DID YOU KNOW? Quiet places & forgotten history
EXPLORE local gems
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TUNNELS ◊ CASTLES BOTTOMLESS HOLES and much more
A PUBLICATION OF THE YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC SEPTEMBER 30, 2012
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DID YOU KNOW? This magazine isn’t about Central Washington’s most famous places, although we couldn’t help but mention a few of the local gems for the benefit of visitors or new residents. No, this magazine is more about quiet places that go unnoticed or unrecognized. Places that you might have driven past on your way elsewhere but didn’t pay much attention to or that you didn’t know the story behind. There’s a bit of history. A little mystery. A touch of trivia. Some the places might be familiar, others new. We hope, however, that you finish reading about them you’ll know a bit more about Yakima and the surrounding regions than you did before.
◊ Forgotten Roads, Beautiful Byways & Natural Wonders
The Yakima Valley Museum displays many colorful neon signs. PHOTO BY ANDY SAWYER
◊ Traces of the Past
Tunnels under the city of Yakima? One man has spent A towering rock formation that years on a quest to learn altered the life of a young man more about them. Fancy old who would grow up to influence buildings? The Yakima area the entire county. A 2-mile-long has three elaborate enough that tunnel beneath the Cascade castle is part of their name. Did Mountains. Some of the nation’s you know about the vanished oldest paved roads. These can community of Roza that once all be found within easy driving thrived in the Yakima River distance from Yakima. Canyon? There are plenty of traces of the past if you know Wenas Road 6 where to look for them. Kloochman Rock 8 Snoqualmie Tunnel 9 Snipes cabin 22 Blewett Pass 10 Convicts Cave 23 Tieton Lava flow 12 Little Roza 24 Zillah silt cliffs 14 Three castles 26 Lincoln Grade 15 Naches store 28 Oak Creek feeding station 16 Yakima tunnels 29 Maryhill Loops Road 18 Pioneer Cemetary 30 Yakima River Canyon 19 Hanford Reach 20
◊ Spooky, Mysterious, or ◊ For Newcomers
Just Plain Unexpected
A dummy on an island in a man-made lake. Wild horses running free, going nowhere. A bottomless hole (perhaps). A gateway to grandeur in downtown Yakima. And of course, UFOs. The paranormal and not-quite-so-normal are all around you. Lake Buchanan dummies Horses at Vantage Gravity Hill Mel’s Hole Carousel museum Hops museum Larson Building lobby Yakima Research Station Signal Peak
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A reflective concrete dome, an American Indian cultural center, murals and museums galore, an observatory, a grand theater and a signature 17th-hole. It’s all waiting for you in the Yakima Valley. Yakima Valley SunDome Yakama Nation Cultural Center Yakima Valley Museum Toppenish murals Fort Simcoe Northern Pacific Railway Museum Goldendale observatory Capitol Theatre Apple Tree Golf Course
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ON THE WEB Check out these stories at discoveryakimavalley.com:
Wildlife ponds of Sunnyside • Gingko Petrified Forest • Yellowstone Highway • Cle Elum transformer station Dick and Jane’s House • Church of God-Zillah • The Merci boxcar • The Princess Theater • and more!
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September 2012
This hospital is owned or invested in by physicians. 40.231530.ANN.N
◊ WENAS ROAD
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A (stagecoach) road (really) less traveled
BEFORE CARS, before the railroad, there was the stagecoach. Carrying passengers and mail, it regularly trundled 154 miles from Dallesport on the Columbia River north to Ellensburg. Not much of the original route is left, but there’s a section northwest of Yakima that more or less follows the original road and in places provides a reasonable approximation of what stagecoach passengers would have seen in the late 1870s and the early 1880s. Known as Wenas Road, the route snakes nrth out of the Wenas Valley and crosses the little-known Ellensburg Pass before dropping into the Kittitas Valley. Mail delivery by stagecoach along the road began about 1877 and lasted less than a decade before the Northern Pacific’s rail line was established in 1885. The road has remained in use ever since. According to a pamphlet produced by the Yakima Historical Society, coaches were mounted on sleds to navigate snow-covered areas during
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winter months. Each coach was drawn by four horses, and the driver was his own guard and always carried a sidearm. And something else to stay warm. “I’d always wear a wide leather belt when I was driving,” explained the driver in the pamphlet. “So I’d get a flat quart of whisky and stick it under my belt. Then I’d rig up a tube with a bottle and run it up inside my coat just below my chin. That way I could keep warm and still never have to let loose of the lines between stops.” Stagecoaches usually carried nine passengers and were outfitted with leather window covers. The rear seats were preferred because of their high backs. Center seats were the worst, where the rider would be subject to the jabbing knees of passengers on either side during sharp turns. The road remains unpaved, but is passable to most passenger cars as long as there’s no snow or it hasn’t rained a great deal. But it’s remote. Be sure to tell someone where you are going before leaving. ◊ — Phil Ferolito
TOP: A barn near Arlan Kummer’s home sits under a dramatic ridgeline along Umptanum Road in Kittitas County. ABOVE: A spring-fed watering box was used to water horses traveling from Yakima to Ellensburg on the Umptanum Road. The Umptanum Road and Wenas Road formed part of a stagecoach route from Dallesport to Ellensburg. PHOTOS BY KRIS HOLLAND
September 2012
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Did you know... • In 1932 during the height of the Great Depression, Pingrey sold only one car the entire year. The customer was a local doctor who would sometimes make payments with sacks of potatoes. •Henry Ford’s first vehicle, the Quadricycle, was built in a small brick shed behind his home in 1896. When the vehicle was finally ready to run, Henry discovered it was too wide to fit through the door of the shed. He grabbed an axe and smashed the bricks out of the wall to make room. • october 1913, the first moving assembly line for automobiles was born at the Ford Highland Park, Michigan Assembly Plant. The assembly line improved chassis assembly from 12hrs 8mins to 1hr 33mins per car. The improved speed allowed Ford to drop the price of the Model T from $895 in 1908 to as low as $260 in 1924. • contrary to popular belief, the original Model T was not available only in black. From 1908 to 1914 the “T” was available in grey, green, blue and red. It was in 1914 that the “any color as long as it is black” policy was implemented as a way to streamline production due to the fact that black paint dried the fastest.
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◊ KLOOCHMAN ROCK
Kloochman Rock towers above Rimrock Lake near White Pass. PHOTO BY GORDON KING
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Kloochman climb offers challenge, rewards determination
STEEP, DARK and crumbling, Kloochman Rock soars above the surrounding timber east of Rimrock Lake. For the late Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, Kloochman was a symbol of adversity and challenge — a stony embodiment of the forces that spark man’s greatest spiritual and physical achievements. Ninety-nine years ago, the 14-yearold Douglas and companion Douglas Corpron overcame Kloochman’s brittle rock and dizzying cliffs to pioneer a new route up the formation’s southwest approach. “On these dark walls in 1913 I .... first communed with God. Here I had felt the presence of a Mighty Force, infinitely beyond man,” wrote Douglas in his book “Of Men and Mountains.” Douglas’s narrative of a grueling, sometimes terrifying ordeal has
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been chided as exaggerated by some mountaineers. Famed Northwest climber and author Fred Becky called the justice’s description of the climb up Kloochman as “the overstatement of an impressionable youth.” But more important than any climbing narrative is what Douglas said he gained in scaling the 4,532-foot peak. Douglas said the climb helped him begin shedding the larger fears that would have shackled his growth and stopped him from tackling the challenges that eventually made him one of the most noted jurists of the 20th century. Each year, scores of people scramble up Kloochman. But be careful. Even the least-taxing route is steep, exposed and in places laden with easily dislodged
rocks ranging in size from oranges to cinderblocks. A few have died while scaling its wall. Blame the rock’s brittle condition on the process that created the formation some 20 million years ago when a vein of molten rock squeezed its way toward the surface from far below. Material on the outer edges cooled faster, creating a crumbly rock. In some places it cooled slower, creating the soaring columnar face on the formation’s northwest face. Kloochman’s rock can best be viewed from U.S. Highway 12 looking east and to the south from Rimrock Lake. A poorly marked and overgrown trail leads to the rock’s base from the Tieton Reservoir Road. But this is not a hike for the inexperienced. For more information, check with the Naches Ranger District. ◊ — Craig Troianello
September 2012
SNOQUALMIE ◊
ABOVE: The eastern portal of the Snoqualmie Tunnel — a 2.3-mile-long underground passage beneath the crest of the Cascade Mountains — is near the Hyak exit on Interstate 90 just east of Snoqualmie Pass. RIGHT: The Snoqualmie Tunnel runs beneath the crest of the Cascade Mountains at Snoqualmie Pass. PHOTOS BY CRAIG TROIANELLO
September 2012
Take a trip through the Cascades — literally — in this 2.3-mile-long tunnel
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SOME PEOPLE get the willies. Others think it’s one of the strangest trails they’ve ever hiked or ridden. Still others believe it’s the coolest — both literally and figuratively. Welcome to the Snoqualmie Tunnel — a 2.3-mile-long underground passage beneath the crest of the Cascade Mountains. Running deep under Snoqualmie Pass, the 100-year-old tunnel is dark, cold, damp and claims to be the nation’s longest tunnel opened exclusively to nonmotorized traffic. From its east entrance at Hyak in Kittitas County, the tunnel burrows in a nearly straight line for more than two miles to emerge in King County on the west side of Snoqualmie Pass. Sometimes if you stare hard enough at one end you might eventually see the faintest pinpoint of light on the other. But don’t try traveling this dark corridor without a reliable flashlight. And bring a sweater. It may be 90 degrees outside, but the temperatures hover in the 50s in most of the tunnel. Dripping water makes it feel even colder.
