REGION
Tuesday, May 4, 2021
East Oregonian
A3
HERMISTON
Metalsmith hopes to carry on legacy
Bark Park holds
of Hard Rock Machine Works owner ‘grand unleashing’
By CHLOE LEVALLEY
Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
MILTON-FREEWATER
— Mike Pierce went into
former machine shop Hard
Rock Machine Works in
Walla Walla, Washington, to
get a lug nut removed from
his 1964 Baja Bug Volkswa-
gen just before closing time.
The shop owner, David
Young, told him not to
worry about the price, and
Pierce asked if he was hiring.
Though the answer was no,
Pierce persistently came into
the shop and even started
sweeping the fl oors for free.
After an employee didn’t
get some parts right, Pierce
made them the right way, and
he was hired.
This sparked a long-
time career in machin-
ing and welding and
opening his machine job
shop in Milton-Freewater,
Pierce Precision Machines,
LLC, which provides custom
machining, fabricating and
welding services.
The shop opened in
March and is located at 321
Peabody St.
He hopes the job shop will
carry on the legacy of his
friend, mentor and owner of
Hard Rock Machine Works,
David Young, who died
two years ago and the shop
closed, Pierce said.
“He taught me everything,
” Pierce said. “I had never
touched a welder before I
went into Hard Rock.”
Pierce worked at the shop
for about six years. Together
they invented some parts for
a wind turbine.
“Now there in use all over
the world, every single Vestas
wind turbine comes from the
factory with one of the little
jobs that we invented, which
was kind of cool,” he said.
Pierce said his stepdad
had done machining his
whole life and taught an
industrial manufacturing and
precision machining course
at Blue Mountain Commu-
nity College and had a shop
in his garage, so it runs in the
family.
Pierce was also a marine
engineer for the U.S.
Merchant Marines, and he
worked at various shops in
town until he decided to
strike out on his own. Now
they refer each other for work
depending on specialties.
His specialty is his knowl-
edge about metallurgy, the
By JADE MCDOWELL
East Oregonian
Greg Lehman/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Mike Pierce with some of his metal-working equipment at his Pierce Precision Machines shop
in Milton-Freewater on Friday, April 23, 2021.
Greg Lehman/Walla Walla Union-Bulletin
Mike Pierce welds on a recent project at his Pierce Precision
Machines shop in Milton-Freewater on Friday, April 23, 2021.
compositions of metal and
how they react to tempera-
ture changes.
“It helps play into this
kind of stuff a lot because
whenever you’re welding
and stuff, there’s a lot of
heat input, and so you’ve got
warpage, and then you’ve got
all sorts of diff erent alloys of
steel that you need to match
with the correct fi ller rod,”
he said.
“ T h e r e’s d i f f e r e n t
processes ... like we do a
lot of cast iron welding and
it takes a special nickel rod,
and then we’ve got to put it
down in ash and vermiculite
to let it cool down at like a
really stable rate.”
He lear ned how to
produce a lot of finely
finished work by working
as a bladesmith and even
landed a spot competing in
the History Channel series
“Forged in Fire.”
The job shop off ers knife
sharpening and assists area
restaurants like Public House
124.
The shop also sells steel
and can cut the customer any
amount needed.
“We’ll take in all the jobs
that nobody wants to do,” he
said.
Only they don’t do engine
machine work.
“We do fine precision
machining, all the way up to
greasy dirty (work),” Pierce
said.
One day he is working on
a walker or fi xing someone’s
metal art for their yard, and
then the next he’s working on
making parts for an airplane
engine valve system — no
project is too small.
Right now, he is building
a custom hay baler. Typi-
cally, companies make ones
that hold four or 10 bales, but
his customer’s tractor is too
small, and they still don’t
want to buck the bales by
hand, so he is custom-mak-
ing one to fi t the tractor that
will hold eight bales.
“We make things out of
metal,” he said. “We weld
all metals, steel, stainless,
aluminum, titanium, cast
iron, brass.”
Mainly, he aims to fi ll the
need that came when Hard
Rock Machine Works closed,
and there was a great need in
the valley for someone to do
machine work and a lot of
agricultural and construction
repair work.
