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THE ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, MARCH 31, 2022
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IN ONE EAR • ELLEDA WILSON
LOVE TOKEN
‘S
ince my heart attack I haven’t been able to detect
like I use to,” metal detecting enthusiast Don
Kelly wrote on Facebook. “I’ve been out twice since,
and each time I last about 30 minutes before I’m wiped
out.
“I decided to try a trail at an old city park. In years
past, I’ve found several old coins and jewelry in this
old park. Back in the old days, they use to have large
gatherings at this park as they celebrated the 100th
year of Astoria being founded.
“After a couple of holes, I dug near a large tree on
the trail; I was expecting to ﬁ nd an aluminum can, as
I’ve found a lot of trash in this area in the past. As I
dug down about 8 inches, I saw something shiny in
the hole.
“As I pulled it out, I knew right away it was a love
token because I’ve found another one years ago. These
love tokens were popular from 1850s to the 1890s.
This seated quarter dollar is unique, and was made into
a brooch, but the pin was broken oﬀ .
“As I ﬂ ipped it over, I was surprised to see
the year 1857 (two years before Oregon became a
state). This coin was in pretty good shape when it was
altered.”
“I wasn’t out there for (long),” he added, “and my
body told me to head for home. The detector gods
must have missed me, and welcomed me back on this
day! Happy trails!”
‘A WEALTH OF DATA’
A
t 5:36 p.m., on Good Friday, March 27, 1964, a 9.2
subduction zone earthquake struck south-central
Alaska. It was the largest earthquake in U.S. history, and
involved the undersea Paciﬁ c Plate being overridden by
the North American Plate.
The quake made Seattle’s Space Needle sway, and
caused the earth to “ring like a bell” the U.S. Geolog-
ical Survey says, and was followed by thousands of
aftershocks.
The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Admin-
istration reports that the ensuing tidal wave caused over
$2 billion in damage along the length of the Paciﬁ c Coast.
Wave heights peaked at 220 feet in Alaska; and in Ore-
gon, 12 feet, NOAA deduced, yet locals in Cannon Beach
actually described a “30-foot wall of water.”
But the U.S. Geological Survey noted that the catastro-
phe also provided “a wealth of data” about subduction
zone earthquakes, their hazards, and their connection to
tsunamis. “The leap in scientiﬁ c understanding that fol-
lowed the 1964 earthquake has led to major breakthroughs
in earth science research worldwide over the past half
century.” (Photo of Seward Highway: U.S. Army)
WE WERE SAILING ALONG …
A
n incident in Michigan made it to the DailyMail.
co.uk when three ice ﬁ shermen decided to go camp-
ing overnight on Saginaw Bay in a homemade ﬁ shing
shack, even though they knew a big storm was coming.
The next morning, someone onshore spotted one of
the men struggling with the shanty as it was skidding
across the ice in 50 mph winds and called dispatchers.
Deputies, who arrived with an air boat, found the shanty
about 1.5 miles oﬀ shore. Happily, the three men sitting
inside were no worse for the wear, despite the fact that
the bay ice was no longer considered safe.
“These guys had no business being out there today,”
one local said. There was no comment from the uniden-
tiﬁ ed, and probably very red-faced, trio. (Photo: Huron
County Sheriﬀ ’s Oﬃ ce)
ALONG THE WATERFRONT
A
description of an hour’s stroll along Astoria’s
waterfront in The Daily Morning Astorian,
March 31, 1887:
… Sail and steam craft of every tonnage, whether
at rest or in motion, were everywhere visible. Begin-
ning at the extreme upper end of the O. R. & N. dock
was to be found the stanch old side-wheeler Ancon …
Out in the stream, lay the British ship Pomona,
loaded to the Plimsoll mark with wheat to feed the
London folks breakfast. Farther … two other vessels,
waiting to load grain and lumber, the Sir Henry Law-
rence and the Swansea Castle, and coming into port
with a low moan, is the steamship Oregon with freight
and passengers from Portland …
Just below her lies the Columbia, a sister steam-
ship just in from San Francisco. Out from her black
iron side opens red painted gates and a score of men
roll out … freight of all kinds, goods and material …
and at the other end, the mate of the outgoing vessel
starts his men to putting aboard salmon and oysters …
Soon the one swings on her way up stream, and the
other goes out over the bar to San Francisco.
Far down toward the bar is a coil of smoke and the
outline of hull gliding toward the cape; it is the Olym-
pian going to San Francisco …
Gliding up in tow of the Ocklahama comes an
unusual but ever welcome sight, an American ship …
the Wm. H. Starbuck going to dock and discharge her
New York cargo. Out beyond her lies the Lady Isa-
bella … and the Cockermouth with 7,000 boxes of
English tin aboard …
Presently a river steamer glides alongside, the
anchor comes up, and the bark moves slowly past the
other vessels on her way to Portland …
Alongside Main Street wharf lies another English
bark, the Scottish Knight, with 1,150 tons of coal
from Australia … And farther toward the west lies the
Gen. Miles, one of the vessels that makes Astoria the
distributing point of a wide area … Farther along lies
the brig Courtney Ford, bound to Alaska, the real
and only “far W est” that now remains in the Ameri-
can frontier.