Started in 1912 and completed in 1914, the tunnel, along with the rest of the Milwaukee Railroad, was abandoned in bankruptcy in 1980. It was taken over by the state as part of a long-term goal of building a cross-state trail. Today it is part of the state’s Iron Horse Trail. Head west through the tunnel and follow the trail another 20 miles or so and you’ll travel across a series of trestles before reaching the Cedar River Watershed Education Center. Some 23 miles from Hyak, the center is worth visiting. It was created as a way to connect King County residents with the source of their water — the vast Cedar River Watershed located nearby. Hiking is easy on the trail, but the best way to see as much as the tunnel and the trail is by mountain bike or horseback. But this is a state park, so you will need a Discover Pass. Car shuttles can be set up at the parking lots on both ends. The trailhead can be found by taking the Hyak exit off Interstate 90 and following the signs to the trail. ◊ — Craig Troianello
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◊ BLEWETT PASS
ABOVE: The Top-o-the Hill Inn at the summit of Blewett Pass in the early 1900s. RIGHT: A hairpin turn on the Blewett Pass highway in 1925. PHOTOS COURTESY KITTITAS COUNTY HISTORICAL MUSEUM
A pass from the past
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EVER WANTED to know what driving over a mountain pass was like almost 90 years ago? It was one twisty, curvy and steep experience. Still interested? Try driving Old Blewett Pass north of Ellensburg. You’ll find motoring and mining history, along with spectacular views. And plenty of turns. Stretching about 11 miles long, it has 248 turns, according to some estimates. Originally developed as a wagon road linking 1870s gold rush camps in the Wenatchee Mountains, the road was named after the Blewett Mining Co. By the early 1920s, it was improved enough to become one of the region’s first major byways, known as the Sunset Highway. And by the mid-1920s, it had even been paved.
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But just 20 years later, the road was considered unsafe — even by the standards of the 1940s. Plans were started for the current road, U.S. Highway 97. The new highway — straighter, wider and safer — was finished in 1956 and winds over Swauk Pass to the east. It was named Swauk Pass, but the new moniker never really stuck and even drew the ire of locals. The highway pass’ name was eventually changed to Blewett Pass in the 1990s. The original Blewett Pass is now a one-lane forest service road with turnouts that attracts cross-country skiers, motorcyclists and bicyclists.
“It is a real popular place for Sunday drives,” said Nancy Jones, public information officer for the Cle Elum Ranger District. “It does have a couple of pullouts with beautiful views of the surrounding area.” Jones said the road has a hardened surface with numerous potholes. “People do need to be aware of oncoming traffic and rolling rocks,” she said. The road is closed in the winter. The old highway section is reached by turning off Highway 97 about three miles north of Mineral Springs. Follow it and it eventually reconnects with the highway. But drive carefully. ◊ — David Lester
September 2012
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◊ TIETON
Tieton andesite flow is largest of its kind in the world
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OF YAKIMA COUNTY’S many claims to fame, there is one — a world record, no less — that few visitors and residents know about, but nearly all have seen. Part of it involves Naches Heights, a place known for its nascent vineyards and outdoor recreation opportunities, such as hiking in Cowiche Canyon or rock climbing at Royal Columns west of Naches. None of that would exist if it weren’t for an extremely rare geologic feature — the longest lava flow of its kind in the world. This particular lava, known as andesite, “is usually so sticky that it only flows a few miles, said Nick Zentner, a geology professor at Central Washington University. But about 1 million years ago, a volcano near what is now the Goat Rocks erupted and spewed forth what’s called Tieton andesite.
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Following an ancient riverbed, the lava flowed eastward about 50 miles before stopping where U.S. 12 now crosses the Naches River just west of Yakima. The volcano that produced the lava likely stood more than 8,000 feet tall and probably had a similar shape to Mount Rainier, Zentner said. “It appears to be a singular event” that created Tieton andesite, but it isn’t clear if it was a violent explosion or a more subdued one, he said. Either way, it must have been impressive. “That would’ve been pretty interesting to see,” said Dave Hagen, a Yakima Valley conservationist and amateur geologist. Hagen has served as the president of the Cascadians, an outdoor recreation group, and currently sits on Cowiche Canyon Conservancy’s board of directors. The flow helped create one side of Cowiche Canyon and the popular September 2012
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A climber scales a route at the Royal Columns climbing area west of Naches. The columns, also known as Tieton andesite, were formed by a lava flow a million years ago.
Dorothy Grabenstein – over 65 years DauGhter bert – 40 years
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PHOTO BY TJ MULLINAX
climbing area Royal Columns, which Hagen calls “one of the premier climbing areas in the Valley.” Zentner said he doesn’t know of any other rock columns made from andesite in the world. Cowiche Canyon offers a unique perspective on the flow. Its north side consists largely of Tieton andesite, while its southern wall is made up of the area’s predominant rock, Columbia basalt, Zentner said. Tieton andesite has a dark gray appearance that is sometimes speckled with white rectangular mineral deposits about the size of Tic Tacs, he said. While most people in the region might be unaware of Tieton andesite, Hagen is very grateful for it. “There’d be no Cowiche Canyon. There’d be no Naches Heights, and the Naches River wouldn’t be where it is today. Everything would be different in that part of the Valley,” Hagen said. ◊ — Dan Catchpole September 2012
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◊ ZILLAH
Zillah silt cliffs are reminders of Valley’s watery beginnings
The Zillah Seventhday Adventist Church looms over the white dirt cliffs of Zillah.
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PHOTO BY GORDON KING
EVER WONDER about those dirt cliffs running along Interstate 82’s two exits for Zillah? Those silty remains are the ancient footnotes of cataclysmic floods that occurred between 15,000 and 17,000 years ago. It happened after glaciers that had blocked enough rivers to create a massive lake covering much of present-day Montana gave way, sending floods across central and southern Washington. The Yakima Valley and much of the Tri-Cities were covered with about 250 feet of standing water. It’s estimated that roughly 100 such Ice Age floods inundated much of Central Washington during that time, said Nick Zenter, senior lecturer
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at Central Washington University’s geology department. Floodwater backed up at Wallula Gap south of Kennewick, and much of Central Washington filled up with water and ice, he said. Each flood also carried chalky silt from elsewhere and deposited it in layers, he said. “Each of those layers is a record of when that valley was full of water,” he said. “Still water recedes, creating a layer. This is a large flooding area dealing with half the state.” The entire Yakima Valley was essentially filled with sediment layers, but the Yakima River carved through them, he said. “It was full of layers once upon a time, but the Yakima River has taken
most of that stuff out of there,” he said, noting that sediment layers can also be found on the other side of the river as well. “But Zillah’s are more exposed,” he added. An ancient layer of volcanic ash from Mount St. Helens not only is visible, but serves as an important marker, he said. “That particular ash layer gives us a date (roughly 15,000 years ago),” he said. “That helps us date when those floods occurred.” He invites passers-by to stop and see if they can spot the ash line. “It stands out — a bright white layer,” he said. ◊ — Phil Ferolito
September 2012
PROSSER ◊
End of the road is the beginning of great scenery
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JUST SOUTH of the Prosser city limits, the asphalt ends and the scenery begins. Call it Prosser’s backdoor — a twisting gravel road stretching from the city’s residential neighborhoods upward to the vast wheat farms atop the Horse Heaven Hills. Stand at the crest and the views stretch from Mount Rainier to Rattlesnake Mountain and across a vast swath of the Yakima Valley, including the Yakima River. In the daylight, you can see the native plants that surround the road, including bunch grass and sagebrush. At sunset, Mount Adams and Mount Rainier are silhouetted to the west. Wait a little later and catch a view of the Milky Way.
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Frank Aguilar jogs up Prosser’s Lincoln Grade in November 2011. PHOTO BY ROSS COURTNEY
Accessible by car, this primitive stretch of Benton County’s Lincoln Road, affectionately called Lincoln Grade, also attracts a steady stream of morning hikers, hard-core joggers, dog walkers and, occasionally, a mountain bike or two. “It doesn’t bother us a bit as long as they don’t get run over,” said Steve Becken, a Benton County road engineer. County crews maintain the 1.6-mile Lincoln as a primitive road, meaning it has fewer than 100 vehicles a day and it has no speed limit or warning signs. A few things to remember if you visit: • Watch where you walk in the warm months. Rattlesnakes like the gravel surface, too. • Stay on the road. While it’s public, everything else, whether
marked by barbed wire or not, is private property. • Don’t litter. Like many remote public roads, Lincoln is sometimes used as an illegal dumpsite for trash, discarded furniture and car parts. “Periodically, we have to take out couches and dishwashers,” Becken said. To get there from downtown Prosser, take Bennett Avenue west and turn south onto South Kinney Way. Follow the road until the pavement ends. Street parking is available in the surrounding neighborhoods, but the extra hardy hikers park at E.J. Miller Park on Kinney Way and walk to the hill. ◊ — Ross Courtney
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◊ YAKIMA VALLEY
RIGHT: The daily elk feeding at the Oak Creek Wildlife Area often attracts many spectators. OPPOSITE: The scene after food has been dropped off the back of a retired military truck for Rocky Mountain elk at the Oak Creek Wildlife Area feeding station, outside Naches. PHOTOS BY TJ MULLINAX
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September 2012
Thank You Yakima for 23
Tourific Years!
We are grateful to be the Yakima ValleY’s choice
for packaged tours for more than tWo decades...
Elk, bighorn sheep enjoy your company during dinner For similar reasons, there’s also a bighorn sheep feeding station a few miles away on State Route 410. Feeding time at this site, known as the Cleman Mountain station, is mid-morning. The elk are fed daily at 1:30 p.m. throughout the winter, usually from mid-December to March. A visitor center is open daily between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. through March and is staffed by volunteers. It offers a video program, exhibits and a kids’ corner. Staff also take visitors on truck tours as the elk are feeding. No reservations are necessary, although it doesn’t hurt to make one as space is on a firstcome-first-served basis. The tours are supported by participant donations, which are encouraged so that the tour program can be continued. It should be noted that a state Discover Pass ($30) is now required to view the elk. The pass generates operating funds for the departments of Wildlife, Parks and Natural Resources. Call the Oak Creek Wildlife area at 509-653-2390 for more information on the tours, contact the Wildlife Department at 1701 S. 24th Ave. in Yakima or call 509-575-2740. ◊ — Chris Bristol
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September 2012
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WELL KNOWN to anyone who has lived in the Yakima Valley for more than a few years, the Oak Creek feeding station west of Naches remains a favorite to take out-of-town guests in the winter. Best of all, you don’t have to go out of your way to visit the station, which is operated by the state Department of Fish and Wildlife. Located next to U.S. Highway 12 about 6.5 miles west of Naches, the feeding station is home to herds of hungry elk that come down from the upper elevations of the Cascades each winter. Upward of 1,000 or more elk, including bulls with big racks, can be seen munching on alfalfa and hay at feeding times. The feeding program is part of the 94,718-acre Oak Creek Wildlife Area, home to the Rocky Mountain elk that were transplanted to Yakima County in 1913 from Yellowstone National Park. The elk would normally migrate each winter to lower elevations to find grasses and other food not covered in deep snow. The feeding program is designed to keep the elk away from damaging the orchards and other crops they would otherwise devour.
motorcoach tours, cruises, escorted tours and european riVer cruises.
