Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The Dalles chronicle. (The Dalles, OR) 1998-2020 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 15, 2020)
COLUM Business Review | Inside BIA RIV ER BUSIN RE ESS GORGE VIEW Lady Hawks rev it up for league supremacy | A9 ▶ Hood Rive r News / The Dalle s Chronicle February 2020 Weekend $1.00 February 15-16, 2020 The Dalles, Oregon www.thedalleschronicle.com Vol. 229, Issue 14 Brown Unconventional ‘underdogs’ left their mark Portland Mavericks resigns The had great fan support, record from winning ■ council Builders Choice for Window s and Doors in the Columb ia River Gorge Andersen - Kolbe - LaCantina - Prime - Simpso n By Gabriel Bravo The Dalles Chronicle City Councilor Russ Brown resigned his position on The Dalles City Council Feb. 6, citing person- al reasons, and the council will appoint a predecessor to serve the remaining three years of his term by majority vote. The council agreed unanimous- ly to follow past procedure in ap- pointing a new councilor to fill the vacancy during its Feb. 10 regular meeting, and the city will receive applications through March 4. Brown served in position 3 of the council, which represents the east side of the city. In addition to living on the east side, applicants must have lived within the city limits for the past year,lived on the east side for 90 days prior to appointment, and be registered to vote. The east/west divide is Union Street, and a map is available on the city’s website. Applications can be requested via email to the City Clerk (igross- man@ci.the-dalles.or.us.) Completed applications can be emailed to the City Clerk or deliv- ered to the office of the City Clerk, 313 Court Street, The Dalles. The deadline for submitting applications is 4 p.m. Wednesday, March 4. —Mark Gibson Local breweries join festivities Breweries from around the state will celebrate Oregon’s craft beer scene with the 12th annual Zwickelmania Saturday, Feb. 22, from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Breweries will be opening their doors to the public with tours, tastings, meet- the-brewer sessions, and free samples. In The Dalles, Freebridge Brewing (710 E. Second St.) will offer a family-friendly event with food specials, free samples, guid- ed brewery tours, new releases and an opportunity to meet the brewer. Sedition Brewing (208 Laughlin St.) will offer a dog- and family-friendly atmosphere, also with free samples, guided brewery tours and a chance to meet the brewer. Other Gorge particpants include: Double Mountain Brewery and Cidery (8 4th St., Hood River); Ferment Brewing Company (403 Portway Ave., Hood River); pFriem Family Brewers (707 Portway Ave., Ste 101, Hood River); and Thunder Island Brewing Co. (515 NW Portage Road, Cascade Locks.) Zwickelmania is named in hon- or of the zwickel, a screw valve that mounts on the outside of fermen- tation or conditioning tanks and allows brewers to sample the beer inside for quality assurance and control. Zwickelmania will serve as the highlight of Oregon Craft Beer Month, a month-long celebration that includes tap takeovers, beer festivals, panel discussions and more. Portland Metropolitan area breweries celebrate the event on Feb. 15, while breweries through- out the rest of the state take part on Feb. 22. Thirty of the state’s brewer- ies have also collaborated on a limited run Zwickelmania beer that will be canned and sold at See GORGE, page A3 INSIDE When baseball is mentioned, teams and players come to mind, like the Washington Nationals, Stephen Strasburg and Ken Griffey Jr. When America’s pastime is brought up around area old-tim- ers, the Portland Mavericks come to mind. Only in existence from 1973- 1977, the Mavericks played in the Northwest League, a Class A short-season minor league. In those five years, the Mavs earned fan loyalty, beat favored oppo- nents and provided a second chance to hopeful baseball dreamers from across the country. In 2014, the team was memorial- ized in the film documentary “The Battered Bastards of Baseball.” Michael Guischer, from The Dalles, was one of them. With hopes of pitching in the major leagues, Guischer tore carti- lage in his knee in his final year at Portland State University in 1972. “I thought that it was going to be the end of it,” Guischer said. “I didn’t want to quit playing and I knew there was a little chance of climbing out of there and getting somewhere. But I was still young, loved the game and I’ve been play- ing since I was 8 years old. I just wasn’t ready to call it good.” Guischer returned to baseball in 1974 for one season with the Eugene Emeralds, then transferred to the Mavericks and pitched in 1975 and 1976. “Well, I had probably the best year in Eugene. I was seven and one and I got released along with pretty much the whole ball club,” Guischer said. “College kids came from all over the country to (the Mavericks’) weeklong inter-squad game. Guys were coming in and out from eight o’clock in the morning to eight o’clock at night. So, everybody got a chance to play and got a chance to see everybody. I got something out of that camp as one of the two pitchers.” This unconventional way of recruiting attracted baseball players who didn’t fall in the, then, traditional baseball player catego- ry. Guys weren’t in the best shape and smoked filter-less cigarettes in the locker rooms. But despite their misleading appearance, the Mavericks played well. In their inaugural year, the Mavs had a 45-35 record, 50-34 in 1974, 42-35 in 1975, 40-32 in 1976 and 44- 22 in their last season. Maverick fans appreciated the underdog aspect of the team. With no affiliation with a major league club, the Mavs beat other clubs who were affiliated with the Philadelphia Phillies, Los Angeles Dodgers and the San Diego Padres. “We were pretty seasoned ball players,” Guischer said. “There was rumors that (other clubs) sent people down from their higher ball clubs to beat us.” Game attendance for those five years averaged 