OTE - Oregon Travel Experience

Subject:Describes the use of Oregon Sitka Spruce in the construction of aircraft during World War l.
SPRUCE SOLDIERS OREGON TRAVEL INFORMATION COUNCIL
Aircraft proved their military worth during World War I — initially for observation purposes, and later for the support of ground troops and bombing. When the United States entered the war in 1917, air supremacy was hotly contested and airplane production was vital to the war effort.
Early airplanes were constructed …

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Subject:Describes the pioneer route along the Snake River.
During the late 20th Century thousands of Americans left farms, families and friends to trek the Oregon Trail toward new lives in the West. The trail was nearly 2,000 miles across prairies, mountains and parched deserts, and contrary to popular belief, it was not a single set of parallel ruts leading from Missouri to the Willamette Valley. Pioneers, always searching for shortcuts or …

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Subject:Gateway to Central Oregon crossing the Deschutes River.
This area of the Deschutes River has been a river crossing and fishing location for thousands of years. Peter Skene Ogden made note of an Indian camp and bridge when he crossed here in 1826. Early pioneers using the Meek Cutoff to the Barlow Road passed here on their way to The Dalles and the Willamette Valley. John Todd built a bridge in …

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Subject:Honors Levi Scott, founder of town, and early area commerce.
Few Oregon communities have had a more colorful history than Scottsburg. It was named for Levi Scott, a pioneer of 1844, who homesteaded here and founded the town in 1850. There was a lower town at the head of tidewater on the Umpqua River which became the site of business houses and mills. A mile upstream was the upper town, the …

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The pass located east of here through the Cascade Range was once called Wiley Pass after Andrew Wiley. Wiley with other Willamette Valley pioneers explored it in 1859 while searching for a route to move their livestock to the grass lands of central Oregon for summer grazing. In 1864 the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Military Wagon Road Company was formed and submitted plans to the U.S. Government for a …

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Subject:Boat crew of HMS Chatham sights river and names Mt. Hood from here in 1792. How Sandy River received its name.
HISTORIC OREGON TRAIL
On Oct. 30th, 1792 off the point in the Columbia River where the Sandy empties its waters the boat crew from the H.M.S. Chatham (Vancouver’s Voyages) saw the snow clad peak which Lt. Wm. R. Broughton named Mt. Hood in honor of the Vice Admiral Samuel Lord Hood …

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Subject:An Ice Age river flowed across the high desert in the rocky canyon near the marker.
OREGON GEOLOGY
Ages ago a river flowed across the high desert country in the rocky canyon several hundred yards beyond the marker. The prehistoric river drained a large ice age lake that formed from the blocking of normal drainage in the area by lava flows. The lake covered a large area to the east in the …

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This location marks a travel corridor for Plateau Tribes moving seasonally from the Columbia River to the Blue Mountains.  In 1811, members of the Astor Party under the leadership of Wilson Price Hunt camped here on their way west. They traded with the Cayuse people for horses.   The Imatalam Wana (Umatilla River) abounded with beaver and salmon then. Oregon Trail migrations began passing this way in 1841. In 1868, the …

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