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◊ GOLDENDALE
An asphalt roller coaster you can pedal, walk or bike
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PHOTO BY SARA GETTYS
M A RY H I L L L O O P S R O A D is more roller coaster than road. It winds, it dips, it makes you want to cover your eyes. If you were strapped in, you might throw up your hands and scream. The Maryhill Museum of Art’s stomach-dropping recreational quirk drops 850 feet in 3.6 miles with 25 curves, many of them hairpin switchbacks. No wonder the road has become a mecca for downhill skateboarders. But the asphalt is open to nonthrillseekers, too, accessible to visitors from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day. There is no admission, but you will have to earn your fun. Motorized traffic is forbidden outside of special
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Maryhill Loops Road in Goldendale is a twisting downhill road that provides the course for the Maryhill Festival of Speed.
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event rentals that require hefty insurance policies. And you can only get in and out at the bottom of the hill, which connects to State Route 14, because the Maryhill Museum does not own the high end of the road, which connects to State Route 97. “You have to go up to the top and then come back down,” said Sandra Williams, museum event manager. That means pedaling or hiking. People do it, William said. Folks walk dogs, jog, ride bikes or carry skateboards and street luges up, just for the joy of coming down. The museum doesn’t count the casual users, Williams said, but it rented out the road 18 times this year.
Most popular is the Festival of Speed downhill skateboarding and street luging contest, covered by ESPN. But car and motorcycle clubs rent it out, too. Film directors use it for movie scenes. The Goldendale High School cross-country team held a fundraiser meet on the road. History buffs might like the thoroughfare, too. Maryhill Loops Road was built from 1909 to 1913 by Samuel Hill, founder of the Maryhill Museum, as the only link between the Columbia River and Goldendale at the time. Later, it became the first asphalt-paved road in the state. ◊ — Ross Courtney
September 2012
YAKIMA & KITTITAS VALLEYS ◊
A solo paraglider sails south along the Yakima River Canyon as part of the annual autumn “Baldy (Bute) Fly-in” about 15 miles north of Selah. PHOTO BY TJ MULLINAX
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How much do you know about the Yakima River Canyon?
IT’S GOT SEVERAL NAMES, both official and informal: The Yakima River Canyon Road. State Route 821. Canyon Road. Yakima River Canyon Scenic Byway. Or simply, and probably best, The Canyon. Whatever name you choose, there’s no mistaking the roughly 23-mile canyon connecting the Yakima and Kittitas valleys. Famed for its rafting, wildlife viewing, soaring landscape and blue ribbon trout fishing, it’s often at the top of the list to take visitors to see. OK, you probably knew all that. But did you know: • Before the 1920s, motorists traveling between Yakima to Ellensburg had to negotiate a rough road up the Wenas Valley and over parts of Umtanum and Manastash ridges. It could be muddy or covered in snow long after the valleys below warmed and dried out each spring. Starting in 1918, road crews labored for six years to carve out the Yakima River Canyon Road, now known as State Route 821. It finally opened in 1924. But it would be more than eight years before concrete would be poured on the gravel roadway.
September 2012
It remained the main road between the two valleys until Interstate 82 was opened in 1971. • In June 1982, roughnecks completed what was the deepest well ever drilled in the state of Washington. Working in a pasture a few hundreds yards east of the Roza Dam, drillers in search of natural gas punched down three miles, including through thousands of feet of very tough basalt, to reach sedimentary remnants of an ancient swamp. They stopped drilling at 16,199 feet below the surface. They found natural gas. But it wasn’t enough, they said, to make the well commercially worthwhile. They plugged the well and walked away. It wasn’t the first time the Yakima Canyon attracted wildcat drillers. In 1940, drillers sunk a well in roughly the same area. But given the toughness of the rock and the primitive technology of the era, they managed to drill only 912 feet. They, too, had a small showing of gas. • Sure, Mount St. Helens dumped ash all over Central Washington more than 30 years ago. But it was far from the first time volcanic ash
has fallen here. Not far from the Lmuma Creek recreation site (about 16 miles south of Ellensburg on SR 821) there’s a thick, white-colored strip above the far side of the river. It’s ash from the eruption some 6,900 years ago of Mount Mazama in southern Oregon. The massive eruption blew off more than 2,500 feet of the mountaintop sending ash as far north as Saskatchewan, Canada. Today, the remains of Mount Mazama are better known as the caldera Crater Lake. • The Pomona region, an orchard and ranch area just outside the Yakima River Canyon’s southern entrance, is named after the Roman goddess of fruit. • The Roza Irrigation District, which takes Yakima Canyon water and delivers it to some 72,600 acres of farms, is named after a trickle of a creek about 1.5 miles upriver from the Roza recreation site. The creek was named for the daughter of a Northern Pacific Railroad official who happened to be on hand when railroad construction crews reached the creek in the 1880s. ◊ — Researched by Craig Troianello
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◊ HANFORD REACH
A mix of beauty and destructive power
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W I T H I T S S W E E P I N G vistas and stark beauty, the Hanford Reach National Monument is an ironic land where a half-century of creating the world’s most destructive weapons also preserved vast stretches of arid landscape teeming with wildlife and the last free-flowing stretch of the Columbia River. But unless you’ve got a boat, chances are good that you know more about the Hanford Reach from reading than actually visiting it. That’s because access to much of the 195,000-acre national monument isn’t easy. And that’s too bad, because Hanford has more than 200 species of birds, 30 different kinds of grass, not to mention elk, mule deer, coyotes, badgers, eagles, herons and pelicans. The best way to see the Reach is by boat. Canoes, kayaks and motorboats often launch from the north shore just upriver from the Vernita Bridge. Rafts are not advised because of the time and
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distance required to reach a takeout point. Another caution: The current can be swift and help can be a long way off. Also, along portions of the river, it is illegal to tread past the highwater mark. Started as part of World War II’s Manhattan Project to create the first atomic weapon, Hanford grew to include nine plutonium-producing reactors that were cooled using the Columbia’s water. Visible in the distance from the river is the B Reactor, the world’s first full-scale nuclear reactor. Built in a mere 13 months, the reactor produced the plutonium used in the world’s first nuclear explosion — a test in July 1945 in New Mexico — and in the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan. The reactor complexes are being dismantled, their highly radioactive cores being encased in place. Most are visible from the river, although they may be some ways off. That’s not true of
the N Reactor, the last one to be built. It sits just feet from the riverbank. Farther downriver are the fabled White Bluffs. Composed of crumbly sediment of an ancient lakebed, the cliffs rise high above the river and plunge steeply to the water. Limited public road access prevents access to much of the Hanford Reach along the Columbia. But there is a place with a spectacular view of the river and the Hanford Reservation. Getting there requires driving an isolated road, but the reward is worth it. From Yakima head east on State Route 24 for about 38 miles to the Vernita Bridge. Shortly after crossing the bridge, make a right and continue following SR 24 for 19 miles before making a right on an unpaved road with gate. Follow the road for 8.1 miles. Look to the right for a small cutoff leading to a parking lot with view across the Columbia River and much of the Hanford reservation. ◊ — Craig Troianello
September 2012
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TOP: The Hanford Reach National Monument is a place of sweeping vistas and stark beauty. ABOVE: Limited public road access prevents many from seeing the most spectacular portion of the White Bluffs of the Hanford Reach. This shot was taken from a site about 11 miles downriver from the State Highway 24’s Vernita Bridge and is accessible only by boat The bluffs are composed of crumbly sediment from an ancient lakebed, but access to much of the area is difficult. PHOTOS BY CRAIG TROIANELLO
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◊ YAKIMA VALLEY
One of Ben Snipes’ cabins sits in Toppenish. Snipes ranged cattle in the Yakima Valley and his cowboys used these cabins. The cabin was used from about 1850 to 1890. PHOTO BY SARA GETTYS
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Snipes’ cabins — few and far between — marked cattle trail to Canada
BEN SNIPES, once known as the richest man in the Northwest, made his money by pushing cattle through Central Washington into British Columbia to sell to hungry miners laboring in the Fraser River gold strike of the 1850s. Snipes and his cowboys needed places to stay while herding and droving, so they built a series of line cabins across the Yakima Valley. One of the few remaining cabins now sits in downtown Sunnyside, outfitted with period gear such as a bed with rope strands to support a sleeping cowboy and his bedroll. It came from what is now known as the Green Valley
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neighborhood, about seven miles south of Sunnyside. The cabin, according to Historylink. org, a collection of articles about Washington history, was built in 1859 and was the first in the region to be built by a white person. Bill Flower, a longtime Sunnyside resident who collected historical information about Sunnyside for the town’s centennial and other events, said Snipes likely would have lived in the cabin at some point. It was later moved to property owned by the family of Ren Ferrell, Snipes’ second in command. In the 1950s, it was moved to Sunnyside’s Central Park in recognition
of the city’s 50th anniversary. Sunnyside was incorporated in 1902. Flowers figures that the cabin probably last saw duty early in the 1900s as a chicken coop or pigsty. But for its original purpose, it more closely resembled a castle on the cattle range. “It would have been very comfortable for the cowboys when they are used to sleeping out on the open range with a blanket,” Flower said. Visitors can step inside the cabin today and check out the rustic furnishings. They probably wouldn’t want to sleep there, though. ◊ — Mark Morey
September 2012
SELAH ◊
A Convicts’ Cave, which sits above the railroad tracks in the Selah Gap, is rumored to have been dug by convicts, who stored dynamite in it. PHOTOS BY SARA GETTYS
September 2012
Convicts’ Cave: A blast from the past
