News
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, November 30, 2016
A3
DeWitt Museum added to endangered list
Restore Oregon
provides grant to form
preservation plan
By Rylan Boggs
Blue Mountain Eagle
The Eagle/Rylan Boggs
Kim McDonald, left, and Cory Jewell Jensen
stand outside the Grant County Regional Airport
on Tuesday, Nov. 15.
The science of
sex offenders
Presentation
provides tools
to prevent child
predators
Facts
about sex
offenders
By Rylan Boggs
Blue Mountain Eagle
Child sex abuse is often
difficult to talk about, but
Cory Jewel Jensen has cen-
tered her career around just
that.
Jensen, the co-director
at CBI Consulting, drew a
crowd of roughly 80 people
to the Grant County Region-
al Airport for a presentation
about sexual predators on
Tuesday, Nov. 15.
Judges, lawyers, police
officers and others learned
how sex offenders think and
operate. The presentation
showed the selection, en-
gagement and seduction of
children and adults by sex
offenders.
Jensen explained scien-
tifically why sex offenders
become offenders, how they
groom victims and how to
identify them.
Andrea Officer, victim as-
sistance director at the Grant
County District Attorney’s
Office, attended the presen-
tation and said Jensen had
“an amazing wealth of in-
formation.” Officer said the
presentation would help her
perform her job by giving
her additional tools, informa-
tion and contacts. She said
she was impressed with the
range of people at the pre-
sentation.
Officer said she learned
during the presentation of-
fenders often molest many
children before being caught.
Jensen identified exposure to
pornography at a young age
as a common thread for of-
fenders.
They reviewed research
on what kind of interview
techniques work with offend-
ers, learned about factors that
contributed to confessions
• 35 to 40 percent of sex-
ual crimes against children
are committed by juve-
niles.
• 52 percent of adult sex
offenders say people knew
they were offending and
failed to report them.
• One in five women
and one in 71 men will be
raped during their lifetime.
• Children who have
been molested are more
likely to be re-abused by a
new offender.
• 4 to 7 percent of the
population are child sex
offenders.
The DeWitt Museum has been named
one of Oregon’s most endangered places
by Restore Oregon, a nonprofit committed
to preserve historical sites.
The museum, once the old Sumpter
Valley Railway Depot, has been preserved
as a railroad museum and RV park. It
houses a collection of items left from the
railroad that once ran through the John
Day Valley, as well as other artifacts from
the past.
The railway depot is leftover from a
time when the railroad was the backbone
of the John Day Valley. The locomotive
was slowly pushed out by the automobile
as personal transportation became more
accessible to the average person and more
roads were built.
The Prairie City Depot was construct-
ed in 1910 and used to help transport sup-
plies and personnel for logging, mining
and ranching activities from Baker Coun-
ty to Prairie City.
Later in its life, the depot was used
for passenger service to Prairie City but
was abandoned in 1933. The Olp family
moved into the depot in the early 1940s,
The Eagle/Rylan Boggs
The DeWitt Museum in Prairie
City has been named one of
Oregon’s most endangered
places by Restore Oregon, a
non-profit committed to restoring
and preserving historic places.
and in 1947, the tracks were pulled up,
according to Museum Curator Bob Shive.
The Olp family lived there until 1973.
Following their departure, the depot
fell into disrepair and was almost torn
down. However, a local group gathered
donations and awareness by hiking the old
rail line to preserve the building, accord-
ing to Shive.
The building was added to the Nation-
al Register of Historic Places in 1976, and
the museum moved into the building in
1983. In 1984, Prairie City assumed con-
trol of the museum from Grant County.
Though the museum is in need of a
number of repairs, the situation could
be worse, Shive said. The museum has
tremendous support from the commu-
nity, and he isn’t worried about the
building being torn down anytime soon.
“We certainly haven’t given up be-
cause back in the ’70s it was in really bad
shape,” Shive said.
As well as railroad memorabilia, the
museum is also home to the remainder of
the DeWitt family collection, consisting
of everything from horse tack to medical
instruments and medicine from past eras.
Restore Oregon compiles a yearly list
of endangered places selected from nomi-
nations sent in from across the state. Each
location is historically significant and in
danger of being lost through development,
demolition or neglect. Each endangered
place receives assistance from Restore
Oregon and a seed grant for preservation.
