VIEWPOINT
BY TIM HILTON
A Fresh Look at
Springfield’s History
TAKE A WALK DURING NATIONAL HISTORIC PRESERVATION MONTH
M
ay has traditionally been National
Historic Preservation Month, a time
for communities to celebrate the suc-
cesses of local efforts and to recall
the losses. Last year was a milestone:
fifty years since the National Historic Preservation Act
of 1966!
Fifty-one doesn’t seem like such a big deal by com-
parison, but there is still a lot to crow about.
One of the NHP listed jewels in Springfield is the
home of The Springfield Historic Museum at 590 Main
Street, formerly the office and substation for an early
electric power company. The museum is mounting an
exhibit in its back gallery that features some lost Main
Street buildings among other interesting images culled
from the photo archive.
The exhibit is titled “When Springfield Was Young
— Establishment and Development of the Historic Cen-
ter,” and it primarily looks at the period between 1891
and 1915, from the arrival of the railroad to the First
World War.
It also ties into the earliest construction in the city:
hydropower from digging the Millrace and subsequent
industry with the flour mill and nearby lumber mill.
These were established and maintained since five years
after the Briggs brothers settled their adjacent donation
land claims in 1849.
It’s helpful to have a fresh look at the historic record
of Springfield, one that invites us to understand the lives
of people who walked the same sidewalks 110 years ago
that we do today. That fresh point of view comes from
the new director of The Springfield Historic Museum,
Taylor Harwood, and her assistant, Burt Dunn.
It’s also the perfect time of year to walk through the
Washburne Historic District, to see the blossoming street
trees and gardens, and to admire the handsome archi-
tecture of the houses and preservation efforts there. In
6
May 11, 2017 • eugeneweekly.com
7TH STREET MOUNTAIN STATES POWER STATION
1997 (ABOVE) AND IN 2002 (BELOW)
P HOTOS COUR T E SY OF SP RINGFIEL D HIS TORIC COMMISSION
particular, 660 C Street had a major makeover and now
shines again! Walking Tour Guidebooks are available
at the Chamber of Commerce, The Springfield Historic
Museum and City Hall.
There are also Walking Tour Guidebooks for the
downtown Main Street “Depot District.” Downtown has
improved a lot recently and a big part of it has been the
immigration of young people, the spruced-up storefronts
and bringing sidewalk lamps back to Main Street.
The Springfield Chamber of Commerce is housed in
another jewel that is also NHP listed: The SPRR Station
(1891), the oldest remaining Victorian Passenger and
Freight Station in the state of Oregon. It was nominated
to the National Register in 1979, finally, when a com-
munity effort rescued it three years after being slated
for demolition. It was subsequently moved seven blocks
to its present site and carefully restored. Retracing that
route back would take you to South 7th Street — a lonely
road. You can still see the concrete platforms near where
the old station stood.
Across the tracks, you’d see an impressive brick
industrial building on the Millrace which is all that re-
mains of the former electric generation plant. A steam
engine was powered by burning mill waste, bringing
electricity to Springfield in 1892. That first generator
was in a wooden building that burned down, the remain-
ing brick structure was built in 1911 — the same year
as the Springfield Historic Museum / historic substation
building, in the same brick and for the same company.
You could say they are “sisters,” separated by circum-
stance, that is if buildings could have sisters.
Nearby, the new Willamalane bike path along Quarry
Creek to the Middle Fork of the Willamette River follows
the path of the original branch line of the Springfield
Millrace, dug by the Briggs brothers, Isaac and Elias, in
1852. The story goes that after a big flood around 1850
the brothers climbed Springfield Butte to get a view of
the situation. Looking down from the slope they noted
how the flood drained from the land, into channels, back
to the river. This is how they selected the location of the
millrace. Later floods changed the path of the Middle
Fork so the present route of the millrace was created
with its head at Clearwater Park.
Wrapping up, the issues and resources in Springfield
are not much different than in other places that had early
pioneer settlement. The success or failure of preserva-
tion efforts is primarily in the hands of volunteers and
amateurs interested in history or saving old buildings.
Perhaps you are reading this far away, or have no in-
tention of ever stepping foot in Springfield. That’s cool,
but then go out into your own community and see places
where preservation efforts have saved a movie theater
or stabilized an old neighborhood, how conservation
has cleaned up an industrial site or restored an almost
forgotten rural cemetery, how adaptive-reuse repurposes
an old storefront or warehouse, or how archaeologists
record and protect the relics and resources of pre-settle-
ment First Peoples so that they won’t be looted, vandal-
ized or lost to time.
Large and small, these efforts are being undertaken
in communities all around the country, and I hope you’ll
take some moments in May, wherever you are, to ap-
preciate the work of those volunteers, and how historic
preservation is part of what makes life better.
Tim Hilton is the chair of the Springfield Historic Commission.