THE ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, JUNE 25, 2019 • B1
WATER UNDER
THE BRIDGE
COMPILED BY BOB DUKE
From the pages of Astoria’s daily newspapers
10 years ago
this week — 2009
F
or the four young women who made up this
year’s Scandinavian Midsummer Festival
Court, there was bound to be much anticipation
leading up to festival weekend.
But as much as they were looking forward to fi nd-
ing out which of them would be crowned as the fes-
tival’s 42nd Miss Scandinavia, they were all also
eagerly awaiting a particular treat that usually is avail-
able just once a year — lefse.
Miss Denmark Jodi-Lynne Meyer, crowned Miss
Scandinavia Friday night, said there was no doubt that
she’d be making a beeline to the Sons of Norway lefse
booth for some of the folded fl atbread that had been
slathered with butter, cinnamon and sugar.
“It’s so good, you have to wait all year for it. It’s
the anticipation that makes it that much better,” she
said.
After being thrown from her seat and
hitting her head in the rush-hour Metro-
rail crash Monday, Warrenton native Jody
Wickett went to work helping other injured
passengers.
Wickett, a registered nurse, was in the
moving train that plowed under another
stopped train Monday in Washington, D.C.
She told CNN she was sending a text mes-
sage when she felt the train hit something.
She and other passengers went fl ying from
their seats. She found many people on the
train were injured much worse than she was,
and she helped pull back metal and debris to
remove people who were pinned between the
cars.
The crash — reportedly the worst in the
history of the city’s Metrorail system — sent
more than 70 people to area hospitals.
2009 — The Lady Washington fi res off a cannon round in front of the 39th Street Pier before pulling into the East
Mooring Basin to dock alongside the Hawaiian Chieftain.
Cannon Beach Fire & Rescue and the Coast Guard
rescued two Seaside boys at 6:45 p.m. Monday from
the rocks off Tillamook head north of the Tillamook
lighthouse.
Kevin Walsh, 14, and Ronald Dean, 14, decided
to walk from the Cove in Seaside around Tillamook
Head while the tide was out. But when the tide came
in, they were stranded on rocks, said Cannon Beach
Fire Chief Cleve Rooper.
Clatsop County’s unemployment rate con-
tinued to climb in May, a month that nor-
mally brings seasonal job growth as summer-
time approaches.
The county’s seasonally adjusted unem-
ployment rate jumped to 11 percent in May
from 10.2 percent in April after a month-long
plateau between March and April, according
to the Oregon Employment Department.
50 years ago — 1969
Do Columbia River gillnetters have prior right of
use to drifts maintained and fi shed over the years, and
should they be compensated for drifts closed off by
the government agencies?
Russell Bristow, executive secretary of the Colum-
bia River Fishermen’s Protective Union, is seeking
an unprecedented $80,000 reimbursement from Con-
gress for a group of Westport gillnetters.
Test case is the Westport Island Drift, closed by the
Army Corps of Engineers a few years ago. The engi-
neers drove pile dikes in the area in an effort to main-
tain the ship channel at its present depth.
Eight fi shermen were forced to stop operations in
the closed section of the river. In 1952, they had re-es-
tablished “drift right” in the area, rights not recog-
nized by law but respected by most commercial fi sh-
ermen on the river.
How are drift rights established? Bristow cites tra-
ditions started in the 1800s. Fishermen cleared their
areas of all snags and bottom obstacles, making a
clear run for the fi sh and safe passage for naviga-
tion. Clearing work is done each year, and expense
accounts are kept.
Bristow is presently copying bills of sale and
expense sheets from various river areas to show Con-
gress what is involved, in time and money, in keep-
ing the areas clear. He contends that his evidence will
show that gillnetters provide a service benefi cial to
the state as well as themselves.
Elaine Huhta, Miss Clatsop County for
1969, and 22 other candidates selected in local
pageants will compete in the 23rd annual
Miss Oregon Pageant in Seaside July 9-12 for
the title of Miss Oregon and the opportunity
to become the 42nd Miss America.
The Oregon State Sanitary Authority granted a
nuclear power plant waste disposal permit to Portland
General Electric Co. today.
The proposed nuclear power plant will be on the
Oregon side of the Columbia River 42 miles north-
west of Portland.
The authority’s staff report on the proposal said
emissions from the plant should have no measurable
effect on the surrounding environment.
75 years ago — 1944
It was not a bright picture that was painted of the
future of the Columbia River salmon industry last
week at a conference between the Oregon fi sh com-
mission, representatives of the industry and members
of the legislature’s fi sheries interim committee, but,
dark as it was, there was no disposition to accept it as
2009 — While the Astoria Viking, Nordic and Scandia
Dancers perform on the outside stage at the Clatsop
County Fairgrounds, ‘Lord Grog’ Shawn Kottmeier of
Portland rests up before his battle during the viking
encampment show.
1969 — Margie Huhta, Miss Clatsop County.
1969 — An unusual visitor to the Port of Astoria, this hydrofoil stopped in for fuel and minor repair on its way from
Seattle, where it was built, to Southern California.
one without background of hope.
There was, however, general agreement that to
save what is left of it and to restore some of its lost
proportions there must be a new program, one mark-
edly different from that of the past and one which will
require more fi nances than are now available.
The encroachment of civilization has brought tre-
mendous problems, what with obstructing dams, irri-
gation diversions, stream pollution, destruction of
spawning and other developments interfering with
nature’s processes for preserving the salmon runs.
Such menaces will increase as the development of the
many other resources
of the river and its
tributaries proceeds.
Only man can repair
the damages that
man is doing. Nature
has been hopelessly
handicapped.
Jack Dempsey,
the huge-shoul-
dered killer of the
ring and the most
colorful world’s
heavyweight
fi ght champion
in boxing history,
will appear on
the stage of the
Liberty theater
tonight in a spe-
cial bond show
that opens at 8:30
o-clock.
Two letters have been received by this newspaper
recently, both of them complaining about conditions
in Astoria growing out of the crimes and misdemean-
ors of members of the Navy. One was from a civil-
ian residing in Jeffers Gardens. The other was from
an Astorian in the Army, who made his observation
while on furlough in his home town.
The charges assessed against that group of obstrep-
erous bluejackets who step over the line of decency
and reasonable conduct we think are too extrava-
gantly applied to all of the Navy personnel, and fuzzy
up the true picture
Next month, when the 50th and fi nal Kaiser car-
rier shall have been put in commission here, there will
have been 3,000 offi cers and about 30,000 enlisted
men and non-coms through Astoria in the 12-month
period since July of 1943 — on this program alone. In
addition there are the fi xed personnel of the Naval Air
Station at the port docks. A third naval facility of con-
siderable size is the naval air station’s airport, where
squadrons of fi ghting planes have come and gone, car-
rying their crews with them, and leaving behind the
maintenance and operation complement of the facil-
ity, which is considerable.
Now, it should be recognized that with this num-
ber of men, drawn into service from all walks of life
and all points of the country, there may be expected a
percentage of tough guys, of social misfi ts, of embryo
rascals and more than a corporal’s guard of brainless
youngsters who simply don’t know up from down.
Mix this small minority up with one part emotion, one
part adolescence, one part away-from-home-for-fi rst-
time and two parts whiskey or fortifi ed wine — and
what have you? But it should be remembered, above
all, that it is still a minority and not a large one either.