When Dad first started working on Hell's Canyon project he moved the trailer to Cambridge which is titled "Gateway to Hell's Canyon" or something similar. Before that it was and always has been a farming community. We always liked the drive to Cambridge because that meant we were going to visit Homer Bott (long time childhood friend of Dad's) and his family. He lived on a good size ranch/farm, had a terrific strawberry bed and a horse named Oscar trained to jump up into the back of the pickup when Homer had to go irrigating. I rode Oscar once, learned quickly NOT to lift the reins because that meant Take Off Like A Bat Out Of Hell. I fell off and broke my glasses, well I more or less rolled off because Oscar was headed for a fence and he looked like he was going to jump...and I was not prepared to go with him.
In Cambridge, The trailer was parked in a small park and the rail road track ran by just behind. Richard and I loved to scrounge up double headed nails and place them on the track and retrieve our shiny miniature swords after a train had flattened them. I somehow do not think Mom knew what we were doing or we would have been flattened.
I remember the roads into the canyon were all dirt and were not paved until later 1960's to help the tourists and fisherman find the dams. When we were back country driving Dad would tell us to keep an eye peeled for "slow elk." What's that Dad? Cows.
Dad loved big machinery. He operated caterpillars, draglines and backhoes. One of our treasured "toys" was cotter keys. These were very large metal bobby pin looking things that secured teeth onto the shovel of the backhoe and when Dad changed the teeth we begged for the cotter keys, what treasures!
Dad also loved cranes the bigger the better but never had the opportunity to work on them professionally. One day Dad told us that TK Jensen, an old family friend and contractor with MK, was going to move a big crane around Oxbow so we all loaded up to go watch, it was muddy, it was rainy and it was boring but we all knew TK and so we watched the humongous crane inch down the road and then we went home. While we were gone a sudden storm had gusted in and when we got home, Mom could not see the clothesline where she had hung freshly washed clothes, they were all down in the mud. She was one ticked off woman.
If I think of any other gems, I will post.
In Cambridge, The trailer was parked in a small park and the rail road track ran by just behind. Richard and I loved to scrounge up double headed nails and place them on the track and retrieve our shiny miniature swords after a train had flattened them. I somehow do not think Mom knew what we were doing or we would have been flattened.
I remember the roads into the canyon were all dirt and were not paved until later 1960's to help the tourists and fisherman find the dams. When we were back country driving Dad would tell us to keep an eye peeled for "slow elk." What's that Dad? Cows.
Dad loved big machinery. He operated caterpillars, draglines and backhoes. One of our treasured "toys" was cotter keys. These were very large metal bobby pin looking things that secured teeth onto the shovel of the backhoe and when Dad changed the teeth we begged for the cotter keys, what treasures!
Dad also loved cranes the bigger the better but never had the opportunity to work on them professionally. One day Dad told us that TK Jensen, an old family friend and contractor with MK, was going to move a big crane around Oxbow so we all loaded up to go watch, it was muddy, it was rainy and it was boring but we all knew TK and so we watched the humongous crane inch down the road and then we went home. While we were gone a sudden storm had gusted in and when we got home, Mom could not see the clothesline where she had hung freshly washed clothes, they were all down in the mud. She was one ticked off woman.
If I think of any other gems, I will post.
3 comments:
Hi big sister, let me help you out here. Dagget was the name of the gent who owned the trailer park where we lived the first time in the canyon , with the downed clothes line. Their is a store and café by the road that went in to, what used to be the old trailer park, it has storage rentals now. Pine creek is where we lived below oxbow, where we built the dam for the swimming hole. Just up the road a ways is a café/ beer joint that serves one hell of a bacon chees burger, we have been their a couple of times. We went down the river on the Oregon side to see what was left of Homestead, nada, zipo. just a wide spot by the river.
thanks for stories, I probably heard them before but it is great to read them again.
gale
Thank you for the story! My mom and her family lived in Brownlee while the dam was being built.
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