Brigs and barks and ships and steamers lie close
together in port, and diverging at the mouth of the
river, ﬂ y to the ends of the E arth. (Full story at https://
bit.ly/AstoriaDocks)
KIRKWOOD DOWN
T
he Daily Morning Astorian, on March
31, 1885, mentions that the previ-
ous Saturday, Capt. Amlot brought the
steamer Barrowmore in with an 16 extra
souls aboard. They were the captain and
crew of the Kirkwood, who had narrowly
escaped death.
Several days before being rescued,
another steamer had come across the Kirk-
wood, which was dismasted. Her captain
inexplicably refused help, despite the fact
that the crew was continuously, and franti-
cally, pumping out water.
When the Barrowmore found the Kirk-
wood, even the lifeboats had been swept
oﬀ the decks, a horriﬁ c gale was blowing,
and the by-then desperate crew signaled
Capt. Amlot for help.
Despite the wind and raging seas, Capt.
Amlot sent several men after them in the
steamer’s lifeboat, but they could not get
close enough for a rescue, as “the sea was
breaking over the Kirkwood, and tossing
her about like a straw.”
The seas were so rough that those left
aboard the Barrowmore kept losing sight
of their comrades in the lifeboat in the deep
troughs of the waves.
The solution? Large amounts of oil
were poured onto the sea’s surface, which
calmed the waves enough for the lifeboat
to make a closer approach. Then the life-
boat crew were able — using a line and a
lifebuoy — to rescue the desperate men,
one by one.
Capt. Amlot already had several awards
for saving lives at sea, and undoubtedly
received another for saving the captain and
crew of the Kirkwood.
LIGHTING THE WAY
I
kujihana Lighthouse, in Toyama Prefecture, Japan,
has a new role: It’s a “fully functional” tsunami evac-
uation shelter on the Sea of Japan coast, Mainichi.jp
reports. The lighthouse is almost 90 feet tall; its founda-
tion is 13 feet above sea level.
In addition, the 9th Regional Coast Guard installed
the ﬁ rst device of its kind, which makes the exterior
lighthouse lock box (where the door key is kept), open
automatically once it receives a signal from the emer-
gency warning broadcast system.
It’s a tough escape route, since there are 123 steps
inside, and no emergency supplies in the building. Even
so, the lighthouse could temporarily shelter 80 to 90
people. But can a reinforced concrete lighthouse with-
stand a tsunami? Time will tell.
On the bright side, the last tsunami fatalities (there
were four) on the Sea of Japan coast were in 1858.
(Lighthouse photo: 9th Regional Coast Guard)
WHERE IS VESPER?
T
he Daily Morning Astorian, March 31, 1886,
mentions that 18 citizens were not able to vote
because of a glitch, and one of the precincts mentioned
in passing was Vesper.
Vesper? The Nehalem River passes through this
unincorporated area in Clatsop County, which is near
Birkenfeld and the Columbia County line.
The town was named and settled by an Irish-
man named William Johnston who, with his fam-
ily, settled there in 1876 and built the town’s ﬁ rst
church using local lumber. In the winter of 1879, he
opened the town’s ﬁ rst post oﬃ ce, and was the ﬁ rst
postmaster.
Vesper was initially cut oﬀ from the rest of the
county to the west by land, and was only accessible by
ferry on the Nehalem River. In 1901, a 42-mile county
wagon road was built to Vesper, and in 1908, the road
was restored to make it suitable for automobiles. Now
the road through Vesper is state Highway 202. The ﬁ rst
bridge in Vesper across the Nehalem River was built
in 1915.
If you look at a Google satellite map, there doesn’t
seem to be much left of the original Vesper, which is in
the Clatsop State Forest. However, there is the wind-
ing Old 77 Vesper Lane, if you dare, and still standing
is a small, wooden, often-photographed 1915 church.
(Photo: Flickr/ Tony Webster)
NO, THANKS
F
ool-ish rerun: Micha Cameron-Lattek, one of the
owners of Street 14 Cafe , sent out a bulletin pro-
claiming that a “very limited edition” of local sea lion
coﬀ ee would be available, starting April 1.
The idea is inspired by Kopi Luwak, i.e. civet coﬀ ee
($100 to $500 a pound), which is processed from coﬀ ee
beans which have been digested by, and pooped out by,
the weasel-ish looking Asian/African mammals.
The Astoria coﬀ ee shop has supposedly created a
brew with “a local North Coast twist on this delicacy”
by adding “some of the ﬁ nest coﬀ ee cherries to (the
sea lions’) ﬁ shy diet,” and then collecting the pinni-
ped-pooped beans for processing.
Micha’s advice: “We invite you to try this deli-
cacy black, with no sugar or milk added.” (In One Ear,
4/11/14)