OTE - Oregon Travel Experience

This Monterey pine was planted between 1906 and 1921 by the Simpson family as part of their extensive estate.  Louis J. Simpson was a lumberman, shipbuilder, and founder of the city of North Bend.  In 1942, Simpson sold his estate to Oregon, designating it as a park.  This tree was recognized in 2002 as the largest of its species in the United States by the National Register of Big Trees.
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This large Gray Poplar (Populus canescens) located southeast of Benton Hall on the Oregon State University campus in Corvallis, was a popular gathering spot on campus shortly after the university (at the time the school was known as the Oregon Agricultural College) was founded.  The tree got its name around 1900.  The OSU Class of 1901 christened it as the “Trysting Tree”  after college President Thomas Gatch admonished two students …

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This Jeffrey pine tree is located at the site of the historic Siskiyou Smokejumper Base at the Illinois Valley Airport in Cave Junction.  The Siskiyou Smokejumper Base was one of four such bases in the US built in the early 1940’s.  The base was established following an incendiary bomb-drop by the Japanese in Brookings, Oregon in 1942.  Forest fires required significant manpower and equipment to control, and many thought the …

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Adam Randolph Shipley crossed the Oregon Trail from Ohio in 1852.  In 1861, after becoming a successful entrepreneur in Portland, Adam and his wife Celinda established a farm on this site which eventually totaled about 1,000 acres.  The Shipleys donated land for the first school and grange in the Hazelia area, making their farm a center for the community.  Shipley served as the State Grange Master, was one of the …

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Sugar Pine Trees

Sugar Pine Canopy

Largest Sugar Pine in Tub Springs Wayside

Tub Springs Wayside, 1932

The Tub Springs Sugar Pine is the first Sugar pine to be elected to the Oregon Heritage Tree list. The species was “Discovered” by David Douglas in early 1800’s (Douglas-fir namesake); but known by indigenous people for millennia before him.  The Sugar pine’s range is from Baja California in the south to Southern Washington Cascades in the …

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Witness Tree

Oregon Heritage Tree Committee Members at the Witness Tree (photo taken by Paul Reis)

Dennis Devine, owner of the Witness Tree Vineyard (photo taken by Paul Reis)

Quercus garryanna
This Oregon White Oak reflects the early practice of using landmarks as survey markers for property boundaries. With time, these original markers have disappeared. The Witness Tree served as a survey marker for the southeast corner of the Claiborne C. Walker donation Land …

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Populus trichocarpa
This giant black cottonwood stands near the site of the Willamette Mission established by Reverend Jason Lee in 1834. At that time, the Mission and tree were located on the banks of the Willamette River. The great flood of 1861 changed the river course to its present channel, leaving what is now Mission Lake. The Willamette Mission Cottonwood is the largest of its kind in Oregon and the nation.

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Ulmus
This tree has long been identified with Henry H. Wheeler for whom Wheeler County is named. From 1864 through 1868, Wheeler drove the first stagecoach service past this site on The Dalles – Canyon City Wagon Road. In 1866, Wheeler was ambushed near here and severely wounded. A monument dedicated to Wheeler stood by this tree for over sixty years until it was moved with the realignment of Highway 26.

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Tsuga mertensiana
On September 13, 1888, after traveling two months along the spine of the Cascade Range, Judge John B. Waldo, Oregon’s foremost nineteenth-century conservationist, and his companions rested at Island Lake and carved their names into the mountain hemlock near the southeast shore of the lake. This trip provided first-hand information for Waldo to use in his lobbying efforts to support legislation designating the 4.5 million-acre Cascade Forest Reserve in …

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