Oregon Sites

"The Upper Sandy Guard Station Cabin, built in 1935, is an exceptional expression of a "rugged" Rustic style U.S. Forest Service building constructed by skilled local carpenters and laborers assisted by men employed under one of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal work relief programs. Funded by the Emergency Relief Appropriations (ERA) Act of 1935, and cooperating funds from the City of Portland, the cabin was built along the newly constructed Timberline Trail specifically to provide housing for an administrative guard to protect the Bull Run Division watershed, the source of the City of Portland's drinking water supply, from public...

The picnic area at Wahkeena Falls benefitted from the attention of Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees soon after the program was rolled out in March 1933. Workers from CCC Camp Benson improved a picnic area on the north side of the Columbia River Highway at Wahkeena Falls by adding stone fireplaces, picnic tables and a community kitchen/picnic shelter. As a result, the Wahkeena Falls Picnic Area is the largest day use area on the historic Columbia River Highway. The Wahkeena Falls Community Kitchen, similar to the community kitchen at Eagle Creek, consists of post and beam construction, three to four feet...

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees were brought in as early as 1933 to improve the hiking trail network in the Gorge along with their other forest management and recreation development. The Wahkeena Falls Trail was among the first to be improved, following Wahkeena Creek toward its source on the Columbia gorge rim. Another new trail, along the rim, linked Wahkeena and Multnomah Falls to allow hikers to go from one falls to the other without using the highway. In the 1920s, as part of a larger project giving Columbia River Gorge waterfalls their current names, the Mazamas (a local climbing and...

Adjacent to Portland’s International Rose Test Garden in Washington Park, the amphitheater served originally as a venue for “all ceremonies incident to the christening of roses or functions held in honor of roses in Portland”(1921). Designed to accommodate 5000 people viewing a 300-square foot stage, the Washington Park Amphitheater has become a popular public venue for concerts, theater performances and other events since it conception as the “Portland Rose Theater” or “Rose Bowl Theater” (1921; 1924; 1937). In 1941, Works Progress Administration (WPA) workers helped document the Washington Park Amphitheater architectural plans and complete access to the natural amphitheater by constructing...

Portland’s morning newspaper, The Oregonian, announced in late January 1936 that the city’s Seawall Railing was nearing completion, bringing with it a harbor line that was “beautified and protect(ed).” The ornamental, reinforced concrete railings added 3 ½ feet to the harbor wall along a stretch of the Willamette River from Jefferson Street to the Steel Bridge.  Approximately every 100 feet, heavy bases had been added to allow for ornamental light standards along the wall. Federal relief funds provided by the Public Works Administration (PWA) provided $60,000 for the completion, employing approximately 100 Works Progress Administration (WPA) workers. Planning for the harbor...

"The former West Salem City Hall building was a Public Works Administration project, completed in 1936 at a cost of $30,000. This two-story Art Deco style brick building was designed by architect Lyle P. Bartholemew and served as City Hall for the City of West Salem from 1936 to 1949. It is one of only two Art Deco style buildings in West Salem. Until 1949, West Salem was an independent city, in Polk County on the west side of the Willamette River. It's location on Edgewater Street was in the heart of West Salem's business district. After being plagued by...

In 1935, the City of Portland Bureau of Planning approved the development of a city park to serve the Westmoreland neighborhood, which had rapidly developed during the previous twenty years without the benefit of any park or playground facilities. The City acquired forty-two acres for the park’s development from the Oregon Iron & Steel Co. (a business owned by Ladd Estate Company, the developer of Westmoreland) in January 1936. Since Crystal Springs Creek ran through the flat rather marshy site, water features were incorporated into the park’s design by Francis B. Jacobberger, a principal in the architectural firm Jacobberger &...

Wickiup Campground, located approximately sixteen miles south of Canyon City on the banks of Canyon Creek, is one of two campgrounds built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollees from Company 1231, Camp Canyon Creek. Members of Company 1231 spent nearly five years engaged in numerous improvements for the Malheur National Forest, including maintenance of fourteen campgrounds as well as construction of the two new ones. Today's Wickiup Campground offers nine trailer sites and four picnic sites.

