Image provided by: North Santiam Historic Society; Gates, OR
About The Mill City enterprise. (Mill City, Or.) 1949-1998 | View Entire Issue (April 23, 1959)
Park Use Heavy Recreational Spots in Variety Provided For Tourists by Forward-looking Men Oregon offers to its Centennial visitors one of the largest and fin est systems of state parks in the United States. With the recent addition of the new Farewell Bend Park, on U. S. Highway 30 on the new Brownlee Dam pool - where the immigrant wagon trains left the Snake River and started the terrible pull over the Blue mountains to the Colum bia - Oregon now has 168 State parks in use, with a total of 510.« 000 acres. Of these 168 parks some 36 are equipped for overnight camping or for trailer parking, and these are all maintained at the exceptionally high standards required by the Ore gon state sanitary authorities. Nom inal fees are charged for over night facilities which include fuel and water. During 1958 - which was a lean year economically - 10,062.014 per sons used Oregon's state parks and. of these, the overnight campers tot alled nearly 500,000 New facili ties for both day and overnight us ers are being added to accommo date the huge increase of Centennial year. Coast Park Most Popular In terms of attendance the top park in the Oregon system in 1958 was Yaquina Bay Park at Newport on the Oregon Coast with 1.136,- 247 visitors, but the relatively new Rooster Rock park on Highway 30 cast of Portland drew 417,681; the magnificent Jessie Honeyman Mem orial Park in Western Lane county attracted 353,046; the spectacular Wallowa Lake park in Eastern Ore gon drew 307,626, far from beaten paths; Umpqua Lighthouse park, near Reedsport in Douglas county drew 270,885; and Sunset Bay near North Bend, 319,833. The official season for the vari ous parks depends upon location and demands, and schedules are published from time to time by the State Parks Division of the Oregon State Highway Department at Sal em. In the main, the season is from early spring to late fall, al though many parks, especially along the Oregon Coast, find heavy use all year long. “How does Oregon, a rela te ely sparse state, less than 2.000,000 population, rate a park system which is one of the largest in the United States’" Oregon's State Parks are admin istered by the Oregon State High way Commission, assisted by a State Parks Advisory Committee of six members from all parts of Ore gon, selected by the Highway Com mission and the Governor. The Ad visory Committee meets whenever necessary during the year, makes inspection trips, holds hearings, submits recommendations on all major problems as they arise. The members of this Advisory Ccmmittee an’ W. M. Tugman. Reedsport, chairman; Glenn Jack- son, Medford; “Cap” Collier. Klam- atn Falls; Robert Frazier. Eugene. A. E. McCormick, Pendleton; and George Henderson. Portland. The Superintendent of State Parks is Chester A Armstrong, a veteran state highway engineer and administrator. Around Mr. Armstrong are gathered a small but highly trained group of spec ialists in park planning and opera tions. Small Budget for Park« The total budget for this enor mous system during 1959 is only $1,800,000 — much less than is al located to the comparable state park system in California and the somewhat smaller system in Wash ington. This is possible because of the many economies which are possible by joint operations with the State Highway department -- a central accounting system; the pooling of engineering talents for the design ing of park roads, bridges and other structures Much of the mainten ance in state parks is done by ex isting road crews of each area There is no costly duplication of equipment No report on the Oregon state park system would be complete without tribute to the late Sam Boardman, a state highway engin- er. and the first Superintendent of State Parks, who startl'd the crusade to set aside scenic and historic areas nearly 40 years ago In this pioneering work. Mr Boardman was ably assisted by "tire Three Musketeers” — Jessie Honeyman, of Eugene. Maria Jack sou. and Mrs Rix-key. of Portland - who for years led the Oregon Roadside Council in its campaign to make Governors, legislators, hard headed businessmen, and all citizens conscious of the tre mendous assets in Oregon s na tural beauty, its forest streams, lakes, beaches. Working with Mr. Boardman. they persuaded many a property owner along the Oregon Coast to give to the State some vast tract of headland or beach, long before the completion of Highway 101 made the cost of such properties almost prohibitive. With the late Senator Charles L. McNary they worked out legisla tion to permit the U.S Forest Ser vice and the Bureau of Land Man agement to trade interior tracts of timber to save from logging tracts which lay along major highways, such as the roads to Crater Lake They begged, pleaded, exhorted, scolded, and in time, they con verted thousands to their cause Oregon is proud to welcome vis itors to its State Parks. Informa tional folders on the parks and their facilities may be obtained by in quiry to Carl