The DeWitt museum will receive a
$2,500 seed grant from Restore Oregon
to form a preservation plan and budget for
repairs. Shive said the building is structur-
ally sound but needs a new coat of paint,
repairs to the siding on the building and,
most of all, volunteers. Volunteering at the
museum is ”a great way to study the area,
history and learn more about it,” Shive
said.
One such volunteer is newly elected
Prairie City City Council member Frank
Primozic, who has been volunteering at
the museum since 2005.
Primozic said he started volunteering
because he enjoys history and the museum
helped him appreciate it.
“The railroad opened up the John Day
Valley to the 20th century,” he said.
Helen Bogart awarded for senior center service
Seniors applaud
Bogart’s
contributions
By Angel Carpenter
Information from Cory
Jewel Jensen’s Nov. 15 pre-
sentation in Grant County.
Blue Mountain Eagle
and heard testimony from
those who confessed.
Jensen said very few sex
offenders are treatable, but
support systems can be built
around them. She said it re-
quires a lot of treatment for
them to not be a danger to
society.
Jensen previously served
as the executive director at
the Association for the Treat-
ment of Sexual Abusers. She
was the recipient of Oregon’s
Commercial Crime Preven-
tion Award and has been a
featured guest on the Oprah
Winfrey Show.
Jensen donated her time,
and the presentation was
free for those who attended.
She said she enjoys work-
ing in her field, but there is a
high demand for more peo-
ple due to a high burnout
rate among workers.
A full house of diners at the
John Day Senior Center’s Nov.
17 Thanksgiving meal applaud-
ed Helen Bogart for her years
of service at the facility.
Chris Labhart presented a
plaque to Bogart, on behalf
of the seniors and people of
Grant County.
“This is for her outstanding
and dedicated service to the
John Day Senior Center,” he
said. “She and Ken had a vision
of what could be to make it the
wonderful facility we have to-
day.”
The plaque hangs in a place
of honor at the center, alongside
her late husband Ken’s plaque,
next to the American flag.
The Eagle/Angel Carpenter
Helen Bogart receives applause and a plaque,
presented by Chris Labhart, for her dedication and
outstanding service to the John Day Senior Center
at the Nov. 17 Thanksgiving luncheon at the facility.
Helen, 93, said she was tak-
en by surprise when presented
the award.
“It kind of threw me,” she
said.
Helen said she’s loved “be-
ing with the group and helping
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out and helping decorate.”
But she’s done much more
than decorating the tables for
all the holidays and seasons and
calling for sponsors to provide
meals.
Helen and Ken opened a
trust fund for the center’s build-
ing construction and operating
costs before it was built 39
years ago.
Several founders and con-
tributors to the trust fund helped
make the senior center a reali-
ty, donating $100 to $1,000 to
get the building project off the
ground. Volunteers also helped
with many fundraising events.
Grant County senior pro-
grams manager Veanne Weddle
said Helen has been an example
to her over the years.
“I hope that I will be at
least half as active at her age,”
Weddle said. “She’s one of the
most selfless people I’ve ever
worked with. It has never been
about Helen, but about the se-
nior center and the people who
go there.”
This is a “thank you” to ODFW’s J.R. Goin, Pam Alley
and Russ Powell, for their willingness to complete a
spring development that Charlie and Pam Ubler
started in 2005. The spring (on FS land) had to be dug
up and piped to our property, and two troughs put in,
one on FS land and one in our pasture. Unfortunately,
there wasn’t enough water for two troughs so only one
was put in, on our property. We were wanting two - for
wildlife and permitted cattle. J.R. Goin found out about
this in early 2014 and started the ball rolling. He
handled all negotiations. We didn’t foresee any
problem but unfortunately, there were. In 2015 we were
ready to give up. That’s when Steven Beverlin stepped
in and streamlined the project. Thank you, Steven
Beverlin, for your help. The spring has drawn cattle up
on that hill and improved the grazing 75%. The spring
was completed in June 2016. I am sure Charlie and
Pam Ubler are smiling about this. Thank you also to
Stacia Kimball for all your help, kindness when I was
so frustrated, and your patience. ODFW has treated
Charlie and I very well over the last 20 years. When
Charlie first started chemo, we never would have been
able to run cows without that fence. ODFW kept it in
good shape and was always willing to come and fix
problems. Thank you also to the crew from the FS who
helped with the actual digging and laying pipe. I don’t
know everyone’s names, but “thank you” all.
Sincerely,
Jan & Jake O’Rorke
O’Rorke Ranch
04870
Ny
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