AS YOU DRIVE through the gap into Selah from Yakima, look to the hillside on your left and you will see the only remnants of what once was part of a prison labor camp. Perched part way up the ridge and plastered with graffiti, there’s a concrete structure containing what appears to be a small tunnel. At one time, it was part of a rock-crushing operation making gravel to pave roads. But what isn’t as visible is what’s higher up the ridge and further back at the base of a basalt cliff. Known as Convicts’ Cave, it’s roughly 3 feet in diameter and reaches some 30 feet into the cliff. Old timers say it is where dynamite was stored for blasting. It was 1910, when some 30 convicts from the state prison in Walla Walla were brought to the area to blast rock and feed a massive rock crusher that
was placed about 100 feet above the rail line, according to The Selah Story, a local history book. “They had to break basalt to get the rock out,” said Yakima Valley Museum Director John Baule. Prisoners worked under the watchful eye of gun-toting guards, and a camp for them was formed where the freeway now cuts through the gap. Most folks are not aware of the cave, nor the history behind the concrete structure, said Yvonne Wilbur, vice president of the Yakima Historical Society. She said she learned about it in a history book. “I don’t think anybody knows anything about it except for the people that read the The Selah Story,” she said. “Not too many people ask about the cave.” ◊ — Phil Ferolito
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◊ LITTLE ROZA
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ONCE A BUZZING, teeming place — now it isn’t even there. Or almost not there: The old town site of Roza still exists, but it’s a mere vestige of its former self. A very few signs remain of the town that built up big and fast around several silica mines and two mills in 1919, but it’s mostly just tumbleweed and dust now. Located about two miles upriver from the Roza Dam, on the western bank of the Yakima River, the town once had miners, farmers, ranchers and workers in the mills that converted silica, a hard, glassy mineral, for a variety of uses — some say in silver polish, cosmetics, glass and even rubber. Until 1926, Roza was a happening place. “Although it wasn’t officially considered a town, it did have a post office,” reports Sadie Thayer, director of the Kittitas County Historical Museum. A refinery, one-room schoolhouse, laundromat, general store, houses and cabins rounded out
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Bustling town, born of silica mining, faded
the buildings at Roza. The railroad brought needed supplies. Once silica was extracted from the mines dug into the hillside, it was transported across the Yakima River in tram cars on a cable device. There it was refined at one of two mills; one was owned by the Great Western Silica Co., which advertised that its silica mine there was the second largest in the country. The other was the Japanese-American Silicate Co., which was founded by a Japanese family but later sold to an American firm. The trade thrived for about seven years until the Great Western mill burned down in 1926. By the 1950s, the town was all but abandoned. Helen “Nell” Donald Hadley taught in the little school from 1920-21, earning $125 a month. Her Roza reminiscences are part of a book, Making the Grade: Plucky Schoolmarms of Kittitas Country by Barb Owens. Hadley recalled that the only real way to come and go was by train because although there was a road,
TOP: Mr. and Mrs. Roberts sit on the front porch of their store and the post office in Roza, around 1920-1922. Their daughter sits in front of them and Mrs. Helen “Nell” Donald Hadley sits on the left. She was the school teacher and rented a room from the Roberts. MIDDLE: The town of Roza. ABOVE: The town of Roza as seen from the bluffs above the Yakima River. PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE KITTITAS COUNTY HISTORICAL MUSEUM
September 2012
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ABOVE: The Great Western Silica Co. mill at Roza. PHOTO COURTESY OF THE KITTITAS COUNTY HISTORICAL MUSEUM
LEFT: A concrete block stands in what was once the town of Roza, situated on the west side of the Yakima River across from the Big Pines recreation site. Little evidence remains of the mining town, which had a schoolhouse, laundromat and post office.
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September 2012
Even now, getting there is no picnic. It’s accessible by boat across the Yakima River. Or, it’s possible to drive a four-wheel-drive vehicle to the Wenas Wildlife Area from Selah, going along the Old Durr Road, accessed from Sheep Company Road, until it reaches the Roza Creek Road. At the end of that, there’s a gate, so it takes another three miles to hike down to the Roza town site. ◊ —Jane Gargas
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it was a very round-about route. She taught three students from farm families and three from mill families that year. Thelma Miller Shephard of Pasco was born in Roza. Now 93, she lived there until she was 3. Her daughter, Suzanne Swisher of Pasco, says the family heard lots of stories about Roza. “My mom said it was desolate when the wind blew, and her own mother was so glad to get out, she never looked back.”
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◊ THREE CASTLES
Congdon Castle remains shrouded by trees, mystery Room with a huge fireplace, a formal dining room (also with a fireplace) and an indoor swimming pool that would temporarily drain all the water from the well when it was filled. Although he visited Yakima often during his career, Chester Congdon died Nov. 21, 1916, just a year after the mansion was completed. He may never have even seen it when it was finished. Today, Congdon Castle is a bit of a mystery to most residents of Yakima, as it remains in the hands of the very private Congdon family and is rarely opened to the public. For many years, however, it was the The historic Congdon Castle in West Valley is seen center of a thriving orchard operation, in this 1920 photograph. one of the biggest in the region, and was PHOTO COURTESY OF THE YAKIMA VALLEY MUSEUM no mystery to the farm’s employees and their children. In 1976, as part of the city of Yakima’s of land that now form Yakima and LOCATED SOUTH of Nob Hill bicentennial project, an old trolley line parts of the West Valley. Boulevard just a stone’s throw from was restored and tourists flocked to the The castle apparently was intended the busy West Valley Wal-Mart is a city to ride out to the castle. as a summer home for the Congdon nearly century-old mansion known as But the Congdon line shut down family, which remained based in Congdon Castle. in 1987, and the once-huge Congdon Duluth and lived in a beautiful mansion Largely hidden by orchards and empire, over 900 acres, became shrouded in mystery, the castle was on Lake Superior called Glensheen. the subject of a zoning battle over built in 1914-1915 by industrialist Known to the family as Westhome, annexation and redevelopment. the Yakima castle is built of local rocks Chester A. Congdon, an attorney and Your best bet today is a quick glimpse quarried near the Painted Rocks, which mining magnate from Duluth, Minn., as you pass by on your way to Wal-Mart, was once owned by Congdon’s Yakima and builder of the Yakima Valley Canal. once a Congdon orchard. The occasional Valley Canal Co. Congdon first came to Yakima in tree-thinning operation makes it easier to 1889 with his younger brother, Albert. Like all castles, fanciful or for-real, see, temporarily. the mansion has a tower and a turret. By the mid-1890s, they had built the ◊ —Chris Bristol canal, also known as the Congdon It also is said to have more than 80 ditch, and had also bought vast tracts rooms, including 18 bedrooms, a Great
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From castle to creamery, Carmichael family left its mark on Valley
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PHOTO BY GORDON KING
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BECAUSE IT’S LOCATED on a quiet side street of Union Gap, the Carmichael Castle too often goes unnoticed. And that’s too bad, because the rough-hewn rock home, complete with a turret, has rightfully earned itself
a listing on the National Register of Historic Places. The house, at 108. W Pine St., was built by Elizabeth Loudon Carmichael, who in 1884 immigrated from New Zealand with her husband and three children to a Cowiche-area farm. But September 2012
The story behind Yakima’s Carbonneau Castle
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Belinda Carbonneau built Carbonneau Castle, located on 48th Avenue just south of Tieton Drive, in 1908 after making her fortune in the Klondike gold rush. The mansion now houses a business — Findery Floral and Gift — on the first floor and serves as a residence on the upper floors. PHOTO BY SARA GETTYS
IF HER HEART had not broken, Belinda Carbonneau might not have moved to Yakima. And had she not lived in Yakima, there would be no Carbonneau Castle — a four-story stone home now known as Findery Floral and Gift at 620 S. 48th Ave. Born Belinda Mulrooney in Ireland, Carbonneau grew up in Pennsylvania. At an early age, she left home, living in such places as New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Juneau, Alaska. By the late 1800s, she’d moved to the Klondike to make her fortune from the miners working the Alaskan gold rush. She sold silk and hot-water bottles at a reported profit of 600 percent, reinvesting her returns in other business ventures. She built her first hotel in Grand Forks, then constructed the fancier Fairview Hotel in Dawson City in 1898. It’s said she personally accompanied a shipment of cut-glass
chandeliers, silverware, china, linen, and brass bedsteads over Chilkoot Pass. Both of her hotels catered to — or “mined” — miners. While some rumored that Carbonneau had been a madam, others say she was legitimate businesswoman who staked goldmining claims of her own and grew wealthy. While still in her 20s, she was one of the most famous women in the Klondike, as well as one of its most successful business people. While Carbonneau had good business sense, the same could not be said about her choice in men. According to the book Staking her Claim: The Life of Belinda Mulrooney, Carbonneau shunned the advice of her friends — and a Catholic priest — and married Charles Eugene Carbonneau, a handsome French con man posing as an aristocrat in 1900. While their money lasted, the two lived the high life in the Yukon and
France. But when it ran out, so did Charles. The couple divorced and Charles returned to France taking some of Belinda’s money and jewels. Belinda, meanwhile, started a bank, amassed a new fortune, divorced her husband and moved to Yakima to be with her family. By 1909, she had purchased a 22-acre ranch in Yakima and built the mansion on South 48th Avenue. It’s now listed on the National Register of Historical Places. Carbonneau lived here until the mid-1920s, when she moved to Seattle, giving occasional interviews about her gold rush days. She died at 95 in 1967. In 1992, Leonard and Judy Russell purchased the home — later converting the main floor into Findery Floral and Gift. The Russells live upstairs, while Judy’s daughter, Sue Goertler, manages the shop. ◊ — Erin Snelgrove and Adriana Janovich
shortly after their fourth child was born, her husband died, prompting her to move to what was then Yakima. (This was a few years before Yakima famously hauled its buildings several miles to the north in order to re-establish itself at the railroad stop.) There, in what is now Union Gap, she opened a general store. It was a success, but she closed it to move to California with her second husband. But after he died within a year, Carmichael moved back and reopened the business.
