Port Orford News
THE MOST WESTERLY WEEKLY IN THE CONTIGUOUS 48 STATES
Volume 52, No. 19
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Inside
Price - Fifty Cents
Port Orford, Curry County, Oregon 97465
A challenge to the PHS Class of 2008
Ruby Price
Principal
SMART
If youʼre really
SMART, then you
get to graduate.
— Page 2
The editor
The Port Orford
News and Editor
Matt Hall could use a
few kind words - you
can help your
newspaper - again.
— Page 3
Graduates
A whole page, with
well-wishes,
showing the
Pacific High
School Class of
2008, including Eva
Digby, right.
— Page 8
This week
Science Fair
For the Port Orford News
I
want to congratulate our
graduates, the Class of
2008, on your graduation
from Pacific High School. I
celebrate the accomplishments
of this class of fine young men
and women who have met the
requirements of the rigorous
course of instruction set out by
our national, state and local
elected officials. We are requir-
ing our students to be better able
to demonstrate that they have
mastered the skills and knowl-
edge necessary to be productive
and successful citizens in a
democratic society. You who are
graduating have done just that.
We are celebrating the com-
pletion of the first years of your
public school education.
Webster’s Dictionary defines
graduation as, a “step, degree or
stage in a series”. Think about
that for just a moment. You
have completed a major step in
the series of steps that will make
up your life. Reaching this
milestone required hard work,
conviction, and determination
on your part. It also required
the support and guidance of
those who are joining in your
celebration today. Think of all
the times you were ready to
give up – the times when it
would have been so much easier
to quit . . . to skip school . . . to
forget homework . . . to miss a
test. But, you didn’t. You held
yourselves accountable. You
wanted to succeed, and you
have.
I suspect that a number of
family members and staff who
have also had those moments.
But they never let their support
for you or their belief in your
ability slip. They have been
with you all the way. Be proud
of yourselves. Be proud of your
successes. But don’t forget the
definition of ‘graduation’ – it is
one step in a series . . . tomor-
row you will be starting yet
PON photo by Carol Berger
For a complete page of the Pacific High School Class of 2008 along with the best wishes
of area businesses and individuals, see page 8.
another exciting step. Approach
it with that same positive atti-
tude you’ve exhibited in high
school and follow the advice of
Confucius, “Where ever you go,
go with all your heart.”
Many of you will be heading
to college, others into the work-
force. Some have joined our
armed forces. Some may travel
for a while. Your paths will take
many directions; your successes
will be many and varied. Some
of you may not see each other
again until future reunions bring
Port Orford Rotary Club
The Port Orford Rotary Club meets each Thursday,
at noon, at the Port Orford Community Center.
Port-Orford-cedar Expo
The Port-Orford-cedar Expo will take place at vari-
ous locations in Port Orford May 23 - May 25.
Also inside
Rays Food Place and McKayʼs Markets
Contributed photos
An Artists’ Reception
opens the third annual
Flamenco guitarist
Port-Orford-cedar Expo
Grant Ruiz of
held from 5 to 8 p.m. in
Port Orford Friday, May
Ashland will be
23.
joined by guitarists
The reception takes
place at the Port Orford
Les Stansell of
Arts Council office in
Pistol River and Cliff
Seaside Plaza, 1320
Oregon Street, and honors
Stansell ... Sunday,
artists participating in the
May 25 at 2 p.m.
Fine Arts Contest, center-
piece of the Expo.
Artists’ work must use
Port-Orford-cedar as subject or as medium. The contest/show
continues until 3 p.m. Sunday, May 25.
Other events on Saturday, May 24 include an Art Walk to
seven local galleries between 2 and 5 p.m. and a concert by
blues guitarist David Jacobs-Strain at the Community Building
on 11th Street at 7 p.m. Tickets are $10. at the door or at the
Downtown Fun Zone in Port Orford. Admission is free to all
other festival events.
Flamenco guitarist Grant Ruiz of Ashland will be joined by
guitarists Les Stansell of Pistol River and Cliff Stansell in per-
formance Sunday, May 25 at 2 p.m. at Theatre 101 in Seaside
Plaza. At 3 p.m. winners of the Fine Arts Show will be
announced.
Disease-resistant Port-Orford-cedar trees will be available for
sale during the entire festival. Contact Port Orford Arts Council
at www.portorfordart.org or (541) 332-0487.
Other sponsors of the Expo are City of Port Orford, Johnson
Gallery, Chetco Federal Credit Union, Theater 101, Chris and
Julie Hawthorne, Brian Tooley and Crazy Norwegians
Restaurant.
◆ You can steer yourself in
any direction you choose.
◆ You are on your own.
◆ And you know what you
know.
◆ You are the guy who’ll
decide where you go.
To all the students at Pacific
High this year, I am very proud of
you. Remember to care, aim high,
and never stop learning. I expect
great things from all of you!
