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THE DAILY ASTORIAN • FRIDAY, DECEMBER 29, 2017
editor@dailyastorian.com
KARI BORGEN
Publisher
JIM VAN NOSTRAND
Editor
Founded in 1873
JEREMY FELDMAN
Circulation Manager
DEBRA BLOOM
Business Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN
Production Manager
CARL EARL
Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
Firefighters deserve applause for
COURAGE, DEDICATION
I
magine your phone ringing late at
night with an urgent plea to drop
everything and come help complete
strangers far away. Imagine canceling
all other plans and heading out — with
no idea of how long you’ll be gone or
exactly what dangers you may face.
Welcome to the world of Clatsop
County firefighters.
This year has been exceptional for
crews from Knappa to Cannon Beach
who have answered the call and bravely
headed off to battle blazes elsewhere in
the state and in California.
As they have returned home, begun
to regroup and get back to normal as
the new year dawns, it’s timely to pause
and applaud them for their courage and
dedication.
This summer, crews from Seaside,
Gearhart, Olney, Lewis & Clark,
Cannon Beach, Warrenton and Knappa
fire districts were first dispatched to fires
throughout Oregon.
Throughout late August and early
September, more than 50 from the
region battled the Milli Fire in Sisters,
the Chetco Bar Fire in Brookings and the
Eagle Creek Fire in Multnomah County.
On returning, scarcely had they
drawn breath and resumed normal fam-
ily life back home on the North Coast
when the Oregon Fire Marshal received
an urgent request for assistance from
California through a national state-to-
state mutual aid system.
The call came late one night in
Although 2015 was a busy year for such
deployments, veteran fire leaders on the Coast
cannot recall any year quite like this one.
mid-October. Remarkably, crews were
mobilized and on their way down
Interstate 5 the next day, heading to
Santa Rosa, California, a city of more
than 175,000. There they fought blazes
on every side, south and east to Sonoma
and Napa, one of 12 wildfires burn-
ing in eight counties. The fire killed 22,
destroyed 7,000 homes and buildings,
and damaged another 500. Damage
totaled more than $1 billion in Santa
Rosa alone.
The third deployment sent many of
these and other Clatsop heroes back to
California, where they spent at least 16
days fighting fires in Ventura County
near Los Angeles in fires that destroyed
nearly 200 homes and caused 200,000
to be evacuated.
Although 2015 was a busy year for
such deployments, veteran fire leaders
on the Coast cannot recall any year quite
like this one.
In commending this outstanding
commitment to helping their neighbors,
there are others to thank, too.
Firstly, employers of fire volunteers
know there is always the possibility
their staff members may have opportu-
nities to serve on the front lines in far-
away places. That means they need a
game plan on how to cover their jobs
— because they may have to leave their
regular workplace for prolonged periods
with no definite end date.
Fire departments, and the cities or
rural communities they protect, also
have to make sure their primary role is
covered, going deep into their bench to
give additional on-call shifts and other
opportunities to serve to those who are
not selected to travel to trouble spots.
And families always bear the brunt
of supporting first responders. Having
loved ones away from home and poten-
tially in harm’s way is stressful and wor-
risome. No one can properly imagine
what that’s like unless they have faced
that situation.
When the firefighters return, they can
tell “war stories,” of course, but they
also bring back valuable experience that
they can share with others during drills
and training opportunities.
Being neighborly has a cost. But
it’s the right thing to do. We salute our
region’s fire chiefs and the agencies that
supervise them, for creating the climate
in which Clatsop’s finest respond with
skill and courage whenever that call
comes and wherever it takes them.
GUEST COLUMN
Mark Hatfield’s widow guards access to Oregon history
W
e live in a golden age of biog-
raphy. Ron Chernow’s recent
biography of President Ulysses
S. Grant is only the latest in a bevy of
great reads. Among Anne Edwards’ large
biographical stable is her life of Judy
Garland. Gillian Gill has given us Agatha
Christie.
The fattest opportunity for Oregon
biography is the late Mark Hatfield,
whose two terms as governor and five as
U.S. senator left an imprint on this state.
Brent Walth — who wrote “Fire
at Eden’s Gate: Tom
McCall and the Oregon
Story,” the most
important political
biography of this state
— will not be taking on
Hatfield. When asked
by Hatfield alumni to
Steve
write that biography,
Forrester
Walth insisted that the
late senator’s dark side
would have to be in the story. That ended
the discussion.
Now another impediment to serious
Hatfield research is lying inside the
archives of Willamette University. In
“Hatfield’s Senate papers tucked out of
view until 2022,” published Dec. 27 in
The Daily Astorian, Claire Withycombe
of our Capital Bureau reported that the
senator’s widow, Antoinette, has sealed
the papers until she is “in the grave.”
The irony in this is that Hatfield was
the poster child of the Senate Historical
Office for the manner in which he pre-
served and disposed of his official papers.
It’s also worth noting that the papers
of Hatfield’s peers — senators Henry
Jackson and Warren Magnuson — are not
sealed.
From the day that Mark and Antoinette
married in 1958, she has been a highly
visible element of the once dynamic polit-
ical commodity that was Mark Hatfield.
In Washington, D.C., Antoinette entered
the real estate business. Her earnings
afforded the Hatfield family a better life,
and her savvy got them nice homes.
Early in my decade as a Washington
correspondent, I wrote a feature article
on Antoinette for Oregon Magazine.
In a town where most people shade the
meanings of their words and are always
Michael Lloyd/The Oregonian
Antoinette Hatfield watches husband Mark ponder a question during a 1984 interview.
guarding their escape hatches, Antoinette
was refreshing in her candor.
In addition to my weekly newspaper
output, I was also doing biographical
research on one of Hatfield’s predeces-
sors, former Sen. Richard L. Neuberger.
And that’s when I ran into what I will call
the Widow Rule of research.
In addition to the Neuberger papers, at
the University of Oregon, I was seeking
access to the Wayne Morse papers, also
at UO. But to gain access to the Morse
papers, one had to be approved by his
widow, Mildred. Someone sympathetic
to the life of Neuberger would not likely
gain access. The Morse-Neuberger feud
of the 1950s was one of the most incendi-
ary of Senate history.
As I stumbled through this new
territory, I encountered a most helpful
older historian. He explained: “When a
collection is open, that often means the
widow has probably culled it for the best
stuff, which is not there. If the collection
is intact, the widow controls access.”
He continued: “That’s why the first step
in writing a biography is to shoot the
widow.”
One winter’s evening, my wife and
I hosted the Hatfields in our Capitol
Hill home. Our other guests, two young
friends, were the only people whom we
knew who would not want something
from the senator.
During the course of the meal, I
described my predicament with the Morse
papers. Then I delivered the historian’s
admonition to “shoot the widow.” Sitting
next to me, Antoinette looked stricken.
Mark had a big laugh. Little did he
know. Or did he?
Steve Forrester, the former editor and
publisher of The Daily Astorian, is the
president and CEO of EO Media Group.
David Falconer/The Oregonian
Oregon Secretary of State Mark Hat-
field and his fiancee, Antoinette Kuz-
manich, enjoy the Oregon-Washing-
ton football game in 1957.