With an entrepreneurial spirit, Carmichael founded Yakima City Creamery in 1902. She began by making cream and butter, but expanded to making Carmichael Ice Cream, according to the Yakima HeraldRepublic’s archives. It was about that time that she ordered rock cut from a Selah-area quarry and had it hauled to the Union Gap site by her four sons. Over the years, her business grew. It was managed by family members who
expanded operations into the Maid O’Clover Dairy Store, which eventually became a chain. Carmichael’s business became so profitable that she had two homes — the castle on Pine Street and another home at 2 Chicago Ave. in Yakima. The second, more modest appearing home is also listed on the National Register of Historic Places. ◊ — Erin Snelgrove
September 2012
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◊ NACHES HEIGHTS
The Little Store on Naches Heights is a constant in a sea of change
Don Weiss, Larry Judd, Jeff Nelson, Gerald Biggers and Vernon Ford enjoy their morning coffee at The Little Store on Naches Heights as they have for many years. The store seems to have stepped out of a time long past where small country stores have all but disappeared. Jackie Hakala and her family have run The Little Store for 31 years, serving many of the growers and workers in the Upper Valley agricultural community with food, everyday items and a welcome place to begin the day.
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PHOTO BY TJ MULLINAX
ONE CAN DISCERN the ebb and flow of the seasons here simply by pulling up a seat at The Little Store on Naches Heights. Business slows in the winter when the rolling orchards that surround the small white building sleep. During late-winter pruning, summer work and fall harvest, however, activity picks up noticeably. Located at 5531 Naches Heights Road, the store is one of the few old-style country mercantile outlets remaining in rural Yakima County. Jackie Hakala has seen it all in the 31 years she’s owned the store, one of the few old-style country mercantile outlets left in rural Yakima County. But one constant is the group of mostly retired orchardists who gather each morning to share coffee, friendship and the news of the day.
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“They went to school in this area. Sometimes there are as many as 10, usually every morning,” said Hakala, 79. “A lot of them are retired from the orchard business.” Visitors to the store pick up a few items, pop or beer, which provides her a chance to catch up with neighbors and friends. “I know all the neighbors and hear the neighborhood gossip,” she said. The store is open every day but Christmas. Some date the store to the 1920s, others say it opened earlier than that. This much is clear: The store has changed little over the years. But the outside world has changed. The store no longer receives deliveries from its suppliers of milk and other products.
The Naches Heights rural fire station, which used to be located across the road now sits farther away on Naches Heights Road. Years ago, the store owner had the ability to unlock the station doors when a fire alarm sounded. The first volunteers at the station would write on a chalkboard the location of the fire for those who followed. Hakala and her husband, Bill, moved to the area from Texas and purchased an orchard. When the farm sold, Hakala said Bill, who is now deceased, asked her what we wanted to do. She wanted to operate The Little Store. “I had never done this before,” she recalled. “This was something different to do.” With help from her son, Ed, she has been there ever since. ◊ — David Lester
September 2012
TUNNEL VISIONS ◊
Did Chinese workers build secret passageways under Yakima?
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IN THE BASEMENT of the Olde Lighthouse Shoppe, Paul Schafer points to the strongest evidence he’s found of long-rumored tunnels he believes Chinese railroad laborers used in the late 19th century to travel safely when white men didn’t want them on the streets after dark. Schafer, a retired Eisenhower High School history teacher and a board member of the Yakima Valley Museum, has been tunnel-hunting for years. He learned about this one from a 1974 Charlie Lamb column in the Yakima Herald-Republic: “Apparently the tunnels had been built by Chinese laborers who came to the Yakima Valley in numbers in the late 1880s to build the Northern Pacific track. Yakima District Judge George Mullins, whose family owned the old Montana Hotel (now destroyed by fire) at 1st and Chestnut, said he doubted if a tunnel went under the tracks. Mullins, however, had heard of a tunnel extending along Front Street from a former electric company building across Chestnut from the Montana. The building had earlier been a mecca for patrons of that fine old Chinese dominoes game known as Mah Jong.”
September 2012
Paul Schafer shows a possible tunnel under the Union Gospel Mission build in Yakima. PHOTO BY TJ MULLINAX
In the basement of the Lighthouse, the Union Gospel Mission thrift store on Front Street between Yakima Avenue and Chestnut Street, he’s found what appears to be the remains of a tunnel matching the description in the old newspaper story. It features a wider opening than the old steam tunnels underneath the city that others have pointed him toward. Those were smaller and were used to transmit steam-heat through pipes. “These things get confused over the years,” Schafer says. “And people mix it up with the steam tunnels. … The steam tunnels were a couple of feet by a couple of feet.” Despite that confusion and a few deadend leads over the years, Schafer believes there was a small system of interconnected tunnels in the city’s downtown core. There may have been one underneath the recently closed Cheshire Books, 310 E. Yakima Ave. But any evidence there has been erased by a huge block of concrete where the opening was said to have been. The one he’s sure of, the one that ran under what is now the thrift shop, ran west
to the street and turned left, he says. “We know for sure there was a tunnel that had an entrance here,” Schafer says, standing in the Quality Rentals parking lot at 24 S. First St. “It goes across like that and across that way, and the substructure of that is underneath the Union Gospel Mission (store).” Beyond that, the “Chinese tunnels,” as Schafer calls them, remain a largely unsolved puzzle. But it’s a puzzle with a sense of wonder to it to a history buff like Schafer. His eyes sparkle as he talks about the community of about 500 Chinese railroad workers who came to town around 1885. He bristles at the injustice of how they were treated, but delights in thinking about how they built the tunnels and how those tunnels may have taken on other lives over the years before they were sealed off. “They were probably used during prohibition,” he says. Even then, they were a secret. “I don’t know how many people knew about them when they were actually operational,” Schafer says. ◊ — Pat Muir
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◊ YAKIMA
A final resting place for Valley’s early residents
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YAKIMA COUNTY’S oldest cemetery lies at the east end of Ahtanum Road in Union Gap on a rise above the west bank of the Yakima River. The oldest grave dates to 1865, the year the Civil War ended. It belongs to Priscilla Goodwin, wife of Yakima pioneer Lewis Goodwin, who owned the cemetery and gifted it to Union Gap — then known as Yakima City. The cemetery is also home to the graves of Blanche and Lorenzo Perkins, two pioneers killed by Indians near Rattlesnake Springs on July 10, 1878. The famous incident — believed to be a retribution killing for an earlier murder of several American Indians by white settlers — was rarely omitted in any early pioneer writings on the community. The deaths are said to have cemented the white man’s distrust of Indians and used to justify their oppression. Records in Tahoma Cemetery indicate some of those initially interred in the Pioneer Cemetery were later moved to lie in larger family plots at Tahoma. The settlers buried in Pioneer Cemetery came from places as far east as New York, such as John T. Kingsbury, who served as a soldier in the 26th New York Volunteers Infantry in the Civil War. He died in 1926. Buried next to him is his wife, Anna Adams Kingsbury, lineal descendant of Henry Adams, who was an ancestor of two American presidents. The cemetery is also dotted by “Unknown” markers, illegible or broken tombstones and unmarked sites. ◊ — Mike Faulk
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September 2012
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ABOVE: Pioneer Cemetery, Yakima County’s oldest cemetery, is in Union Gap and is the resting place of several of Yakima’s early settlers. This monument marks the graves of Blanche and Lorenzo Perkins, two pioneers killed by Indians near Rattlesnake Springs on July 10, 1878. LEFT: A curved sign marks the entrance to Pioneer Cemetery. PHOTOS BY TJ MULLINAX
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◊ YAKIMA
Do you suppose Barney expects to catch prehistoric fish?
A Barney Rubble dummy sits on his own island in Lake Buchanan in Yakima. Barney was orginally in a boat until he was transferred to the man-made island in 1998. PHOTO BY GORDON KING
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WHO IS THE GUY always fishing in the middle of Lake Buchanan? He never seems to take a break and can easily be spotted from Interstate 82, between the Nob Hill Boulevard and Yakima Avenue exits. Well, it’s Barney. You know, the guy from The Flintstones cartoon series. He was placed on a 12-by-12-foot floating island at the center of the 50-acre lake in 2000. Because the lake is a former gravel pit, its owners — the Buchanan family — thought it was only fitting to decorate it with characters from The Flintstones. The show’s main character, Fred Flintstone works at a gravel pit. Barney is Fred’s best friend. The Barney mannequin was originally placed in a small boat on the lake before being relocated to the man-made floating island. He’s fishing from a chair and is surrounded by trees. He isn’t the only character on the lake. In 2007, Betty’s Island — which measures 30 by 30 feet — was launched so Barney wouldn’t be alone, according to an interview given by the late Doug Buchanan that year. Betty, who is Barney’s wife in The Flintstones, sits in a chair in front of a computer amid 31 trees planted in 12 yards of soil. Nearby is Pebble’s Island, an 8-by-8foot island composed of a few trees that grow around a goose nest. And if you don’t recall, Pebbles is Fred’s daughter. All the islands were constructed of wood and foam floating blocks by Doug Buchanan, who died in February 2012 at age 64. ◊ — Phil Ferolito
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◊ VANTAGE
Wild horses still run free above the Columbia River
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ONE OF THE PLEASURES of heading east on Interstate 90 is the guaranteed sight of wild horses galloping furiously over a ridge above the Columbia River’s Vantage Bridge. But looks can be deceiving. The 15 horses are made of rusted steel and weigh about 1,200 pounds each. They were actually commissioned in 1989 to honor the days when great numbers of real wild horses roamed the arid steppes. The area near Vantage was the site of the last grand roundup of wild horses in 1906. Artist David Govedare got the idea
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for the project in the mid-1980s when he read that organizers of the upcoming 1989 Washington State Centennial were looking for ideas. What’s more interesting is the artwork, titled “Grandfather Cuts Loose the Ponies,” is only half-finished. Govedare, of Chewelah, conceived the project with the idea of the horses galloping out of a “great basket” tipped over by “grandfather” (in other words, a godlike spirit) to gift the world with the gallant creatures. The steel basket is projected to be 25,000 pounds and 36 feet in diameter.
September 2012
EORGE C. DONALD HOUSE THEeG served by the Woman’s Century Clu Pr
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Many changes have occurred over the years at the Donald House, and many festive occasions have been celebrated here.