Jordan, director of Travel Information, Highway build ing, Salem. Folders on state parks are also available at most Chamber of Commerce and local information centers. Superintendent Armstrong says: "Our only regret is that it never has been possible to keep pace with the ever increasing demands, but wc feel we must maintain the high standards which have been set for us." Diversity of Oregon Crops Amazing (Continued from page 1> so the nation's top producer of Easter lily bulbs. Sheep and beef cattle roam tlese counties, too. And you’ll find mink, mostly from Tillamook north; some nursery and green house products, fine bentgrass in Clatsop county, and a variety of small fruits and vegetables though not on the grand scale Dairy farmers here get their alfalfa from eastern Oregon or California Grain production is virtually lack ing. Southern Oregon — This means Douglas (Oregon’s leading sheep county), Jackson and Josephine. Besides sheep and wool, emphasis in Douglas is on beef and dairy cattle, poultry and turkeys, farm woodlots, prunes, nursery stock and truck crops; this county was cradle of Oregon's turkey i n - dustry and is home of the widely known Dillard melons. Famous Winter Pears Jackson is famed for its winter p< ars, also Bartletts, and develop ed the first major fruit-of-the- month gift packing in the nation: fruit, which means about 99 per cent pears, grossed growers $16 million in 1957. Fruit is grown un- oer irrigation and about half the other cropland is irrigated. A variety of field crops, beef and a million-dollar poultry industry complete the picture here. Dairying and beef are top items tn Josephine. Gladiolus bulb cul ture is punctuated by a Gladiolus Festival each year at Grants Pass. Hops and Ladino clover are comparatively old timers here; pep permint and snap beans are new comers. Columbia River Basin — This is THE wheat belt of Oregon, except for Hood River county which ma jors in apples and pears (irrigated mostly) and grows some cherries and strawberries. Wasco is one of the leading cherry counties and grows apricots although wheat re turns about one-tljird of the coun ty's cash farm income. Barley is runnerup to wheat in the grains anu hays; livestock in descending importance includes beef cattle, hogs, sheep, dairy cows and poul try. Wheat Peas Rotation Umatilla county tops all in wheat a.id with barley and cattle is the major item in the other Columbia river counties. Irrigated areas de velop exceptions as for example specialty field and drug crops in Umatilla and melons from Mor row's county’s Irrigon district. U- matilla’s green pea industry (wheat-summer fallow and wheat pea rotation > supports several can neries and freezers. South Central Counties — This seven-county group stretches from Jefferson, Crook. Deschutes, and Grant to the California line. Two of the three major potato produc tion centers (upper central Oregon and Klamath county) are located here, but cattle and sheep, alfalfa und native hay. barley and seed crops are common to most of these counties. The Madras area has developed a considerable pep permint acreage in recent years Snake River counties — Cattle and wheat are the major products in all but Malheur, where sugar Leets rank second to cattle and are foundation for the state's only sugar refinery, at Nyssa. Malheur is Oregon's No. 1 county in both leef and dairy cattle and is the third of the major potato centers Irrigation has placed Malheur in the diversified columns, not only with sugar beets and potatoes and some other row crops, but also with hops, peppermint, strawberry plants, gladiolus bulbs and vege table seeds In Baker county, wheat plays tilth to beef, sheep, dairying and swine. Union county has a big gruss seed industry; fruit is grown here, with sweet cherries the chief item in this line. The beef grazing ir scenic Wallowa are the first at traction to the visitor — and th«’ top farm item, with hay. wheat, fr.im timber and diary products following Indians of the Pacific Northwest practiced slavery. Th«’ Chinooks got their slaves by trad«’. The first market for European manufactured goods in the Pacific Northwest was among the Amer- can Indians. OREGON Portland Eugene Astoria Albany Corvallis North Bend Coos Bay Roseburg Medford Klamath Falls Pendleton La Grande Baker Ontario Salem Bend-Redmond Newport-Toledo Bums Lakeview WASHINGTON Seattle Olympia Port Angeles Aberdeen-Hoquim Yakima Wenatchee Ephrata-Moses Lake Spokane Pasco-Kennewick- Richland Walla Walla Clarkston Pullman Omak IDAHO Couer'd Alene Moscow Lewiston Boise Payette McCall Twin Falls Sun Valley-Ketcham Burley Rupert Pocatello Idaho Fall» UTAH Logan Ogden Salt Lake City Oregon begins its second century with a new kind of travel along the Oregon trail—the swift, sure, smooth comfort of the jet age Brought to Oregon on the wings of the brilliant F-27 Prop-jet, on the routes of West Coast Airlines MONTANA Kalispell Cut Bank-Shelby Great Falls CALIFORNIA Sacramento Oakland San Francisco Now connecting Oregon with all the Pacific Northwest—soon with service to Montana, Utah and California. tuest const untunes 5
