Category Archives: History

CAPAS – FILIPINO SACRIFICE IN THE SHADOWS OF NEW CLARK CITY

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Inside the three towers of the Capas National Shrine. Three columns representing Japan, the Philippines and the United States. A desire for peace.
Inside the three towers of the Capas National Shrine. Three columns representing Japan, the Philippines and the United States. A desire for peace.

The spire of the Capas National Shrine rises 240 feet into the air above the hot, humid plains of central Luzon.  There is lots of symbolism included in the site.  Three parts of the towering spire represent the peoples of the Philippines, the United States and … Japan.  Covering 54 hectares – 130 acres – over half of the grounds have been planted with 31,000 trees representing the 25,000 Filipinos and 6,000 Americans who perished here at Camp O’Donnell following the end of the Bataan Death March in 1942.  The park was named a national shrine by President Cory Aquino in 1991 with the tower was added in 2003 with a memorial wall behind with the names of those known to have perished here at the camp.

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CORGIS ON PARADE – MAGIC IN THE COAST AIR

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Corgis mix it up in Ecola Creek at Cannon Beach Corgi Day.
Corgis mix it up in Ecola Creek at Cannon Beach Corgi Day.

My wife, our Corgi and I recently escaped the summer heat of the Willamette Valley for a day at the beach, Cannon Beach to be exact. Home of the annual Corgi Day at the Beach. It was an awesome day made more mystical by swirls of fog lying along the shore. Over 500 Corgis were running up and down through the sands.

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HIGH ATOP MONTE NERO, THE COLONEL WEPT – MAGIC OF KRN

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View from atop Krn looking northeast into the heart of the Julian Alps, Jezero Lake far below.

Over a hundred years after the tumult of the Great War, vestiges of the struggle remain in visible evidence around the 2245-meter-high mountain top of Krn – Monte Nero (Black Mountain) in Italian.  Strands of barbed wire twirl about on the slopes adding to the drama of the incredible views from the Adriatic Sea to the Italian Dolomites and into the heart of the Slovene Julian Alps.  Here on Krn and its surrounding ridges, mountain warfare on a harsh scale took place from mid-June 1915 through to the end of October 1917 when the Battle of Caporetto moved the unmovable front far to the west for the Italian Front’s last acts.

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DEVELOPMENT – REALIGNMENT, US 101 ON EDGE OF OREGON

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Nestucca Spit - saved from realignment of US 101 by then Secretary of State Robert Straub.
Nestucca Spit – saved from realignment of US 101 by then Secretary of State Robert Straub.

US 101 is the main focus for would-be tourists to Oregon.  The Oregon coastline is truly spectacular.  The Oregon Coast Highway provides the main access for those wishing to see the magic.  Driving the length of the magnificent road gives one an excellent window into the wildness, beauty and changeability of a unique environment.

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GREAT DUNE OF KIWANDA – MAGIC ON THE OREGON COAST

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Erosion continually reshapes the landscape at Cape Kiwanda.

The Oregon Coast spans some fantastically beautiful scenery.  Driving along US 101 in the summer can be a bit frustrating at times stuck behind the travel trailers and rvs making their way north or south along the highway, but there is a reason so many are there.  People ask me what the favorite spot I have along the long coastline.  That is a lot like the question what your favorite travel place in the world is.  There are simply too many. One recent spot I discovered was the mystical charms to be discovered atop the Great Dune of Cape Kiwanda.

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THE DOUBLE NINE – PACIFIC HIGHWAY – DIVERGENCE AND WEALTH SHARING IN THE WILLAMETTE VALLEY

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Double Nine – East Side Version.

As a child, road maps drew me in. The lines on the map fascinated me, linking places I had never been to or heard of together. Numbers linked with the lines created journeys for discovery. In 1926, the federal government came up with a plan to number highways to replace names – in this case, the Pacific Highway – in order to establish an integrated system of roads throughout the country. The so-called “Federal system” did not mean the federal government built or maintained the roads. That process remained the responsibility of local and state governments. Highways simply gained numbers and signs so auto drivers could determine their location.

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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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