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About The nugget. (Sisters, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (July 10, 2019)
4 Wednesday, July 10, 2019 The Nugget Newspaper, Sisters, Oregon Tales from a Sisters Naturalist by Jim Anderson An eventful journey Back in 1958, I was look- ing for something to really sink my teeth into. I tried out being a buckaroo, a log- ger and a powder monkey. I was living with Dean and Lily Hollinshead on George A. Jones Road, in the house George A. Jones occupied when he had the grand idea of making that property into a model Central Oregon fruit farm&which failed because of freezing frost that hit him every spring in that micro- weather zone. To keep the Hollinsheads from tossing me out among the frost-killed fruit trees I was employed by Bill Miller as a powder monkey/ mechanic in the business of harvesting pumice west of Bend 4 where the William E. Miller Elementary School stands today. At the same time, because I was so involved with the volcanic geology of the region, I became first a pest 4 then a pal 4 to Phil Brogan, who was a writer for The Bend Bulletin and The Oregonian, and subse- quently the author of <East of the Cascades,= a wonderful book about where we live. Every time I ran into a strange volcanic mystery I9d ask Phil about it and he would either know what it was right off the top of his head, or he9d look it up in his geological text books from the U of O 4 from which he graduated with a degree in geology 4 or he9d send me searching on my own. There was no such thing as Google or Wikipedia in those long- ago days, so I became a reg- ular fixture in the Deschutes Public Library, which I still am today. Phil became my men- tor in the late 1950s when I expressed the desire to become a writer for The Bulletin. My first attempt to write a news piece was when Phil sent me to write up the latest police beat news. As I sat in front of that trusty Royal pounding out the words (me, a guy who couldn9t spell <cat= 4 even to this day), Phil came up behind me, stood there with- out saying a word, and then reached over my shoulder, pulled the paper from the typewriter and said, <A natu- ralist you are, my boy, but a writer you ain9t= and I threw in the towel. But our friendship never cooled; he and I got the edi- tor of The Bulletin to pub- lish <picture pages= we9d cook up. I9d shoot photos of natural history subjects, Phil would do the writing, and they were hits. One Sunday he asked me if I would like to accom- pany him to Camp Hancock where he was asked to give a geology lecture on Red Hill (an ancient cinder cone on the edge of camp). The camp is named for one of Oregon9s early geologists, Lon Hancock, who discov- ered many types of Miocene fossils in the area just east of the John Day River near the Clarno crossing. In time he was recognized throughout western U.S. as a new and outstanding geologist with his discovery of fossil rhino teeth and several sites of fos- sil nut trees adjacent to the camp. Why do you have house plants? These discoveries eventu- ally led the Oregon Museum of Science & Industry (OMSI) to create a science camp near Clarno which they named Camp Hancock. That camp became the main stay of the museum and the facility that led hundreds of high school-age young people into careers in geol- ogy. On our way from Bend to Hancock Phil shared these details, so when we arrived I was ready to soak it all in. I not only soaked in Lon Hancock9s life and work (he had gone out among the stars earlier), but I met his wife, Berrie, who was the cook in the camp kitchen. But it was the kids who really got me. They already had a distinct purpose in life and knew where they were going 4 and I wanted to be a part of that life. Phil and I lined up a picture page story about Hancock. It was a hit and when the director of the museum, Loren McKinley (a retired newspaper publisher) saw it, he asked Phil and me if we would do the same for the museum9s new Camp Arago on the coast, which we did, and I used this expe- rience to work my way into a position as OMSI9s staff naturalist and science camp teacher. PHOTO BY VICTOR BERTHELSDORF Pale snaketail dragonfly. In that role I drove the bus, taught high school students from freshmen to seniors and science teach- ers for that part of the muse- um9s activities. I also met and worked with hundreds of kids from kindergarten to high school who wanted sci- ence to become part of their lives (this was in the Sputnik era, and everyone was hot for science). The OMSI kids grew up to become adults and never lost their natural curios- ity or love for the world around them. I9ve kept close to several of those mag- nificent young people and hair, skin & nails JULY SPECIAL 1-hr. Microdermabrasion FACIAL ~ $ 80 541-549-6566 484 W. Washington Ave. Suite B Were they a gift or a plant left behind? Do you talk to or touch your plants? Quilt Drawing I help owners of house plants get to know each plant they adopt. FURRY FRIEND S Plants need nutrients. They need to be disease- and parasite-free. Plus, they need attention! I off er house-plant decorating, repotting and plant-sitting in Sisters, Redmond, and most of Bend. $15/hr. for fi rst consult Plant Care & Decorating Available A Growing Business Donna Lee Bolt, 541-740-4906 Donn one, Victor Berthelsdorf 4 who lives on his parents9 old farm near McMinnville 4 is a marvel. I try to get to his place each spring as he has nesting boxes up for kestrels and I band the nestlings. He also sends me photos of his other natural history discoveries almost daily. The remarkable photo at the beginning of this story is his; he sends me photos on a regular basis and has enriched both our lives. These dragonflies patrol his property and caught his pho- tographic eye. Thanks Victor& for 501 ( c )( 3 ) FOUNDATION 100% of the proceeds go to Furry Friends Foundation! “Bark for Our Parks II” quilt was designed, appliqued, and quilted by Valerie Fercho-Tillery. The original design and incredible detail make this a spectacular quilt! The quilt is currently on display at the Furry Friends offi ce, 204 W. Adams, Ste. 109, in the Sisters Art Works building (next door to the Habitat Restore parking lot.) Tickets are $1 each, six for $5 or go for it, 25 for $20. Tickets may be purchased at the Furry Friends offi ce or online at www.furryfriendsfoundation.org For more information: 541-797-4023 “Bark for Our Parks II” - by Valerie Fercho-Tillery This ad sponsored by The Nugget Newspaper