S ERVING THE S ILVERTON A REA S INCE 1880
50 C ENTS
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A U NIQUE E DITION OF THE S TATESMAN J OURNAL
V OL . 135, N O . 19
W EDNESDAY , A PRIL 27, 2016
SILVERTONAPPEAL.COM
Students help strengthen fire safety
JUSTIN MUCH
STAYTON MAIL
Silverton-area fire safety
was fortified this past weekend
following a joint effort involv-
ing Silverton High School stu-
dents.
On Saturday, April 23, Amer-
ican Red Cross volunteers took
part in the regional “Home Fire
Campaign” by locally installing
free smoke detectors at resi-
dences in Silverton, Mt. Angel
and Scotts Mills.
The groups, which included a
number of Silverton High
School Students and Silverton
Fire Cadets, engaged in the fire-
safety activity locally just as a
number of others have in com-
munities throughout the region.
Silverton Fire District Chief
Bill Miles called the campaign a
“great extension to what we are
doing.”
The chief said his fire pre-
vention officers met with the
Red Cross representatives to
help facilitate the outreach.
“For us this is great because
it just extends what we are able
to do,” Miles said. “We get to a
lot more folks this way.”
Miles said the district has
smoke alarms and batteries on
their units that they can install
when they spot a need, but the
Red Cross reach helps to aug-
ment Silverton Fire’s reach.
Red Cross officials, who are
spearheading this campaign
throughout Oregon and South-
west Washington, said that
home fires are the single great-
est disaster threat to individ-
uals and families nationwide.
Monique Dugaw, spokes-
woman for American Red Cross
Cascades Region, said in a press
release that more than a dozen
Silverton High School students
volunteered to help install
smoke alarms.
“At least three of the stu-
dents have been affected by a
SHELDON TRAVER/SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
Silverton Fire District volunteer firefighters work during a practice burn.
home fire, themselves, and are
now giving back to help others
in the community,” Dugaw not-
ed. “Many of the students have
volunteered with the Red Cross
throughout high school and
have helped out at Red Cross
shelters, including the one es-
tablished in Oregon City during
the record winter storms last
year.”
The Silverton students are
part of the school’s very active
Red Cross Youth Club, led by
teacher Kirsten Barnes.
Barnes, Salem’s Dianne
Mekkers and Portland’s Cara
Sloman recently received the
National Presidential Award
for Excellence in Washington,
D.C. for their work to set up a
training academy for disaster
responders. The model they de-
veloped is now being imple-
mented throughout the country.
“The volunteer power of the
Red Cross is one of our greatest
strengths. When there is a com-
munity need, Red Cross volun-
teers are there,” said Red Cross
CEO Amy Shlossman. “We
know that home fire is the sin-
gle greatest disaster threat in
Oregon. The Silverton High
School Red Cross Youth Club is
creating meaningful and life-
saving change by installing
smoke alarms in homes that
need them. They are truly living
the Red Cross mission.”
The Red Cross Cascades re-
gion responds to an average of
two home fires every day.
For
information
visit
www.redcross.org/CascadesH-
omeFire or email volunteer.cas
cades@redcross.org.
INFORMATION SURFACES
ABOUT DETROIT ARTIFACTS
Charter
school
may move
to church
CHRISTENA BROOKS
CHRISTENA BROOKS
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
Six months after a pair of artifacts sur-
faced from drought-shrunken Detroit
Lake, clues about one of them have
emerged too.
A concrete pit found in the mud next to
a wooden cargo wagon at the Old Detroit
town site was apparently last used as a
fishpond at the original Detroit Ranger
Station. Along with the rest of the town, it
was abandoned and purposely flooded in
1953.
Terry Dean, of Springfield, was 6
years old when Detroit Dam was complet-
ed, turning this section of the North San-
tiam River into a 3,580-acre reservoir. He
remembers Old Detroit’s ranger station –
its remnants now underwater much of the
year – because he spent many days play-
ing there as a young boy.
Near the ranger station’s open storage
barns was a concrete fishpond with simi-
lar dimensions to the concrete octagonal
feature found by a few people this fall
when the lake was at a 46-year low.
Dean said he recalls the octagon clear-
ly. In the 1950s, it was a rock-lined pond
filled with goldfish of all sizes.
“All the kids would lay there on the
grass and watch the fish swim in the
pond,” he said. “There was a lattice
screen over it so you couldn’t fall in.”
By the time Dave Zahn, a marine depu-
ty with Marion County, stumbled upon the
octagon last October, it was partially
filled with mud and foul-smelling water.
Guessing it was about 5 feet across and
less than 2 feet deep, Zahn wondered
what it could’ve been.
So did U.S. Forest Service archaeolo-
gist Cara Kelly, who trekked out to see the
wagon and octagon before fall rains
brought the lake level back up. She start-
ed talking to Old Detroit residents, many
of whom she’s interviewed over her 26-
year career in the area.
Dean, 69, has good memories of the
town, and many of them center on the
ranger station, which was built in 1906. By
the time Dean was born, more buildings
had been constructed – a warehouse, open
Silverton’s
Montessori
charter school has entered
into negotiations with Silver-
ton Friends Church to rent the
building now housing a K-8
Christian school.
Until Sunday, the Commu-
nity Roots School was slated to
move from inside the old high
school on Schlador Street into
new modular buildings out-
side in a district-wide restruc-
turing. But following the
Friends church’s consensus
earlier this month to cease its
36-year-old Christian school
ministry at year’s end, the
public charter school is seek-
ing a long-term lease of the
church’s school facilities.
“We’re working on a con-
tract,” said Christine Golden,
spokesperson for the church.
“We are very excited to be able
to offer this facility to Com-
munity Roots.”
Community Roots’ princi-
pal, Miranda Traeger, couldn’t
be reached for comment.
While church leaders antic-
ipate receiving much-needed
rent payments on their build-
ing, they are sad to step back
from the Christian school,
Golden said. The Friends
church is going through a time
of transition, including the
loss of some members and fi-
nancing, and cannot continue
to financially support the
school.
“We cannot carry the
school anymore,” Golden said.
“In all honesty, it would have
taken us down.”
Parents from the school are
planning to strike out on their
own but can’t quickly come up
with a way to pay rent at the
church. So they’re looking to
continue operating elsewhere
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
This pit, which was revealed during low water in Detroit Lake, might once have been a fish pond.
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
See LAKE, Page 3A
The railroad turnaround was too big to have been the source of the octagon-shaped pit.
See CHARTER, Page 2A
CHRISTENA BROOKS
SPECIAL TO THE APPEAL TRIBUNE
Principal changes are
occurring at Silverton
High School, Silver Crest
School and Evergreen
School.
Starting July 1, Silver-
ton High School Principal
Mark Hannan will work at
Silver Crest, a kindergar-
ten though eighth-grade
site, half time as principal
and half time at district
jobs.
“Most of these (district
level tasks) will be com-
pleted out of Silver Crest
School. This will increase
the principal presence in
the building on a more fre-
quent basis than what has
been possible in the past,”
Superintendent Andy Bel-
lando wrote to parents.
This year’s Silver Crest/
Victor Point Principal Ja-
mie McCarty will change
his duties to become next
year’s Victor Point/Ever-
green principal. Ever-
green principals Bob and
Heidi Ostrom are plan-
ning to retire, staff said.
“This change will allow
See PRINCIPALS, Page 2A
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INSIDE
Births......................................2A
Canyon Views ......................3B
Calendar................................3B
Classifieds..............................3B
Life..........................................4A
Obituaries .....................2A, 3A
Sports......................................1B
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3 schools to make
principal changes