Among several school projects proposed for Clackamas County in 1935, the Willamette Grade School project moved ahead to construction with approval of a grant from the Public Works Administration (PWA). The federal contribution was approximately $30,000. The school opened in September 1936 and served the Willamette neighborhood of West Linn until destroyed by fire in 1949. The New Deal era school consisted of eight classrooms, a cafeteria, kitchen, and playroom. The collegiate-Gothic style building was red brick building with stone trim.  Portland-area contractor W. A. Hunt directed construction of the building. The local newspaper the Oregonian reported that eighteen men were...

In 1949, the Willowcreek Community Church purchased the former CCC Camp Vale's Recreation/Commissary Building for use as their gathering space. Renovations changed the building soon after its purchase, including the addition of a living space in the back of the building and placing sheet rock on the church's interior walls. Over thirty years elapsed when, in the 1980s, an effort to insulate the building required removal of the sheet rock. That renovation work revealed the original walls and, to the church members' surprise, the murals painted by Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) enrollee Frederick H. Kluemper. That discovery sparked an interest among...

"Oregon Route 6 is a state highway in the U.S. state of Oregon that runs between the city of Tillamook on the Oregon Coast, to the Willamette Valley, near Banks. It (or portions thereof) is also known as the Wilson River Highway No. 37 (see Oregon highways and routes), named after the river its westernmost segments run parallel to...During the Great Depression workers from the Works Progress Administration assisted in the construction of the road." (Wikipedia) "The Wolf Creek and Wilson River highways were designed to provide a more direct route from Portland to the Oregon Coast, as well as work relief...

The Union Creek Historic District on the upper Rogue River in Union Creek, Oregon, is listed on the U.S. National Register of Historic Places because it is a fine representative of a type of rustic resort popular in the early 20th century and has been little altered since the 1930s.   There are almost one hundred buildings and other facilities in the Union Creek Historic District, almost all of which conform to the Forest Service plans of the 1920s and 30s.  Roughly a third were constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) from 1933 to 1942. CCC enrollees worked during summer...

The Bandon Fire, which burned the majority of the town on September 26, 1936, displaced a number of the city's residents from their destroyed houses. The Works Progress Administration (WPA) promptly responded to a request for emergency housing by using WPA workers to construct 36 cottages. Despite the temporary nature of the original emergency housing, one still remains in the NE area of Bandon. While the demand for alternatives to the tent city that housed displaced residents was great, the emergency housing units were developed explicitly for those households on relief. Bandon residents who were employed were directed to the Federal...

The Public Works Administration awarded $27,415 to Yamhill County in 1935 for construction of Yamhill High School, later renamed Yamhill Carlton High School with consolidation of the Yamhill and Carlton school districts. County voters approved a $51,335 bond for the remaining cost of the project. The Oregonian, a Portland daily newspaper, announced that the "start order" would provide work for ninety workers "taken from relief rolls in Yamhill County." The Portland architectural firm of Barrett & Logan designed the school and Portland contractors Lonner, DeBruin and DeBruin oversaw its construction.

The Yamhill County Clerk building in McMinnville, Oregon was originally constructed as the town's post office with funds from the Treasury Department during the New Deal. The building was completed in late 1935. The cornerstone has been altered to remove all trace of the building's origins, just leaving the date. This is not something one usually sees when the U.S. Postal Service sells off old post offices. Some of the interior appears to be intact, but we visited too late in the day to gain entry.

The bridge at the mouth of the Yaquina River at Newport OR was constructed with funding from the Public Works Administration (PWA) in 1934-36.  It was one of five PWA-funded bridges over the Alsea River, Coos Bay, Siuslaw River, Umpqua River, and Yaquina River that completed the Oregon Coast Highway. All but the Alsea River bridge still stand. The coast highway was developed after 1914 by the state and county highway departments, but money ran out in the Great Depression before the job could be finished.  With the advent of the New Deal, the PWA offered $1.4 million and a loan...

The original 32-acre tract that established Yaquina Bay State Park was donated by the United States Department of Commerce, Lighthouse Service on September 1, 1934. Shortly after, Civilian Conservation Corps workers from CCC Camp Newport began development of the site. Located on the north shore of Yaquina Bay, with access to the ocean beach and views of the jetty, the park offered scenic amenities given its distinctive location as well as its historic landmark. The wooden Yaquina Bay Lighthouse, active from 1871 to 1874, served as a focal point for the new picnic area developed by CCC enrollees. They also laid-out...