The Donald House, constructed in 1907-08, was the fashionable stone residence of George Donald, a pioneer Yakima businessman. At the time of construction the house represented surprisingly progressive trends in architecture and interior design. The Woman’s Century Club was formed in 1927 by combining two pioneer clubs, the Woman’s Club and the Twentieth Century Club, and bought the George C. Donald House at 302 North 2nd Street in 1930 to serve as their clubhouse. When the home was purchased the four upstairs bedrooms and three baths were removed to make room for the auditorium A further change has been the addition of a breathtakingly beautiful wedding chapel upstairs. The original woodwork has been retained throughout the building. Some of the original contents remain in the building, including the custom-made dining table and twelve chairs, all hand carved, and a matching buffet and china closet. The house is listed on local, state and national historical registers. Over these last 82 years the Woman’s Century Club has fulfilled its mission of enriching the community by maintaining and preserving the Donald House for future generations. Further, to share our lovely residence with the community we offer, for moderate fees, the opportunity to schedule weddings, receptions, business meetings and other special events. For additional information call (509)453-3921.
LEFT: The view from the top of the WIld Horse Monument near Vantage. ABOVE: The Wild Horse Monument near Vantage. PHOTOS BY ANDY SAWYER
September 2012
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A 2008 story in The Seattle Times reported the project would take about $350,000 to finish and supporters were hoping that money could come from the state. But finding money amid the seemingly endless rounds of budget cuts — and convincing the lawmakers of its merit — have proven to be major stumbling blocks in completing the project. According to state Department of Transportation figures, more than 100 million vehicles have driven past the horses since they were first bolted to the rocky ridge. ◊ — Mike Faulk
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◊ PROSSER
Gravity Hill’s tourist attraction is no illusion
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MYSTERIOUS FINGERPRINTS on the bumper. Cars rolling uphill. A shadowy grain elevator where children were killed. Or where a child fell. Or where a woman drowned. Whatever version of a spooky story accompanies the place, Gravity Hill remains one of the Lower Yakima Valley’s favorite haunted hotspots for teenagers. The “hill” is a remote stretch of North Crosby Road high on the Rattlesnake Ridge about 15 miles north of Prosser. The place of mystery gets its name from an optical illusion that makes cars appear to roll uphill and away from a supposedly haunted nearby elevator. Gravity Hill is such a popular landmark that somebody painted a white start line across the road to indicate
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The legend of Gravity Hill, a stretch of North Crosby Road about 15 miles north of Prosser, has it that cars roll uphill toward the haunted grain elevator in the distance. It has become such a popular teenage haunt, somebody marked the road for other spook chasers. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY ROSS COURTNEY
where drivers begin participating in the gimmick. The story goes something like this: A driver takes friends, younger siblings or a date to Gravity Hill, puts the car in neutral and lets the mysterious forces do their worst. Then, the driver dares them to get out and see for themselves fingerprints left on the dusty bumper by the invisible forces that pushed the car. Spoiler alert: Some versions of the prank involve driving off and stranding friends with the paranormal. One threat is very real though. The road is public, but the grain elevator and all surrounding property are private. Tromping through the fields is trespassing, punishable by up to 90 days in jail and a $1,000 fine. Now that’s scary. ◊ — Ross Courtney
September 2012
MEL’S HOLE ◊ “We’ve been serving the Yakima Valley for over 29 years!”
“WE EXCEL AT WHAT WE DO BEST”
A tale with a lot of mystery, but not much else H U M A N S O F T E N talk of leaving a legacy once they pass from this mortal coil — something that will improve the future of mankind or create a lasting impression. For a guy named Mel who once hung out on Manastash Ridge, that legacy will be a hole. Whether the hole — or even Mel, for that matter — exists remains in dispute. But reading the story of Mel’s Hole provides potentially hours of entertaining research on that great repository of knowledge, the Internet. We know, for example, that the longlived legend of a bottomless hole in the Ellensburg area got its modern rebirth in 1997, when a man calling himself Mel Waters spoke about the mysterious hole on Art Bell’s late-night Coast to Coast radio show. Bell is known for featuring the paranormal and flat-out weird on his show, so there’s that. But Waters has insisted over the years that his hole is real. He said on the radio show that he dropped spool after spool of fishing line down the shaft without ever touching bottom.
He also said that he drove a Chevrolet Suburban, that his wife worked for Central Washington University and that the government reached a secret settlement with him to close off access to the property. And that someone once dropped a dead dog down the hole. It was later seen frolicking in the forest, alive as could be. People known as scientists, including one interviewed by The Seattle Times for an article on a 2002 expedition to search for the hole, point out that the hole is likely geologically unrealistic. Waters, or someone claiming to be him, is last known to have sent a message to whalesinspace.com in 2011. He said he was barred from speaking about the Ellensburg hole under a federal settlement. He said he had discovered a second hole in Nevada, meanwhile, and that everything he said about that hole was true. Furthermore, he disclosed that he had returned to Australia and was working on a wombat refuge. ◊ —Mark Morey
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◊ BICKLETON
Take a ride on Bickleton’s wood-track carousel
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THERE’S AN UNEXPECTED pleasure to be found in this tiny community high atop the Horse Heaven Hills and far from the maddening crowd. Perhaps best known for its vast wheat farms, and more lately for its growing number of wind-power turbines, this town has something that as few as three other communities in the nation can boast: a working Herschell-Spillman carousel. The 1900s-era wood-track carousel has been in Bickleton since 1929, when four local men, Charles Jensen, Chris Jensen, Sam Ganders and Soren Matsen, brought it from Oaks Park, an amusement park in Portland. For nearly eight decades, residents and visitors could only see and ride the carousel’s beautifully painted horses or carriages during the annual Alder Creek Pioneer Picnic and Rodeo in June. But now opportunities are more plentiful. The carousel is housed in the Alder Creek Pioneer Carousel Museum, which
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is open from April to October, attracting an average of 1,500 to 2,000 visitors each season. The museum is located at 4 E. Market St., but on Bickleton’s small main street it’s impossible to miss. For 50 cents, you can ride one of the two dozen carved wooden horses or one of the four carriages. For a dollar bill, you can get three rides. And if you get a friendly operator, your ride may be a bit longer, said Lynn Mains, co-chair of the museum’s board. Funded by $450,000 in state grants, the museum opened in 2007 as a way to permanently house the carousel, but the museum has also been a central place to learn more about the history of East Klickitat County and the neighboring Glade area in Yakima County. “A lot of people leave here and don’t come back from many years,” Mains said. “They’re surprised of how much of their family history is still around.” ◊ — Mai Hoang
September 2012
DID YOU KNOW… That Stein’s Ace Hardware is a full service hardware store that was built by owner Dick Steinmetz in West Valley in 1986?
DID YOU KNOW… Stein’s has expanded and now carries the complete line of
power tools?
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Did You Know...? CLOCKWISE FROM OPPOSITE LEFT: Some restored horses are displayed at the Alder Creek Pioneer Carousel Museum in Bickleton. • One of several historic displays at the Alder Creek Pioneer Carousel Museum. • The Alder Creek Pioneer Carousel Museum is located on Bickleton’s main street. PHOTOS BY ANDY SAWYER
– B & C Sewing & Vacuum Center located on Yakima Ave. is a family owned business that has been servicing the Yakima Valley with top quality sewing & vacuum products since 1976 (for three generations) and that it was started in a garage specializing in industrial sewing machine sales & service. – B & C is Yakima’s only exclusive sewing and vacuum store – featuring the most advanced easy to use Babylock sewing, quilting & embroidery machines and B & C is home to the only Jet-Air Threading, no tension, built-in rolled-hem serger, the Babylock Imagine (the top selling serger in the country). – B & C is also a full line vacuum store featuring top quality vacuum cleaners at affordable prices like Miele, Sebo, Royal, Simplicity, Oreck, Panasonic & more. – B & C offers a full range of fun & exciting sewing classes designed for every level of sewer from the beginner to the expert. – B & C repairs & services over 500 sewing machines every year. Like Bernina, Viking, Pfaff, Singer, Brother, Janome & more. And they repair & service all brands of vacuum cleaners & stocks the Valley’s largest selection of bags, belts & filters for most makes & models.
40.236290.ANN.N
– B & C has always taken great pride to offer great customer service, top quality products, expert technical service and affordable prices, with the understanding that “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”
A PArt of Your Home Since 1976
SALES & SERVICE • PARTS 453-8301 • 613 West Yakima Avenue www.yakimasews.com
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◊ TOPPENISH
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American Hop Museum calls Toppenish home
IN 2006, a single warehouse fire in Yakima took out 4 percent of the world’s supply of hops in one fell swoop. Such a calamity was possible because the Yakima Valley just happens to produce 75 percent of the nation’s (and 25 percent of the world’s) supply of hops, a key flavoring ingredient in beer. Which is why Toppenish is home to the American Hop Museum, billed as the only museum in the nation dedicated to the history of Humulus lupulus, aka hops. So just by reading this you already know a lot more about hops than you ever did. Go there and you can learn even more. Located at 22 S. B St., the museum is housed in a building that was originally opened as Trimble Brothers Creamery in 1917. Today it chronicles the history of the American hops industry from New
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England to California and, ultimately, the Pacific Northwest. Locally that history dates to the late 1860s, when a farmer in the Ahtanum Valley named Charles Carpenter planted rootstock from his father’s farm in New York. Production eventually migrated from Yakima east to Moxee and south Toppenish, gaining 50 percent of the nation’s market by 1963 and a whopping three-quarters today. Exhibits at the museum describe the history, growing process, and unique biology of hops, a perennial vine that produces a flowering cone similar in appearance to a green pine cone. It’s open Wednesday through Sunday from May 1 to Sept. 30. Hours are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. except Sundays, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is $3. ◊ —Chris Bristol
TOP: Displays set up inside the American Hop Museum in Toppenish. ABOVE: Hops grow outside the American Hop Museum in Toppenish. PHOTOS BY ANDY SAWYER
September 2012
YAKIMA ◊
Larson Building lobby is a gateway to grandeur
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STEP INTO THE LOBBY of the Larson Building and step back to the 1930s. Black marble walls are embedded with fossilized seashells. The floors are terrazzo with brass inlay. The colors are sophisticated: mauve, salmon, teal and yellow. You can all but hear Duke Ellington and his swing jazz standards. At the southwest corner of Yakima Avenue and Second Street in downtown Yakima, the Larson Building was built in the same era as other art deco classics — the Rainbow Room at Rockefeller Center comes to mind — with the same attention to detail and craftsmanship. Built in 1931 by A.E. Larson, a Yakima developer, the 11-story structure remains
September 2012
The lobby of the 11-story Larson Building in downtown Yakima. Built in 1931, it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. PHOTO BY GORDON KING
a local gem with a well-earned spot on the National Register of Historic Places. Larson was a founder of the Yakima Chamber of Commerce and served as a Yakima Rotary Club president. He died in June 1934, just three years after the brick tower was completed. He spared no expense on the structure, which cost about $750,000, according to local historians. Larson insisted on attention to every detail, including the bathrooms, which are tiled in marble and ceramic with thick mahogany doors. So “take the A train” to the lobby of the Larson building and experience an era when craftsmanship was king. ◊ — Leah Beth Ward
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◊ YAKIMA
The antenna array is located on the Yakima Training Center outside Selah. PHOTO BY ANDY SAWYER
You can keep your eye on the NSA — from afar, of course
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THE CLOSEST MOST PEOPLE will ever come to the Yakima Research Station is their car, zooming by on Interstate 82. Operated by the secretive National Security Agency, it is located within the U.S. Army’s Yakima Training Center, where it is off-limits to the public. Its “research” is a euphemism for “eavesdropping,” or intercepting satellite communications traffic such as email and cellphone calls. Not that the NSA wants to discuss exactly what happens there. Training Center officials routinely decline to take questions on the topic or refer them to NSA headquarters in Fort Meade, Md.
