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4A COTTAGE GROVE SENTINEL JUNE 28, 2017 O PINION Offbeat Oregon History: Cape Foulweather's building By Finn JD John For The Sentinel S ometime in the late 1860s, a sailing ship hove to just off the Or- egon coast, near the mouth of Yaquina Bay. This ship was full of build- ing materials. Its mission was to land those materials on Cape Foulweather — today known as Otter Crest — so that a new lighthouse could be built there. It would be quite a thing, this lighthouse. Plans called for it to be 93 feet tall (it’s still the tallest on the Oregon coast), equipped with a fi rst-order Fresnel lens, painstakingly packed in molas- ses and shipped halfway around the world from France. From high atop the bluff at Cape Foulweather, it would reach out some 18 miles with the light of its oil lamp, a model designed to burn ordinary lard. There was just one problem. No one had given any thought to how the supplies were to be unloaded at Foulweather. And now, staring at the hungry fangs of rocks with breakers crashing over them, the crew of the sail- ing ship were scratching their heads. But, the cargo had to be de- livered. And so it was: four miles farther south, on a friend- lier-looking headland. And that is how the Cape Foulweather Lighthouse ended up getting built on the wrong basaltic outcropping — at least, according to former lightkeeper John Zenor, who had the story from the son of one of the en- gineers assigned to the project. “The man said he kept this secret until his father’s death,” writes Jim Gibbs in Lighthouses of the Pacifi c. “It was a number of years before the government learned that Cape Foulweather Lighthouse was really on Yaqui- na Head. By then it was too late to rectify.” Now, keep in mind that this is a fourth-hand report — the en- gineer told his son, who told Ze- nor, who told Gibbs, who tells us. It’s also true that there was some confusion in the commu- nity about the names of Yaquina Head and Cape Foulweather, stemming from the fact that Cape Foulweather is arguably not a cape, and Heceta Head in- arguably is one. But whether by accident or by design, once the materials were landed at Heceta Head, the die was cast. On Heceta Head the light would go. The location was tough — not as tough as Cape Foulweath- er would have been, but bad enough. There was a little niche there at the root of the headland that, in balmy weather, was pro- tected from the surf — where the cobble beach is today. The crew carved a rude stairway into the side of the 80-foot bluff there — basically a stone ladder, and “worth a man’s life to use in a heavy wind,” as Gibbs puts it. And with that, and a derrick installed at the top of the cliff, they were able to get to work. The light went into service on Aug. 20, 1873, seven years af- ter President Andrew Johnson authorized its construction just after the Civil War. And for the fi rst few years of its existence, it was still being referred to in offi cial correspondence as the “Cape Foulweather Light.” As it turned out, the Yaquina Head location worked just fi ne for the lighthouse. As the 20th century dawned on the Oregon Coast, and the Roosevelt High- way (Highway 101) was platted and built, visitors from New- port and beyond started com- ing to see the lighthouse and to indulge in recreational activi- ties on the government-owned headland it was built on. Some of those visitors found it to be a fantastic source of dense ba- salt, and a few of them brought equipment in and quarried it for various local projects. So far, so good; federal land is generally available for Amer- ican citizens to use. But then, in the mid-1950s, a Newport grav- el company staked a mining claim on the place. The claim was staked under the Mining Law of 1872, and it gave the company exclusive rights to extract mineral depos- its from the head. In this case, of course, the mineral deposits were the head itself. Shortly thereafter, the federal government actually sold the head to the mining company at a price that, even then, was low enough that it probably would have sent somebody to prison if anyone had cared enough to press the case: $3 an acre. At that point, there would have been nothing to stop the mining company from platting homesites and developing the peninsula for luxury homes, which was what many people thought was the company’s game plan all along. But it wasn’t. With the added security of outright ownership, the company ramped up mining operations progressively over the following dozen years or so, until by the mid-1970s it boast- ed a staff of 25 people, busily hauling hundreds of tons off the head every workday. Then, in the mid-1970s, the situation came to the attention of the state of Oregon, probably through the agitation of one of the then-nascent environmental organizations concerned about the speed with which the head was being dismantled. The state government started looking for ways to stop that process. But it quickly found that not only could the state not stop the quarrying, it also could not stop buying gravel from Ya- quina Head for its area highway construction projects. The state was required by law to take the lowest bidder on such projects, and because of its location and its high yield, the Yaquina Head quarry was always the lowest bidder. Quarry owner Bob Wein- ert didn’t help his cause much when, in a 1982 newspaper in- terview, he shared his vision for the future of Yaquina Head: he intended for it to be quarried right into the sea, leaving noth- ing behind but a small island out on the end with the lighthouse perched on