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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (March 24, 2016)
w E GRAB BAG book shelf • glimpse • wildlife • pop culture • words • q&a aster W orship C elebrate w ith G race the Joy o f Easter Easter Sunday March 27th 8 am & 10 am Photo by Matt Love Grace Episcopal Church SINCE 1886 Dock of the Bay in Bay City, Washington, is a gritty, antiquated coastal dive bar. 1545 FRANKLIN AVE., ASTORIA • 503-325-4691 Church of Christ Friendship in Christ’s love! A G LIMPSE I NSIDE An occasional feature by MATT LOVE Dock of the Bay Easter Service - 10:30 AM Sunday Sermon - Easter Prophesied, including Jesus’ Resurrection You are invited to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus with an AFTER Easter community sing-a-long Sat. April 2nd 3:00 PM, Refreshments served. 692 12th St. Astoria, OR. For further information call (503)791-3235 or (503)468-8397 All the great dive bar ai cionados in the area told me the same thing: “Matt, you’ve got to check out Dock of the Bay in Bay Center, Washington.” So I did. Glorious. Absolutely glorious in its gritty and antiquated coastal splen- dor. I pulled up in front of Dock of the Bay on a Saturday afternoon in February. I have no idea how I found it. A few lo- cals in Raymond had given me vague directions, but I passed the alleged turnoff from U.S. Highway 101 at least twice and felt lost. As I drove around the fringes of Willapa Bay, it oc- curred to me that the Dock of the Bay might not exist. Per- haps it was only a legend. And then I saw it: a some- what ramshackle, octagon-like building nestled between all things of the oystering trade. I parked in front, exited the truck and inspected the façade. There didn’t seem to be a front entrance so I asked two men smoking outside about this oddity. “There are three entrances,” said a man. That was a i rst in my dive bar life. I walked in and sat down on a stool at a long wooden bar. I ordered a Guinness in bottle and placed an order for — what else? — an oyster burger. A couple of men sat at the bar. They were obviously lo- cals connected to the oyster- ing trade. I asked one of them about Bay Center’s i nest quali- ty. “No cops,” he said. That was that. I like terse an- swers in dive bars. The man suggested I take a look at an old photograph on the wall. I did. It was a black and white shot from 1949 of a great white shark caught in Willapa Bay. It looked as big as the fake one from “Jaws.” I had no idea great whites traveled this far up Pacii c Northwest estuaries — or used to. See what you can learn in coast- al dive bars? Marine biolo- gy, among other subjects. My oyster burger arrived in the blink of an eye. I took a bite. It was the best oyster burger I’d ever tasted. I ate and listened to the men talk. I heard a priceless line: “The gals are up at the house steam cleaning the carpet, and I couldn’t hear the TV so I came here.” I heard more priceless lines. I could listen to the regulars’ i shing and crabbing mis- hap stories for hours. There is easily a novella or true crime thriller in every one of them. The Guinness didn’t re- ally go that great with the oyster burger. Next time, Rainier, as I should have or- dered in the i rst place. on 160 acres in the area after jumping ship in Astoria in the 1870s. The post oi ce oi cially changed its name from Bear Creek to Svensen in 1895. The post oi ce closed in 1944. waiting to take a train for Rainer.” Matt Love is the author/editor of 14 books about Oregon, including “A Nice Piece of Astoria.” His books are available through coastal bookstores or his website, nestuc- caspitpress.com NW word nerd By RYAN HUME Svensen Christian Church of Knappa 42417 Va lley Creek La n e A s toria , O reg on 97103 Service time 10:30 a.m. Christian Church of Seaside 580 A ven u e U S ea s id e, O reg on 97138 Service time 10:30 am Christian Church of Warrenton 1376 S .E. A n chor A ve W a rren ton , O reg on 97146 O ffice: (503)861-1714 Fa x: (503)861-3392 W eb: w w w.cconline.cc Service times: 9:00 and 10:30 am >VYܭQVܭQ@ noun 1. an unincorporated area in Clatsop County situated on the Columbia River and located 11 miles east of Asto- ria on U.S. Highway 30 2. Svensen Island: a some- what marshy island sitting in the Columbia River at Mile 24 and separated from the main- land by the Svensen Slough, which drains into the river Origin: A variant of Svensson, one of the most common Scandinavian surnames, which literally means, “son of Sven.” In Sweden to refer to someone idiomatically as a “Svensson” is to imply their ubiquity in Swedish culture, much like calling someone an average Joe in U.S. parlance. The community, island and slough in Clatsop County are attributed to Peter Svensen, a Finnish sailor who settled into a homestead “Charles P. Duke, the prisoner who escaped from the County Jail Thursday evening, was captured by Deputy Sheriff McLean at Svensen this evening as the fugitive was —“Escaped Prisoner Retaken,” The Sun- day Oregonian, June 9, 1907, P. 15 “The 30-kilowatt generator is locat- ed at the base of Bear Creek Dam east of the city near Svensen and is expected to produce about 154,645 kilowatt-hours of electricity a year.” — Derrick DePledge, “At Bear Creek Dam, a shift in power,” The Daily Astorian, Feb. 26, 2015 March 24, 2016 | coastweekend.com | 23
