Image provided by: Morrow County Museum; Heppner, OR
About Heppner gazette-times. (Heppner, Or.) 1925-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 14, 2012)
2013 fair and rodeo queen named M iiiil.iil(|ii|j|lllll||l|iii|j Eugene, OR 97403 VOL. 131 N 0.46 8 Pages Wednesday, November 14, 2012 Krysten Powell, 19, of Pendleton, has been named the 2013 Morrow County Fair and Oregon Trail Pro Rodeo Queen. Queen try outs were held Nov. 4, with three young ladies vying for Morrow County, Heppner, Oregon the coveted title. Though from Pend leton, the 2013 queen has family and history here in Morrow County, trac ing back to the fair and rodeo court. Powell is the daughter of Mike Powell o f Pendleton and Annette Wilgers Powell, 1982 Mor row County princess. She is the granddaughter o f Vi Wilgers and John Wilgers, long-time Morrow County residents. She served on the last mounted Umatilla County Fair Court in 2010 as a princess and has shown her paint horses for many years with her mother. When asked why she wanted to become Morrow County Fair and OTPR Q ueen, she responded, “While growing up, my fa vorite stories were those my mom told me from when she served as a princess. I begged her to tell them over and over. It sounded like so much fun! Not only did it 2012 Morrow County and OTPR Queen Maggie Collins (L) with newly-chosen 2013 queen Krysten Powell. -Contributed photo involve my favorite thing in the world—horses— but also my favorite place.” 2013 is going to be a landmark year for Morrow County, being the 100lh year for the fair and the 91 ” year for the rodeo and the royalty. The first court was crowned in 1922 with Mar jorie Clark riding as queen with princesses Bea Gentry and Jane Allstott. For three years during World War II, and from 2009 through 2011, the fair and rodeo royalty was absent. In 2011 and 2012, the fair ambassa dors were created to help fill the need for public relations for the fair and rodeo with out having to ride horses. -See 2013 RODEO QUEEN/ PAGE EIGHT New kiosk planned for cemetery Fire department ‘smokes’ Cemetery improvement will help visitors find gravesites more easily old apartments By Andrea Di Salvo Visitors to Heppner’s M asonic Cem etery will soon see a new fixture de signed to make life easier for visitors. A kiosk designed to help fam ily m em bers, friends and genealogy buffs visit and research gravesites within the historic cemetery has been constructed at the edge of the cemetery’s small parking lot, near the workshop. H ep p n er C em etery Maintenance District Direc tor Tom Wolff says he and fellow directors Kit George and A1 Riney started work on the kiosk because they saw a need. “Every year, especially The Heppner Fire Department put the torch to the old, dilapidated apartments on Chase Street around Memorial Day, there Sunday. Fire Chief Rusty Estes said the burn went “real well.” -Photo by David Sykes are phone calls and ques tions about grave locations, and this is going to aid in a lot of ways,” says Wolff. Riney, whom W olff Local firefighters end record season Wildlandfirefighters log 275 days fighting fires throughout the West By Andrea Di Salvo Most people who hear the name of Bruce Young Logging think of, well, logging. For this company, though, the call of duty in the forest can involve some real firefighting. Yes, em p lo y ees o f Bruce Young Logging ap ply their skills to wildland firefighting in logging’s off season. The company, owned by local man Bruce Young, is headquartered on land Young inherited from his parents in the Blakes Ranch area near Heppner. Young, 53, says his crew recently finished one o f the most severe fire seasons they have seen in several years. The season started earlier than normal, with the team heading out to a fire in Utah on July 2. The last man to return home from a fire was Young him self, on Oct. 2. That’s three months of fires, far more than the “typical” fire sea son of 30-60 days. Young says local fire season often begins in late July and goes into September, a length of four to six weeks. “(This was) our best year ever in terms of most days out,” he says. Bruce Young Logging’s fire crew had its two engines out 105 days total, with a whopping 275 days out for Plans discussed to deal with influx o f wind farm workers By David Sykes If construction on the number of proposed wind farms and transm ission projects planned for Mor row County actually moves forw ard, residents here could expect an influx of tem porary construction workers, and then perma nent workers looking for housing, a forum sponsored by the Willow Creek Valley Economic Development Group (WCVEDG) d is cussed last week. A large group of com munity leaders including mayors, city managers and elected county officials, along with a number o f state officials, discussed how the county could han dle the influx o f people and do it to our economic benefit. Planning Director Carla McLane, along with WCVEDG director Sher- yll Bates, put together the conference, with President Michael Blauer giving the introduction and closing remarks. Held at the Port of Mor row, the morning session was attended by about 30 calls the “driving force” behind the project, says the kiosk was a long time coming. “ This is som ething we’ve been thinking about for a number of years, and w e’re finally getting it to completion,” he says. “ We’re trying to update our cemetery so it’s more acceptable to the public and they can locate friends and relatives without having to call us.” He added that the book -See CEMETERY KIOSK/ PAGE TWO Morrow County follows rest of Eastern Oregon voting Romney By David Sykes In last week’s general election, Morrow County voted much like the rest of Eastern Oregon, 65 percent Romney and 30 percent Obama. However, 10 large ly-populated counties out -See WILDLAND FIRE- o f the 36 Oregon counties FIGHTERS/PAGE EIGHT ultimately gave the state to Obama. Romney likewise did not lose any of the five pre cincts in the county, with lone giving him the highest percentage, 78 percent to Obama’s 21 percent. Hep pner came in at 68 percent for Romney and 28 percent WCVEDG holds county housing forum Heppner Cemetery Maintenance District Director A1 Riney shows where the new cemetery kiosk will hold a map of the cemetery, placed under glass, so visitors can easily find graves ites. -Photo by Andrea Di Salvo for Obama. Boardman had Obama’s highest percent age of votes at 38 percent. On the local level, every precinct supported incumbent county com missioner Leann Rea, who won county-wide with 57 percent to challenger Cody High’s 42 percent o f the vote. Irrigon gave High his biggest percentage of votes at 47 percent. lone racked up the highest percentage for Rea at 70 percent. On the state-wide is sues, every precinct in the county voted down the marijuana legalization law with a total of 68 percent no to 32 percent yes. Irrigon turned in the highest yes vote at 38 percent yes to 62 no. Lexington had the high est no vote to legalize at 77 percent. Heppner voted 68 percent no and 32 yes. The measure failed state-wide. One statew ide m ea sure where Morrow County voted against the rest of the state was on Measure 84, which would have phased out existing inheritance taxes on large estates and -See MORROW COUNTY VOTES ROMNEY/PAGE FIVE G-T closed for Thanksgiving people. It started with an outline from McLane of the various projects slated The Heppner Gazette-Times will be closed in observance of the Thanksgiving to come to Morrow County, Day holiday Thursday, Nov. 22, and Friday, Nov. 23. Normal business hours will resume including wind farms, gas- Monday, Nov. 26. We wish everyone a safe and happy Thanksgiving weekend. powered generating plants and transmission line facili ties. Although a total num ber of workers is not known at this time, McLane did lay out a timeline showing the biggest influx should hit in the second quarter o f 2014. Associate county plan ner Layne Wolfmueller gave itnre's Nuts emium Wild Bird Food lb bag $ 9 .9 9 -See HOUSING FORUM/ PAGE SIX t Grain Growers Green Feed A Seed tfcppmr • I7M422 • MM221 (MCOO min omet) t