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But observers of the intelligence community say that the station is a key part of an international monitoring system known as Echelon, which is described as global surveillance network that operates with counterparts in Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. There is also a sister installation in Sugar Grove, W.Va. Built in the 1970s, the facility has been mentioned in several books on national security, but otherwise has attracted little attention. “In the entire country, it happens to be in your back yard,” James Bamford, a former ABC News investigative producer who first documented the Yakima installation in his groundbreaking 1982 book on the NSA
called The Puzzle Palace,”told the Yakima Herald-Republic in 2006. “It doesn’t make noise, doesn’t send smoke,” he said. “It’s almost invisible. The whole agency is virtually invisible.” The NSA was created by President Harry S. Truman in 1952. Its early years involved wiretapping telephones and telegraph lines. But experts say that by the late 1960s, the federal agency had an array of listening posts capable of intercepting satellite signals. Some experts estimate that the NSA has 38,000 to 52,000 employees worldwide. It is not known how many work at the Yakima Research facility. ◊ — Mark Morey
September 2012
YAKIMA ◊ Do extraterrestrial communications peak near Mount Adams?
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WHEN PEOPLE SAY parts of the Yakima Valley area are unlike anything in this world, they aren’t talking about the rolling scenery, the bountiful harvests or the renowned wineries. They’re pointing to something in the sky. The first documented report of a UFO sighting in the nation occurred over the Yakama reservation in 1947 when rescue pilot Kenneth Arnold was searching for a crashed airplane and instead saw nine bright objects skipping like saucers over water. A Discovery Channel show broadcast several years ago called the Yakima area, in particular parts of the Yakama reservation, among the world’s top hot spots for strange lights. And perhaps nowhere else have more strange things in the sky been reported than from fire lookouts in a closed section of the Yakama reservation east of the crest of the Cascades. The fire tower atop 5,100-foot Signal Peak, about 21 miles southwest of White Swan, has been the site of repeated UFO sighting over the decades. Reports also have come from the Satus Peak fire tower, located on a 4,182-foot ridge about 25 miles southwest of Toppenish. The Discovery Channel documentary included an interview with a woman who manned the Satus Peak fire tower. She said during her decades as a fire watcher she witnessed hundreds of unexplained lights in the sky. No single database records how many sightings have been reported, but a search of terms such as “Yakima” and “UFOs” on YouTube yields one amateur video after another of flashing lights of all colors moving erratically across the sky. If the videos indicate anything, extraterrestrials seem to love the view of Mount Adams just as much as we do from the ground. ◊ — Mike Faulk
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◊ YAKIMA
Reflector art by Ellensburg artist Richard C. Elliott adorns the top of the Yakima SunDome. PHOTOS BY SARA GETTYS
The SunDome’s exterior reflects Ellensburg artist’s vision
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IT’S NOT JUST THE SIZE of the Yakima Valley SunDome that catches the eye, but artistic details that separate the facility from your average arena. The indigenous-inspired artwork that rings the base of the dome’s roof was the first major commissioned public art piece by Ellensburg artist Richard C. Elliott, whose work has been featured far and wide in places such as New York City’s Times Square. The reflector art, named as such for the 48,480 colorful, 3-inch reflectors that glimmer brilliantly at dawn and dusk, was inspired by the traditional cornhusk basket designs made by Yakama tribal members.
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Dubbed Circle of Light by Elliott, the artwork was completed in 1992 and is believed to be the largest art project of its kind in the world. The wall itself stands at 5 feet, 4 inches tall and is 880 feet in circumference, and Elliott placed each of the industrial neon reflectors there by hand. According to a 1999 essay by Elliott, he abandoned his original interest in drawing naturalistic landscapes and portraits in the 1980s for the reflector art that became his new concept of “realism.” Elliott patented his process of making art with reflectors. He did similar works for the New York Transit System; Minneapolis’ light-rail system;
the University of Washington’s Henry Art Gallery; and the Ellensburg Public Library. A work for Sound Transit in Seattle was honored by Americans for the Arts as one of the outstanding public artworks for 2007. When Elliott was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer and his physical strength diminished, he returned to oil paint on canvas and then, as his condition worsened, he began working on computer imaging. Elliott died at his Ellensburg home Nov. 19, 2008. He was 63, and had plans for several dozen unfinished works on his computer. ◊ — Mike Faulk
September 2012
TOPPENISH ◊
Winter Lodge at the Yakama Nation Cultural Center. PHOTO BY GORDON KING
Yakama Nation Cultural Center offers peek at history
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THE YAKAMA NATION CULTURAL CENTER, more than simply a museum, is a window into the past, a look at the lives of those who have lived here for thousands of years before the first settlers arrived. Opened in 1980, the Yakama Nation Museum chronicles the traditions of the Yakamas with displays documenting dwellings, food, art and music and the contributions of the nation’s military veterans. The exhibit includes hundreds of photos of members of the Yakama Nation who served in wars back to World War I, as well as military uniforms and weapons. The museum is one of the oldest Native American museums in the U.S. While the museum is the main historical attraction, the cultural center also includes the Heritage Inn Restaurant, a gift shop, a movie theater and the Yakama Nation Library.
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Included in the cultural center campus is the multi-use Winter Lodge, a 76-foot-tall building that has played host to events ranging from trade shows to state legislative meetings to community celebrations. Visible from the highway, the lodge was modeled after an ancient Yakama Nation lodge and meeting hall. The Cultural Center is located on Buster Road just off of U.S. Highway 97 and Fort Road in Toppenish, about 18 miles south of Yakima. Different parts of the center have different operating hours; the museum is open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday. Adult tickets are $6, while seniors and kids age 11-18 can get in for $4 and kids under age 10 get in for $2. To check operating hours for the rest of the center, go to www.yakamamuseum.com/ home.php or call 509-865-2800. ◊ —Molly Rosbach
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◊ YAKIMA
Museum’s attractions are good to glow
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THE YAKIMA VALLEY MUSEUM has a lot to look at — art, local history, traveling exhibits — but the most striking thing is the Neon Garden. Ringing the museum’s bottom floor, the “garden” is a collection of vintage neon signs celebrating Yakima’s smallcity Americana. There are fruit industry signs, a bicycle shop sign and a glowing white Union Gospel Mission cross with the words “Jesus Saves.” In the museum description’s own words, the garden is “a celebration of what Yakima is.” The rest of the permanent exhibits fill out that picture. There is a collection of agricultural equipment, a display of Yakama Nation cultural artifacts, pristinely preserved horse-drawn vehicles and a recreation of the Miocene forest that illustrates the Yakima Valley’s geological history.
In the midst of all this, the museum regularly hosts concerts sponsored by the Yakima Folklife Association including the annual Folklife Festival in the summer, which extends out into adjacent Franklin Park. It’s a combination that exemplifies the museum’s mission as not just a repository of history but a center for contemporary culture. The working soda fountain and restaurant connected to the museum is just another example of that. It could be a museum piece itself, but if you step inside you can still get a milkshake. The museum, 2105 Tieton Drive, is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Admission is $5, $3 for students and free for children 5 years old and younger. There is a $12 family rate. ◊ — Pat Muir
CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: Neon signs on display at the Yakima Valley Museum in Yakima. • The Land of Joy and Sorrow exhibit at the Yakima Valley Museum. • The Yakima Valley Museum in Yakima. PHOTOS BY ANDY SAWYER
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Shop Local, Shop Chalet • Anytime Fitness • Oak Hollow Gallery & Frames • English Country Market • e-nails • Cake Decorator’s Shoppe • Wray’s • Craig’s Jewelry • Blue Sage Salon • Starbucks • Edward Jones • Bead & Body • Heritage-Moultray • Boehm’s Chocolates • Glisten Hair & Tanning • Inklings Bookshop • Quizno’s • U.S. Bank • Go Wireless • Viking Sewing • Loo Wit Gardens
Chalet Place • 56th & Summitview • Yakima
40.236334.ANN.N
Your neighborhood shopping center since 1966
40.236861.ANN.N
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◊ TOPPENISH
Valley history, one mural at a time
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ALL TOGETHER, 74 of them — each different, each historically accurate, each a significant work of art — these are the Toppenish outdoor murals. You’ll find them garnishing buildings all over the downtown and scattered through outer neighborhoods. Around just about every corner, a work of art peeks out. Colorful, vibrant and painted with precision, each hones in on a different slice of life from yesteryear. They depict actual events in the area’s history, everything from cowboys driving cattle, Native American women weaving cedar baskets, pickers harvesting hops, a stagecoach hauling passengers, braceros (workers who
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came from Mexico to help harvest the crops in the 1940s) tilling land and a female rodeo star riding her pony. Plus 68 more. The mural tradition began in 1989 with Clearing the Land, showing the arduous work of plowing fields of sagebrush to plant crops and build a homestead. About a dozen artists painted that work on the wall of a downtown building in one day as a celebration of the Washington Centennial. Mural in a Day is a legacy of that first work. Not only did the town’s mural society, made up of community volunteers, decide to commission more murals for outdoor walls, it also made
September 2012
Some of the 74 murals in Toppenish. PHOTOS BY TJ MULLINAX
painting a giant piece of art in one day an annual event. Every year the first Saturday in June is the day for the creation of a new mural-in-a-day. The whole town — and then some — comes out to watch. Artists from around the Northwest, who are paid professional wages for their work, join in on mural-in-a-day. The latest one-day creation, the town’s 74th mural, portrays a vintage butcher shop and meat market. Some as long as 200 feet, the murals pay homage to the men and women who contributed to building the area through rugged conditions. The 50 or so murals that weren’t painted in a day were all commissioned
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by the society and done by well-known Western artists. Volunteers from the mural society do copious research to make sure all depictions are accurate. To get started on viewing the artistic works, a good place to stop is the Toppenish Chamber of Commerce office, 504 S. Elm St. A horse-drawn covered wagon offers tours, which saves energy and sore legs. Called the town “Where West Still Lives,” Toppenish receives visitors from around the country and world, for its agricultural products and wineries, but many maintain that it all began with the Old West murals. ◊ — Jane Gargas
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◊ YAKIMA VALLEY
Fort Simcoe shares long history for U.S. government, Native American culture
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NOW TUCKED AWAY in a relatively remote corner of the Yakima Valley, Fort Simcoe was once the center of activity for the earliest official U.S. government business in the region. Before that, the site was of significant tribal importance, both as a campground and a place where many trails crossed. Today, it’s a 200-acre state park with much to offer both the nature and history enthusiasts, including an interpretive center depicting life during the mid-19th century and providing a glimpse of Native American culture. It’s an area of both cultural and natural significance, according to Andy Stepniewski of the Yakima Valley Audubon Society. If you want to see the Lewis Woodpecker, look no further than the Garry Oak trees, which are plentiful at the park, he said. Stepniewski says park visitors should also be on the lookout for black bears.