“If you have an old plow
(that needs repair), the
company probably went
out of business like 60 to
80 years ago because your
grandpa probably bought
that plow,” Pierce said. “And
it’s a plow, so it’s not like you
need to get a new plow every
year.”
His shop will repair it.
“It’s really like a dying
breed of people. Everybody
in the U.S. kind of has like
throw-away mentality,” he
said. “That’s not feasible for
the majority of situations.
That’s where we come in.”
HERMISTON — June
Rosenberg has made a lot of
friends the past few weeks
at the Hermiston Bark Park.
Some of them have two
legs, but most of them have
four.
“Amanda and I have
been meeting all of these
dogs, and we know all
these dogs’ names but not
the names of the people,”
she said.
Amanda Woodlee is
one of the human friends
Rosenberg has made since
she began bringing Delilah
Rose, her white Labra-
doodle, to the new dog
park. While the park had
its “grand unleashing”
on Friday, April 30, some
members of the public
have been using it for a few
weeks already after the
fence went up.
Rosenberg said the
large, fenced area at Butte
Park, where dogs can run
off leash, is a great way to
socialize dogs and their
owners. She said Delilah
Rose loves it when other
dogs are available to run
around with.
“We come just about
every day,” she said. “It’s
so handy.”
Wo o d l e e b r o u g h t
Bowser, her family’s stocky
brown and white rescue
dog, to the grand opening,
and watched him play with
the other dogs as they frol-
icked through the grass,
running and rolling around
and sniffi ng each other.
“It gets the energy out,”
she said.
The Hermiston Bark
Park spans about 37,000
square feet at Butte Park,
next to the splash park area.
A large, fenced-off area is
designated for large dogs,
while a smaller area is for
small dogs.
Ben Lonergan/East Oregonian
Bowie explores the new
Hermiston
Bark
Park
during its “grand unleash-
ing” on Friday, April 30,
2021.
Hermiston Parks and
Recreation staff have made
some improvements to the
park other than the fence,
including a concrete entry
area and a stand that holds
clean-up bags for waste. But
Director Larry Fetter said
some improvements are still
on back order, including
additional signs, benches
and trash cans.
The department also
plans to add a kiosk by the
front gate, where people
will be able to hang lost dog
posters and other announce-
ments.
“It’s anything related —
dog training, dog sitting. I
don’t know if we have dog
walkers in town,” Fetter
said.
Shortly before the ribbon
was cut at the park, Fetter
said a dog park was some-
thing he had been hoping
to bring to Hermiston for
years.
“This project has been
in the works for about 10
years,” he said. “We looked
at a lot of locations and I
think we got a winner here.”
The event included a
demonstration by Paws Off
Obedience, which handles
the dog obedience train-
ings sponsored by the parks
department each year, and
bags of treats for dogs and
humans alike.
I Love My City
Car trouble? Lost your license?
Jade McDowell/East Oregonian
Volunteers with the I Love My City event help clear brush from a lot on Southwest Ninth
Street in Hermiston on Saturday, May 1, 2021. The event brought together hundreds
of volunteers from area churches, who pulled weeds, trimmed bushes, spread bark,
picked up trash, washed cars and provided other cleanup eff orts around the city.
LOCAL BRIEFING
Restaurant Revitalization
Fund taking applications
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The federal
Restaurant Revitalization Fund is now taking
applications.
The fund, established by the American
Rescue Plan stimulus package, provides
forgivable, interest-free loans to bars, restau-
rants and other eating and drinking estab-
lishments aff ected by COVID-19 shutdowns.
Businesses can apply for an amount equal
to their 2019 gross receipts minus their 2020
gross receipts, minus any Paycheck Protec-
tion Program funds already received. The
minimum amount is $1,000 per business, and
the maximum is $10 million. Eligible uses
for the money includes a variety of business
expenses, from payroll to rent, and recipients
are not required to pay back any of the money
as long as it is used for eligible expenses no
later than March 2023.
Applications opened at noon on Monday,
May 3. For more information, or to apply, visit
the Small Business Administration website at
sba.gov/funding-programs/loans/covid-19-
relief-options/restaurant-revitalization-fund.
— EO Media Group