— Ruby Price
Principal/Superintendent
Pacific High School
Swenson, Manning honored among PHS graduates
A Science Fair will be held at Driftwood Elementary
School from 5:30 - 7 p.m., Thursday, May 22.
Third annual Port-Orford-
cedar Expo kicks off Friday
you together. Others will contin-
ue close friendships. Whatever
your direction, remember that
your school family and your
own family will always believe
in your abilities. And I want you
to believe in yourself as well.
Perhaps someone who has
been with most of you since
your earliest days of reading,
Dr. Seuss said it best:
◆ You have brains in your
head.
◆ You have feet in your
shoes.
John Swenson, right, and Natalie Manning have been
named Valedictorian and Salutatorian for the Pacific High
Class of 2008.
The graduation ceremony for
Pacific High School’s Class of
2008 will be held at 7 p.m.,
Friday, May 30 in the school’s
gymnasium.
The event will begin with
processional music by the
Blanco/Driftwood Middle
School Band under the direction
of William Jarvis.
Natalie Manning, class presi-
dent and salutatorian, will deliv-
er a welcoming speech, then the
salutatory address.
After a musical presentation
by graduates Jared Tarr and
Signe Tronson, John Swenson
will deliver the valedictory
address.
Commencement speaker for
the event will be Tom Dill, past
Pacific High School teacher and
The Suttons, the Jamiesons
and the Port Orford Tribune
Part II: Families and history intertwine ...
By Carol Berger
PON Staff Writer
Doug Jamieson is very proud of his
ancestry. On a recent weekday morning,
the pastor of the Port Orford Christian
Center talked with me about the six gener-
ations of his family that have lived in Port
Orford.
In part I Jamieson explained abut his
great-grandfather, newspaper publisher
Walter Sutton, his wife Louisa, and six of
their children in September 1889.
In 1922 the Suttons ended a long news-
paper history by selling out to Thomas W.
Fulton. It was expected that Port Orford
would become the county seat.
And it is here that we resume our story
... part II of ‘The Suttons, the Jamiesons
and the Port Orford Tribune.
The county seat ...
Jamieson says that “one of the reasons
Walter wanted to pursue the newspaper in
Port Orford was because, at that that time
he was a state representative and he and
others felt that Port Orford would become
the county seat. There was also the infor-
mation about the railroad coming over this
way. We had the open ocean port here.
Port Orford was on the map at that time.”
Jamieson went on, “Where Hubbard
Creek is, that valley that’s up there was all
homesteaded by Walter Sutton. He had
640 acres up Hubbard Creek before it was
Hubbard Creek. We called it Hubbard’s
Creek.
“My uncle, Dick Jamieson, still lives up
on his piece, which was part of his proper-
ty that came from his mother Alta, Walter
Sutton’s youngest daughter. When you hit
the fish hatchery, all of the property below
the fish hatchery on Elk River clear down
to the marshes was Frank Sutton’s and
Jim Sutton’s. Seven miles up on the left
down over the hill is an A-frame. That
house was owned by my great aunt (Jim
Sutton’s daughter).”
Jamieson’s other great grandfather, and
the one from whom he takes his last
name, was Amaziah Jamieson, born in
Canada in 1858. According to Dixie’s
athletic director.
Scholarship presentations will
follow, then Principal Ruby
Price will present the graduating
class to 2CJ Board Chair,
Rosaria Williams.
Two of the thirty-three PHS
graduates have earned a
Certificate of Initial Mastery,
and ten students have been des-
ignated “Honor Graduates” for
having maintained a 3.00 GPA+
or better throughout high
school.
The graduates include:
Christine Susanna Aiello
Levi Hawken Anderson●
Anthony Carl Armi
Perry Alanzo Ashdown
Tyson Rhett Breuer
Tiffany Nichole Burkhow
See PHS, page 5
A few facts
Note: Pastor Doug Jamieson of the
Port Orford Christian Center is the
great-grandson of Walter Sutton, pub-
lisher of one of the earliest newspa-
pers in Port Orford.
Material in this article came from
an interview with Jamieson and from
the website of his sister, Dixie Lee
Tucker, which includes an excerpt
from A Century of Coos and Curry by
Emil R. Peterson and Alfred Powers
(1952) about Walter Sutton’s newspa-
per career.
Additional information came from
e-mails from Tucker that included a
number of articles from the Port
Orford Tribune and other sources,
including Curry County Echoes (May
1979 issue) and The Centennial
History of Oregon by A.G. Walling.
— Carol Berger
website, at some point thereafter,
Amaziah’s parents, Hugh and Julia,
moved their family of 11 to Maine. At the
age of 22, Amaziah moved to Minnesota
for five years, then to Myrtle Point in
1887, where he met and married Eunice
Corbin. They had four children, including
See TRIBUNE, page 5