OTE - Oregon Travel Experience

Joel Perkins was 23 years old when he and several relatives traveled the Oregon Trail from Indiana in 1844. He quickly settled a land claim and, in December 1846, established the town of Lafayette, which the Oregon Provisional Government recognized as Yamhill County’s first county seat. Perkins made himself the town’s clerk, and when he officially platted it in 1849, he donated a full block to be used as the …

Read More

Formed in 1943, the all-Black 555th Parachute Infantry Battalion was the first opportunity for African American officers and enlisted men to become paratroopers in the segregated US Army during World War II.
Balloon Bomb Blazes
In 1944-45, Japan launched balloon bombs eastward across the Pacific to set US west coast forests ablaze and cause civilian panic. In May 1945, the military ordered the “Triple Nickles” on a classified mission, code named “Operation …

Read More

Welcome to the Oregon Coast
The Oregon Coast boasts forested headlands, towering dunes of sand, and sparkling lakes and rivers. From the Columbia River south to Bandon, the picturesque coastline is bordered to the east by the peaks of the Coast Range Mountains. These peaks are the remnants of a chain of volcanic islands that collided with the North American continent some 50 million years ago. The rugged southernmost section of …

Read More

Welcome to Southern Oregon
Southern Oregon is a land of great geographic diversity. Here are the more than 250-million-year-old Klamath Mountains in the south, and to the north and uplifted 50-million-year-old ocean floor and overlying sediments, called “Siletzia” by geologists. To the east is crystal clear crater lake nestled in ancient volcanic Mount Mazama, and beyond it are Basin and Range fault block mountains separated by lakes such as Summer Lake, …

Read More

The Hollering Place
a strategic site for communication, trade, and travel
Where this marker now stands, the villages of Qaimisiich on this side and El-ka-titc on the spit to the west, were close enough to call across the bay for a canoe ride – hence the translation of El-ka-titc, “Hollering Place.” Coos Bay has been a trade and transportation center for thousands of years.
Camp Cast-a-way
In 1852, the chartered schooner “Captain Lincoln” ran …

Read More

Richard Sommer & HillCrest Vineyard
Oregon’s successful and widely recognized wine industry can be traced to this place, where Richard Sommer first planted Pinot noir grapes in 1961. The Umpqua and Willamette valleys’ climates and topographies are much like those of European wine regions, but most winemakers of the 1960s believed it was impossible to grow fine wines in Oregon. Sommer, however, recognized the significance of sharing latitude with European winemaking …

Read More

Abigail Scott Duniway
(1834-1915)
In 1860, Abigail Jane Scott Duniway and six other women shocked the town of Lafayette by attending a campaign speech by Col. Edward D. Baker, a U.S. Senate candidate. At that time, most people considered it inappropriate for women to take part in any aspect of political life. Age twenty-six at the time, Duniway’s leadership in the act was the first of countless actions for Oregon’s pioneer of woman suffrage.
Startting …

Read More