“I’ve seen as many as seven at one time,” he said. “They come out of the hills every fall and they like to bunch up by the pears and acorns in late summer and early fall.” Of course, there is an equally important historic component to the park. Fort Simcoe was an 1850s-era military installation meant to keep peace between the settlers and the tribes. Five original buildings are still standing at the fort: the commander’s house, three captain’s houses and a blockhouse. Located at 5150 Fort Simcoe Road, the park was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in June 1974. A free family weekend each June pays tribute to military and Fort Simcoe History. Events may include military re-enactors and living history specialists, traditional tribal dancers and a flag raising ceremony. For more information, call 509-874-2372. ◊ — Scott Mayes
CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: Officers quarters at Fort Simcoe State Park. • A broad lawn stretches out from the officers quarters at Fort Simcoe State Park. • An interior of one of the commanding officers’ quarters. PHOTOS BY ANDY SAWYER
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◊ TOPPENISH
Train lovers can relive glory days at Toppenish museum
The Northern Pacific Railway Museum in downtown Toppenish.
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PHOTOS BY TJ MULLINAX
FOR FIVE DECADES of the 20th century, trains picked up and dropped off passengers at the depot in downtown Toppenish. No longer, however, is the depot the town’s major transportation hub. Today, the depot houses the Northern Pacific Railway Museum, which offers a view of the Northern Pacific Railway’s halcyon days. Larry Rice, the museum’s director and curator, estimates the museum has more than $1 million in restored vintage train engines and other memorabilia. Museum volunteers are working on additional engines that will one day be displayed at the museum.
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The museum also holds a variety of school tours, experiences and events to better educate visitors. “This is 100 percent history,” Rice said. After Northern Pacific ended passenger rail service in the 1960s, the train depot was vacant for three decades. By the 1980s, the building was boarded up. In 1989, a group of railroad enthusiasts formed the Yakima Valley Rail and Steam Museum Association in hopes of restoring the building for a new museum. That dream became reality when the museum opened on July 4, 1992.
The museum has a shoestring annual budget of $35,000 to $40,000, Rice said. Everyone involved with the museum volunteers their time. Most of the museum’s revenue comes from admission — $5 for adults, $3 for children 17 and younger —and annual fundraisers including its well-known Toy Train Christmas event, where children ride a caboose, meet Santa Claus and snack on cookies and hot chocolate. The museum, located at 10 S. Asotin Ave., is open from May to October. Hours for the museum are 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday to Saturday and noon to 4 p.m. Sunday. ◊ — Mai Hoang
September 2012
GOLDENDALE ◊
Visit the stars, while staying close to home
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TO TOUR THE HEAVENS, head to Klickitat County. The Goldendale Observatory State Park offers visitors a closer view of stars, asteroids and planets. The observatory, which sits on a hill near Goldendale, houses one of the nation’s largest public telescopes and attracts more than 20,000 visitors a year. “I give everybody who visits me a tour of the universe and get them back home safely in less than four hours,” said Stephen Stout, the observatory’s interpretive specialist. Depending on conditions, Stout shows visitors Earth’s moon, planets, star clusters, binary stars and more. The observatory’s 24.5-inch mirror telescope is the product of four Vancouver-area men’s passion for astronomy. None of the four — Don Conner, Mack McConnell, Omer VanVelden and John Marshall — was
September 2012
The Goldendale Observatory, which opened in 1973, houses one of the nation’s largest public telescopes and attracts more than 20,000 visitors a year. PHOTO BY ROSS COURTNEY
a professional astronomer and only one even had a college degree when they began building the telescope from scratch in the 1960s, according to a history written by Don Hardin, an observatory volunteer. The group originally intended the telescope for Clark College in Vancouver, Wash., but the area’s often-cloudy weather and ambient light from the city prompted the men to offer a deal to Goldendale if it constructed a building. The city agreed, and the observatory opened in 1973. The observatory garnered national prominence in 1979 when it became one of the best places to observe the last total eclipse of the sun visible from the continental United States until 2017. Professional astronomers, national media members and amateur star gazers flocked to the site.
“There are literally thousands of people gathered at this small observatory,” ABC science correspondent Jules Bergman reported during a live broadcast. As the moon slid in front of the sun, ABC news anchor Frank Reynolds noted the high quality of the image from the observatory’s telescope. “It’s a remarkably clear picture,” he said. In 1980, the state’s Parks Department bought the facility from Goldendale. Today, the observatory and its volunteer staff give visitors a chance to explore the sky above us. Located at 1602 Observatory Drive, its hours are: April 1 to Sept. 30, open Wednesday through Sunday, 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. and 8 p.m. to midnight; Oct. 1 to March 31, open Friday through Sunday, 2 to 5 p.m. and 7 to 10 p.m.
◊ — Dan Catchpole
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◊ YAKIMA
For entertainment, the Capitol Theatre still rises above the rest
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YAKIMA’S CULTURAL grand dame, the Capitol Theatre, started as a vaudeville house, transitioned to a movie theater, nearly got torn down for lack of interest and devastated by fire shortly thereafter. Yet, there she sits today, the hub of Yakima’s entertainment scene, hosting acts as disparate as Broadway touring companies and hip-hop groups. The theater’s resilience is a testament to its importance, but that’s not to say its history is without a couple of neardeath experiences. Opened in 1920 by Frederick Mercy, the Capitol was originally called the Mercy Theatre and was the largest of its kind in the Northwest. It saw the end of the vaudeville era and the rise of film, but by the 1970s had lost its luster and was put on the market by the Mercy family. The city of Yakima bought the theater in 1975 with an eye toward
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preserving it. But only days later it was gutted by fire. In a rallying moment in Yakima’s history, the Capitol Theatre Committee was formed and raised enough money to fully restore the grand old theater, including its guilded ceiling. It reopened in 1978 with Bob Hope as a guest performer. The theater is still owned by the city and run by the committee, which coordinates an annual Best of Broadway series as well as administering rental use of the building by musical acts and others. In 2010, a large-scale expansion resulted in the opening of an adjacent black-box performance space, the 4th Street Theatre, which is designed to showcase hipper, edgier, youngerskewing acts.
ABOVE LEFT: Yakima’s Capitol Theatre was built in 1920 by Frederick Mercy and sold to the city of Yakima in 1975. It burned the same year but was restored and reopened in 1978. PHOTO BY ANDY SAWYER
ABOVE: A contestant performs in the Miss Apple Valley pageant in August 2012 in the Capitol Theatre. PHOTO BY TJ MULLINAX
The Capitol Theatre is located at 19 S. Third St. More information can be found at www.capitoltheatre.org. ◊ — Pat Muir
September 2012
YAKIMA ◊
Yakima’s own big apple is a jewel on this golf course
For sound advice on investment and insurance planning see Suzi Williams
Financial Advisor
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110 N. 5th Ave Yakima 509-972-5472
PHOTO BY GORDON KING
In reality, it’s not the most difficult hole, she said. “(Most) people par it, and they’re a little bit surprised,” she said. The hole has been featured in a number of golf publications and websites, including best-of golf lists from by The Seattle Times and Washington CEO. No. 17 has also been a venue for many events — including marriage proposals. One such proposal can involve the man hiding a ring inside the hole. After playing the hole, the man will ask the woman to get the ball from the hole, where she discovers the ring. “The proposals are really cool,” MacNider said. “We go out of our way to make it work.” ◊ — Mai Hoang
Located at Solarity Credit Union Representatives are registered, securities are sold, and investment advisory services offered through CUNA Brokerage Services, Inc. (CBSI), member FINRA/SIPC, a registered broker/dealer and investment advisor, 2000 Heritage Way, Waverly, Iowa 50677, toll-free 800-369-2862. Nondeposit investment and insurance products are not federally insured, involve investment risk, may lose value and are not obligations of or guaranteed by the financial institution. CBSI is under contract with the financial institution, through the financial services program, to make securities available to members.
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EVERY GOLF COURSE has its signature. For the 18-hole course at Yakima’s Apple Tree Resort, that signature is hole No. 17, an apple-shaped green island sitting in a big pond. “You recognize it immediately as Apple Tree,” said Cindy MacNider, Apple Tree’s director of golf. The hole — which is accessed via a stem-shaped bridge — has a par of 3. Depending on the set of tees a golfer uses, the hole can measure anywhere from 106 to 180 yards. Because the hole is surrounded by water and includes a leafshaped sand trap, many new golfers are initially intimidated by it, MacNider said.
The 17th hole at the Apple Tree Golf Course.
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September 2012
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