Category Archives: History

PORTLAND RAIL BRIDGES – CONNECTING THE ROSE CITY TO THE WORLD

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Steel Bridge carries trains and pedestrians on the lower deck; light rail and auto traffic use the upper deck.

There are many articles – blog posts or otherwise – and even books about the bridges of Portland, Oregon.  Of the twelve bridges along the Willamette River – four more on the Columbia – little space usually covers the Burlington Northern Railroad Bridge 5.1 or the rail portion of the Steel Bridge.  If you exclude the new Tilikum Crossing Bridge, which carries light rail tracks and buses, the other rail bridges lack the grace of the St Johns or Fremont Bridges and the traffic of all of the other bridges – maybe the Steel excluded.

A recent post about the rail ferry at Kalama, Washington, some forty-five minutes north of the city, got me thinking about railroads and history.  While at first glance, both are reasonably complicated, in the case of the main rail bridges in Portland, like the ferry at Kalama, it all comes down to James J. Hill.

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YIN-YANG OF THE NORTHERN PACIFIC REVEALED AT KALAMA

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Model of the rail-car ferry Tacoma of the Northern Pacific Railroad at the Port of Kalama Interpretive Center.
Model of the rail-car ferry Tacoma of the Northern Pacific Railroad at the Port of Kalama Interpretive Center.

For years, Kalama meant the Northern Pacific. Kalama was the beginning of the Northern Pacific push from the west to create a third transcontinental rail line. Northern Pacific also used Kalama as a port for a rail ferry to cross over the Columbia River from.

A recent celebration with friends took us to the large McMenamins Kalama Harbor Lodge. The hotel-brewpub-restaurant complex is a brand-new development made in the appearance of a large Maui plantation. Maybe a bit incongruous along the banks of the Columbia River, the complex always appears popular driving past along I-5 judging from the number of cars in the parking lot.

And while, like with most McMenamins establishments, the Lodge is full of history and art laid out in the McMenamins way, right next door is another large building housing the Port of Kalama. The Port building features a large Interpretive Center on its east side housing several interesting exhibits dealing with issues the Port of Kalama has and does deal with. One of the Kalama themes deals with railroad history – Northern Pacific – and the port.

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THE COMMONWEALTH ARMY – VALOR IN DEATH HONORED ON MOUNT SAMAT

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The Philippine flag whips in the wind atop Mount Samat with an urn representing eternal light at the entrance to the Colonnade at the Shrine of Valor.

The last post described the Dambana ng Kagitingan – Shrine of Valor – standing atop Mount Samat on the eastern side of the Bataan Peninsula. While most monuments tend to reward victory, sometimes more can be learned in defeat. Most of the defenders here on Bataan were Filipino. Most of those who died here, on the Death March and in the initial stages of the Japanese prison camps were Filipinos. With the surrender on 9 April 1942, the Army of the Philippine Commonwealth ended. It would not be resurrected again until the nation gained independence in 1946. At that time, it transformed into the Armed Forces of the Philippines. Many of the leaders of the new Forces saw prior service in the army of the Commonwealth.

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MOUNT SAMAT HONORS THE VALOR OF BATAAN

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An old 155 mm US howitzer sits beneath the Shrine on Mount Samat.

MOUNT SAMAT REMEMBERING AMERICAN SACRIFICE

Visitors to the Philippines enjoy a day’s outing, boating across Manila Bay to see the old guns of Corregidor. Off the regular path lies an even more important monument atop a mountain in the southern region of the Bataan Peninsula – the National Shrine of Mount Samat – Dambana ng Katingnan (Shrine of Valor).

Bataan, the sight of the worst defeat suffered by American forces in history. 78,000 men – the vast majority Filipinos new to soldiering – surrendered after a campaign of just over four months. As bad as the long battle against the enemy, the harsh jungle environment, malnutrition and disease was, another type of battle would fall upon the men afterwards, the battle to survive.

A two-part post with the first dealing mostly with the Shrine, the campaign and US Army units remembered here at Mount Samat. The second post will cover the Philippine Army divisions honored here. It is important to remember as hard as it was for American units to suffer on Bataan, Corregidor and throughout the islands, the Filipinos were forced to take the suffering to another level, both with the Commonwealth Army and the civilian population, as a whole.

