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THE ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, JULY 6, 2021
THE ASTORIAN
•
TUESDAY, JULY 6, 2021
•
B1
WATER UNDER
THE BRIDGE
COMPILED BY BOB DUKE
From the pages of Astoria’s daily newspapers
The beach at Fort Stevens State Park was crowded with people in 2011 near the Peter Iredale.
10 years ago
this week — 2011
S
EASIDE — Miss Oregon’s crown has passed to
20-year-old Caroline McGowan of Corvallis.
“I’m elated. I’m shocked. I’m overwhelmed. I
can’t wait to talk to my family,” she said immediately
after her win. “It’s like I’m in a dream.”
McGowan, aka Miss Linn-Benton, prevailed among
22 young women in the Miss Oregon Scholarship Pro-
gram at the Seaside Civic and Convention Center on
Saturday. She will go on to compete in the Miss Amer-
ica competition in Las Vegas.
When the Fourth of July dawned in Sea-
side, long before the fi rst fl oat or marching
band made an appearance, volunteers from
the Seaside Museum & Historical Society were
already giving downtown a festival-friendly
atmosphere.
One of these volunteers was Bob Cook, 78,
of Seaside.
A fi ve-year museum volunteer, Cook showed
up at 5:30 a.m. to hang signs and banners, set
up booths and erect tents for the museum’s
afternoon event, the old-fashioned social.
“The community gave to me, and I fi nd it’s
nice to give back to them,” said Cook, a for-
mer military offi cer and retired U.S. P ostal
Service employee.
By the time the Fourth of July parade
began an hour-and-a-half later, the crowds
were awash in red, white and blue as patri-
otic paraphernalia traced the parade route
from Holladay Drive, to Broadway, to Colum-
bia Street.
You turn 200 only once. That’s why this year’s
Astoria Regatta fl oat is making the rounds on the
Northwest parade circuit as a birthday celebration on
wheels, spreading the word of the city’s b icentennial
and R egatta festival.
So far, the Regatta fl oat has hit 12 of a 20-parade
tour spanning April through October. T he fl oat crew
has won 12 awards.
“We’ve brought home a lot of trophies,” said Eric
Paulson, this year’s Regatta president and CEO of
Lektro.
The Astoria Regatta Association had known for
fi ve years that its mobile ambassador badly needed an
upgrade. It decided to retire the worn-out gas-powered
chassis, which had been in the association’s possession
for 16 years, and commissioned an all-electric version
to be built from scratch.
The task fell to Chuck Godwin, a member of the
fl oat crew since 1992.
50 years ago — 1971
They came by the thousands. Visitors and residents
alike were in evidence throughout the Sunset Empire
this holiday weekend attending special Fourth of July
events and enjoying the sporadic sunshine.
Campgrounds throughout the area were either full
or nearly full, according to reports. Fort Stevens State
Park had to turn some would-be campers away.
Fireworks displays were held in several places:
Cannon Beach, Rockaway Beach, Garibaldi and oth-
ers. Hotels and motels were fi lled to capacity and vaca-
tion homes overfl owed with weekend visitors in Sea-
side, Gearhart and Cannon Beach. Area merchants
reported active business over the weekend.
Four people escaped serious injury on Sat-
urday when their light airplane crashed after
take-off at the Seaside Airport.
One passenger, Joanne Louis Blessing, 35,
of Kalama, Washington, was treated at the
Seaside h ospital and transferred to a Portland
hospital. H er husband and pilot, Richard,
their daughter, Dianne, and nephew, Steven
Blessing, were treated as outpatients.
Oregon State Police said the airplane had
taken off toward the north and was about 100
feet high and 100 yards from the end of the
runway when the motor died. The craft veered
back toward the fi eld, to the west, swept past
some trees and power poles, and crashed into
brush. The wings were sheered off the airplane
and the gas tank ruptured.
Picketing resumed today as longshoremen put aside
memories of “Bloody Thursday” 37 years ago to con-
centrate on their strike against 24 West Coast ports.
International Longshore and Warehouse Union
Miss Seaside Kelly Hertig and Miss
Clatsop County Teresa Hunt in 1971.
Fireworks cast red refl ections on the
Pacifi c Ocean and beach viewed from
the Cove in Seaside in 2011.
Caroline McGowan is crowned the
new Miss Oregon by Stephenie Steers,
Miss Oregon 2010, at the Seaside
Civic and Convention Center in 2011.
bia River Salmon Co., Union Fishermen’s Coopera-
tive Co. and Paragon Fish Co. Since this study into
the proper methods for canning rockfi sh began, at
least two of these companies have canned rockfi sh on
a commercial scale.
