it stands like a jewel in a crown.  It represents a bold but compassionate human intrusion into a place where nature makes the greatest statement.’  Edgar Lazarus, a Portland architect, tapped the Art Nouveau movement for his design of a pavilion to shelter tourists. 

For all its beauty, the Vista House was the subject of numerous controversies.  ‘From the very modest estimated first cost of $18,000, the Vista House has now absorbed over $60,000 of the taxpayers’ money, and the end is by no means in sight,’ noted the Oregon Journal in 1917.  Disputes arose over expensive marble panels, stone walls around the building’s basement entrance, insufficient water systems, architectural fees, and the prospect of shops, cafés, a hotel and cabins surrounding the structure.  In 1918, a dismayed taxpayer alleged fraud.  She sued Multnomah County and the Vista House Association but did not prevail.

Still dubbed ‘the million-dollar rest-stop’ although it didn’t cost nearly that much.

Washington side of the Bonneville Dam

Inaugurated by President Roosevelt on 9/28/1937 – his conclusion was:

‘As I look upon Bonneville Dam today,

I cannot help the thought that instead of spending, as some nations do,

half their national income in piling up armaments and more armaments

for purposes of war, we in America are wiser in using our wealth

on projects like this which will give us more wealth,

better living and greater happiness for our children.’

For centuries, the mighty Columbia River flowed freely from the mountains of Canada to the Pacific Ocean.  Under President Roosevelt, the first dam, Bonneville, was built in the 1930’s and selling power starting 1937.  Today, 31 dams clutter the Columbia and its tributaries.  The Columbia River produces the most hydro power of any North American river.

This project is a unique collaboration among BPA (Bonneville Power Administration) dam owners, the US Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation.  As well as electricity, it provides flood control, irrigation, navigation and recreation such as windsurfing and boating.

When construction of Bonneville dam was completed the project included a ladder to help migrating fish swim safely around the dam.  The fish ladder, which climbed more than 70 feet was one of the highest in the world.  Since then, BPA and its partners have continued to work to protect fish and wildlife impacted by the dam.  They have more than a 99% success rate, very few deaths, and they keep coming up with ideas to make it even better. 

Today salmon and steelhead numbers in the Columbia River are barely higher than when fish were first counted at the Bonneville Dam in 1938 (271,799 in 1938 vs. 336,030 in 2018), even though they had reached over 1.1M in 2013, 2014 and 2015.  Despite the discovery of the factors influencing the decline of the fish such as change of habitat due to beaver trapping, near exhaustion of timber, overgrazing, and, of course, overfishing. 

California Sea lions eat about 4% of the already endangered salmon.  Endangered orcas eat the endangered seals and compete with the seals and the sea lions for the endangered salmon.  How can this possibly end? 

Rubber bullets to make it uncomfortable for them to hunt salmon at the dam and only the ones that come back eventually get killed or moved to zoos.  Says very few are repeat offenders.  The current ruling states that upwards of 92 can be killed per year.

Interesting facts: 

• BPA sells hydro power at cost, not for profit to local utilities.
• One lightning bolt = 100 million volts.
• A thunderstorm contains enough electrical energy to power the USA for 4 days.
• A typical hurricane contains enough power to run the USA for 3-4 years.
• At the time, the Bonneville lock, at 60 feet, was the highest single-lift lock in the world.
  

Bonneville Kaplan Turbine, 1938

Propeller-type water turbine with adjustable blades

Achieving efficiency over wide range of flow and water levels

Museum photo.  Look at the size of this one!

Mesmerizing to watch so many fish swim by, up to 10,000/hour!

Real humans sit and count each fish, specie, whether they are adults or jacks

This must take so much concentration.

Fish ladders snake through the powerhouse in a dark tunnel.

Fish won’t go into darkness, so lights are installed overhead

The fish think there’s sun above them and go up the ladder

Energy bolt guiding you along the way

As for Woody Guthrie, he was hired by the federal government in May 1941 to travel to the Pacific NW and write songs promoting huge hydroelectric dams on the Columbia River.  He wrote 26 songs in 30 days, making this his most prolific writing period.  He was paid $266.66, a little over $10/song! 

Next post, Washington State with, among other things, nuclear energy and ‘Stonehenge’ history…