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TOKELAND – MAGIC OFF THE BEATEN PATH ON THE WASHINGTON COAST

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Former site of the Coast Guard Lifeboat station on the end of the Tokeland Spit.
Former site of the Coast Guard Lifeboat station on the end of the Tokeland Spit.

Tokeland is a small spit sticking into the northern entrance of Willapa Bay.  The estuary is an amazing body of water.  Some write the bay as the second largest estuary on the Pacific Coast.  That depends upon one’s definition of an estuary.  Some include the Puget Sound in the estuary category.  While parts of the Sound are estuarine, the Sound is an inland sea.

Definition of an estuary reads a partially enclosed body of brackish water with one or more rivers flowing into and an open connection to the sea.  The freshwater-saltwater intermix provides high levels of nutrients in both water columns and sediment making an estuary a wildly productive natural habitat.  West Coast Estuary Explorer also includes the Columbia River as an estuary.  They have split the river reaches into eight separate interconnected sections, from the river mouth to the furthest point of tidal influence, Bonneville Dam.  The enormous amounts of freshwater flowing through make the Columbia a special case.

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FROM THE NORTHWEST TO THE FIELDS OF FRANCE – 361st INFANTRY REGIMENT IN THE GREAT WAR

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Private Ora Roscoe
Grave of Ora and his wife on the right.
Grave of Ora and his wife on the right.

On a recent visit to a cemetery, I visited several family ancestors buried in the very small community of Bellfountain, Oregon. Bellfountain lies in the southern part of the Willamette Valley. Amongst the graves, I found one particular headstone near the family ancestors mentioning the man’s service in World War 1 as part of the 361st Infantry Regiment.

The American Army mushroomed almost overnight with the country’s entrance into World War 1 in April 1917. Selective Service – conscription – was brought back for the first time since the American Civil War. One of the units raised, mostly from draftees from Washington and Oregon was the 361st Infantry Regiment, 181st Infantry Brigade, 91st Division.

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REVEALING BRANCHES OF HISTORY ON A PERSONAL LEVEL – GENEALOGY

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2000 Census report on ancestry majority by county – trends similar in recent years.

Television is replete with advertisements for Ancestry.com, “Every family has a story” is their moto.  The truth rings through attracting a wide base of customers to its cause, the rediscovery of family.  Ancestry.com is not the only genealogical online player, but they are the elephant in the room with over three million subscribers and access to billions of historical records. Genealogy making history personal.

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ARTILLERY OF CORREGIDOR – BIG GUNS ON AN ISLAND

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12-inch gun of Battery Hearn
12-inch gun of Battery Hearn, one of the few guns having a 360-degree field of fire.

On the island of Corregidor at the entrance to Manila Bay, American coastal defense came to a high point in the big gun defense theory of protecting vital areas of a homeland.  Using some of the biggest guns in the American arsenal, the defenders held off the enemy for over five months.  The end came swiftly though, flaws in the system exposed terribly.  Capitulation meant the garrison force marched on to the horrors of Japanese prison camps.  With the fall of the island fortress, the theory of coastal defense would slowly re-evolve.

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PHILIPPINE SCOUTS WITH A UNIQUE STORY – MANILA ABMC CEMETERY

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Donato Cabading was a sergeant with the 45th Infantry Regiment - Philippine Scouts
Donato Cabading – right foreground – was a sergeant with the 45th Infantry Regiment – Philippine Scouts. He died the end of January 1942.

During the early battles in the southwestern Pacific, most of the defenders against Japanese aggressions were Filipino. Among the graves and the Walls of the Missing, you will find many of their names. In this post, some of the stories of the Philippine Scouts, a truly unique unit of the American Army, come forward.

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PILLAR ROCK – SALMON CANNERY RELIC ON THE LOWER COLUMBIA

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Boat in permanent drydock in front of the Pillar Rock Cannery.
Boat in permanent drydock in front of the Pillar Rock Cannery.

A recent trip took us downriver to the one of the only remaining salmon canneries along the lower Columbia River.  Pillar Rock is literally at the end of the road.  To go further east, you have to get in your boat.  The cannery dates to 1877 when it was built over the previous spot where Hudson’s Bay employees used to have an operation which salted salmon.  The salmon were then transported to the Sandwich Islands – Hawaii – for sale there, with so-so success.  Lewis & Clark also camped here both coming and going along the river. Local Native Americans had long used the site as a place of encampment for years before.

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