2,724. During Guischer’s two years with the team, total season attendance exceeded 100,000. In its final season, it is esti- mated that a total of 125,300 people attended Maverick home games. “When I was going to school at Portland State, we’d go to a lot of the triple-A games; the Portland Beavers were a triple-A club,” Guischer said. “There’d only be a couple hundred people in that ballpark watching them. For some reason, when the Mavericks started playing, they were very supportive of the ball club. It was a fun place to play. Great fan support.” Now that it’s been over 40 years since he played for the Mavericks, Guischer has been married for 27 years and has two daughters, who also picked up the sport and position. Chelan and Ann-Marie Guischer were raised playing the sport and were babysat by Sarah Clark, former star pitcher for The Dalles High School. “During the summers, (Clark) babysat the kids, so she had an in- fluence on them too and she helped coach pitching lessons,” Guischer said. “They ended up loving the game and played as long as they could.” Both daughters continued the baseball tradition and played in college. Chelan attended Linfield College in McMinnville, Ore., while Ann-Marie went to the Oregon Institute of Technology in Klamath Falls. Guischer once helped in TDHS’s soft ball team, but couldn’t contin- ue due to work scheduling conflicts. But with the kids out of the nest and retirement in the horizon, Guischer said he’d like to, again, give back to the sport. “If I ever do retire, I would proba- bly give it a go again,” Guischer said. “I really enjoyed softball. I wouldn’t mind doing the assistant coach managing end of it. I’d work with the pitchers more than anything.” Michael Guischer of The Dalles is pictured on the pitcher’s mound during his years with the Portland Mavericks. Contributed photo The battered bastards of baseball The Battered Bastards of Baseball is a 2014 documentary film about the Portland Mavericks, a defunct minor league baseball team in Portland. They played five seasons in the Class A-Short Season Northwest League, from 1973 through 1977. Owned by actor Bing Russell, the Mavericks were an independent team, without the affil- iation of a parent team in the major leagues. The title is from a line from Jim Bouton’s book Ball Four: “Us battered bastards of baseball are the biggest customers of the U.S. Post Office, forwarding-address department.” The film was directed by Chapman Way and Maclain Way, grand- sons of Russell, and features Russell’s son Kurt Russell, who played for the Mavericks and worked as a vice president. The film premiered to a standing ovation at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival in 2014. Netflix, initially one of several interested buyers, acquired the rights to the film and premiered it as an original documentary in 2014. —Wikipedia Legislature week 2: What’s still moving, what’s been spiked Session has passed first deadline for bills to move forward. Jake Thomas ■ By Oregon Capital Bureau SALEM —The first major dead- line of this year’s legislative session hit the Capitol on Friday, Feb. 7. Legislation that hadn’t been scheduled committee vote by that day was consigned to the political dustbin. These proposals may not have made headlines, but they could have affected Oregonians none- theless. Lawmakers sometimes introduce legislation that is un- likely to pass just to get the matter attention, or to win the startup of a policy workgroup with the aim of it passing it in a future session. Although the first deadline Oregon news Opinion History means most bills won’t advance, there is a chance for them to be revived. The deadlines don’t apply to the Joint Committee on Ways and Means, as well as other committees that deal with rules or finance. So bills sent to those committees might have more time. For the moment, here’s a sampling of what seems dead and what’s still moving forward. Bill number: Senate Bill 1538 The issue: It’s illegal to carry a firearm into a public building. But a court case made an exception for people who have a concealed carry license. What it does: Allows local gov- ernments to ban people with con- cealed carry permits from bringing guns into public buildings. Status: Still moving. The Senate Judiciary Committee sent the bill to the Rules Committee. The issue: Firearms left unlocked by their owners have been blamed for suicides and as well as other A2 A4 A5 shootings. What it does: Requires gun own- ers to lock up their firearms when not in use or face penalties as well as liability if their guns fall in the wrong hands. What it does: Makes it illegal to hold coyote-killing competitions. Bill number: House Bill 4075 Status: Still moving. The House Natural Resources Committee has scheduled a work session. The issue: Vaping devices that deliver flavored nicotine have been criticized for being used by tobacco companies to hook kids. What it does: Bans stores from selling flavored vaping products. Bill number: House Bill 4005 Status: Still moving. The House Judiciary Committee held a work session on the bill. The issue: Oregon currently has no effective limits on the amount of money that can be donated to polit- Bill number: Senate Bill 1559 ical campaigns. A court case and a Status: Spiked. Stuck in Senate constitutional amendment that will go before voters could allow limits. Health Committee. The issue: Oregon has expe- What it does: Would establish a task force to propose campaign rienced increasingly destructive finance regulations. wildfires. What it does: Attempts to Bill number: House Bill 4124 address wildfires with updates to Status: Still moving. The House Oregon’s building codes, land-use Rules Committee has scheduled a planning, mapping of high-risk ar- work session. eas, treatment of forest debris, mit- The issue: Contests to kill coyotes igation of smoke on public health has drawn criticism that such events are inhumane. See LEGISLATURE, page A3 Obituaries Comics Sports A7 A8 A10-11