top. Quite what the federal gov- ernment’s response to this plan would have been was never made clear, or if it was I was unable to fi nd it. The fact is, though, Weinert’s plan would have cost the Coast Guard mil- lions of dollars and put its per- sonnel’s lives at risk, because suddenly instead of simply driving out onto the headland to maintain the light, a risky and complicated landing in surf would be necessary every time the place needed a fresh coat of paint. But Weinert may have intend- ed the comment as a joke, be- cause by the time he gave that interview, the die had been cast, and he knew very well that the quarry would soon be closed. In 1980, Sen. Mark O. Hatfi eld had pulled some strings in D.C. and got the head named an “Out- standing Natural Area.” Thus fortifi ed, the Bureau of Land Management then got busy trad- ing and buying with Weinert to acquire the head. Today, the gravel quarry is gone — but there is a huge div- ot in the side of the head where it used to be. Called Quarry Cove, it is now the scene of the nation’s only wheelchair-acces- sible tidepools — which haven’t been a total success, because the ocean keeps trying to fi ll them with beach sand. Choosing between green juice and green smoothies: A how to guide Joel Fuhrman MD For The Sentinel Vegetable juices and green smoothies (also called blended salads) both have a place in the Nutritarian diet. Both are great ways to get more raw leafy greens LETTER TO THE EDITOR Relay for Life kudos If you didn’t attend the Cottage Grove Relay for Life, you missed out on a great evening. A big thank you to everyone who worked so hard putting it on, to the businesses who sponsored it, the bands who entertained and most of all the survivors who were able to attend. It was a beautiful night to stroll around the park in honor of those who have died from the terrible dis- eas, cancer. Come on out next year and enjoy the night. Pat Couturier Cottage Grove into your diet, in addition to your usual salads. A green smoothie – a blended mix of leafy greens, fruits and nuts and/or seeds – is an excellent, portable morning meal. It contains all the fi ber from the greens and fruit, plus fat from the nuts or seeds to keep you full. A vegetable juice with a small amount of fruit, depending on size, may be as calorie-dense as the smoothie but will not be a satisfying meal on its own. For this reason, if you have a substantial amount of weight to lose, I wouldn’t recommend juicing often because it will likely add too many extra calories (without the feeling of satiety) and compromise your weight loss efforts. Also for those with diabetes, I do not recommend juicing, since the sugar in the juice enters the bloodstream rapidly without fi ber from the original vegetables and fruits to slow the process. Blending and juicing both disrupt the mechanical structure of plant cells, which increases the accessibility of many micronutri- ents. Many benefi cial micronutrients – carotenoids, polyphenols and folate, for example – are often bound to structural compo- nents or large molecules within the plant cell like fi ber, proteins and starches. Processing, heating and chewing break down these cellular structures to increase the availability of the bound micro- nutrients; however, many may not be accessible for our absorption by chewing alone. Blending increases our likelihood of absorbing these nutrients. Importantly, the micronutrients that are bound to fi ber within the plant cell may be removed with the fi ber by juicing and therefore be more available via blending than juicing. With smoothies, you are often adding nuts or seeds as a healthful fat source. Although blending alone increases the accessibility of carotenoids, since the presence of fats is known to increase carot- enoid absorption from leafy greens, it is possible that nuts and seeds in a smoothie could increase absorption further. For those who have nutrient absorption problems, gastrointesti- nal conditions, or other medical conditions, vegetable juices (espe- cially cruciferous vegetables) are often useful as a supplement to a healthful diet, providing additional benefi cial nutrients to promote healing. Guidelines for juicing and blending: By blending, you get everything that you would get in juice, so juicing is not a necessary component of a healthful diet. Whereas a green smoothie can be a meal, think of a vegetable juice as a supplement to add extra veggie-derived nutrients to a healthful diet. If you do juice regularly, make sure that you are not replacing your leafy green salads and whole raw vegetables with juices. Whether you are juicing or making smoothies, be sure to put a greater focus on vegetables than fruit; use only a small amount of fruit to add fl avor, so that you maximize nutritional value and limit glycemic effects. C ottage G rove S entinel (541) 942-3325 Administration James Rand, Regional Publisher Gary Manly, General Manager ................................................. Ext. 207 gmanly@cgsentinel.com Aaron Ames, Marketing Specialist ........................................... Ext. 216 aames@cgsentinel.com Tammy Sayre, Marketing Specialist ......................................... Ext. 213 tsayre@cgsentinel.com Editorial Caitlyn May, Editor. ................................................................. Ext. 212 cmay@cgsentinel.com Zach Silva Sports Editor ........................................................... Ext. 204 zsilva@cgsentinel.com Customer Service Carla Williams, Offi ce Manager .............................................. 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