The entire packing industry is interested in pros-
pects for the new phase of the bottom fi shery.
Miss Oregon contestants at a rehearsal in 1971.
members entered the sixth day of their strike against
ports from Canada to Mexico, the union’s fi rst coast-
wide strike in 23 years.
Military truck convoys carrying nearly 800
Oregon Army National Guard members will
arrive at Camp Rilea Saturday for two weeks
of annual training.
Units scheduled to train at Camp Rilea
will be from Portland, Lake Oswego, Salem,
Albany, Dallas, Newport and Coos Bay. The
units will conclude training, then convoys will
again be on the highways returning to home
stations.
Thanks to a late-starting summer, the tourist indus-
try in the lower Clatsop County area appears to be
down somewhat from economic levels of last year at
this time, though businesses catering to the more affl u-
ent are reporting noted business gains. Thus, while
most service stations and smaller restaurants contacted
reported business levels to be the same or slightly
lower, larger, more expensive restaurants and clothing
stores reported increased business this year.
“Business is down a little from last year and I would
say down a lot from fi ve years ago,” said Ralph Wad-
dell of Phillips 66 at the Gearhart junction.
C alling the decrease a trend, Waddell suggested
lack of money on the part of the people who would
travel as a reason for the decline but added “It must be
more than just a coastal problem because there aren’t
as many out-of-staters.”
Seaside Aquarium owner Jack O’ Brien agreed that
lessened traffi c to the coastal area has resulted in a fall-
ing off of business.
75 years ago — 1946
Methods for canning rockfi sh were fi rst developed
at the Astoria Seafoods Laboratory on the request of
the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Admin-
istration for an inexpensive pack, according to a prog-
ress report on canning of rockfi sh. The report was
issued by Dr. E.W. Harvey, director of the laboratory,
and Virginia Kempato, Harvey’s assistant.
As a result of this research, the laboratory was
able to provide packers with rockfi sh cooking meth-
ods when a commercial market recently opened up for
the fi sh. In the report, the laboratory announced that
it was assisted in the rockfi sh research by the Colum-
An independent fi sh buyer is unable to fi nd
a location for his business or obtain necessary
ice in the lower Columbia, said S. Einstoss,
one of the leading freelance buyers on the
Pacifi c coast and a representative of Atlantic
& Pacifi c Packing Co.
Einstoss attempted to interest Astoria in
the construction of cold storage on the water-
front, which would be available for lease to
fi sh buyers.
He said the establishment of cold stor-
age would prevent the occurrence of wide
price disparities in fi sh, such as those that
exist between the Columbia River, Puget
Sound and Grays Harbor, and between gill-
net-caught salmon and troll-caught salmon.
Despite regrettable heavy fi shing for blueback
salmon in the Columbia River this season, the fi sh,
which suff ered a drastic progressive decline in num-
bers since 1940, has made a remarkable comeback.
In 1945, only 110 cases of blueback were canned in
Columbia River canneries. E scapement at Bonneville
fell to 9,501 fi sh. Annual escapement totals of blue
back and Bonneville tell the story of the dwindling
stock of this species. In 1940, the total was 148,805;
1941, 65,745; 1942, 55,475; 1943, 39,845; and 1944,
15,071. B y last year, the size of the run had declined
below the commercial quantity.
Already, the 1946 blueback count at Bonneville is
51,451 and promises to perhaps exceed 60,000 fi sh.
With the completion of remodeling work,
in progress for several months at the Mod-
ern Cash Grocery, Astoria now has one of the
most modern, streamlined food stores in the
state.
Under the direction of Richard “Dick” Aho,
owner and operator of the downtown estab-
lishment since 1934, the entire interior of the
grocery has been remodeled in recent months.
Remodeling included the installation of island
merchandise counters, wall fi xtures extending
the full 100-foot length of the store room and
refrigeration cases and counters that are the
last word in food store fi xtures.
The temperature reached 86 degrees Fahrenheit
and was still climbing, the offi cial weather observer
reported.
The noon reading today equaled that of a recent
day, when a 91 degree maximum was reached later in
the afternoon.
Record crowds enjoying the facilities of
Tapiola Park swimming pool these days will
have to get along without a diving board until
the city is able to replace the board that broke.
Crowds at the park this year are the larg-
est in the history of the swimming pool there,
city offi cials said.