From frontier towns to the Silicon forest

This Valentine’s Day, the state of Oregon will celebrate 150 years of statehood. When Oregon was fighting for statehood its frontier towns were surrounded by rugged forests. 

The forests have now shrunk some but Oregon still retains some of the West’s best wilderness. Since then, the state has had to temper business with ecology as it has grown from a collection of tiny towns to one of the West Coast’s most desirable places to live and work.  

A new book, Ooligan Press’s Oregon at Work, chronicles both the history of Oregon and what it was like to live and work in the state over the past 150 years, according to production staffer Natalie Emery. It will use personal histories collected by authors Tom Fuller and Art Ayre to help tell those stories.

Oregon at Work is due out in bookstores in early April of this year and promises to read like a coffee-table version of the exhibits at the Oregon Historical Society museum, according to one of the project’s supporters.

On Feb. 14 there will be a book launch at the museum before Oregon at Work hits bookstores. You can hear excerpts from the book at the Oregon History Society on Feb. 14 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

In anticipation of the historic anniversary, the state of Oregon charged the Oregon 150 Commission with commemorating Oregon’s first 150 years. Among the projects is the Ooligan Press publication.  

Ooligan Press, Portland State’s nonprofit press, regularly features works by local authors. Dennis Stovall is a Portland State professor and director at Ooligan. 

“Oregon at Work is a wonderful example of PSU’s engagement with the community,” Stovall said. “It is a collaboration between the authors, who work for the Oregon Department of Labor, and the graduate students of Ooligan Press, and the result is a beautiful book that showcases Oregon’s past while pointing us to its future.” 

To tell the story, the state turned to Fuller and Ayre. Fuller has a background in local broadcast news and is a communications manager with the state of Oregon. Ayre also works for the state as an economist. 

Ayre delivered historic photos and documents and Fuller put the story to words. According to the staff at Ooligan, the team came up with a candid portrayal of the state’s first century and a half. Those years may have contained as many challenges as it did triumphs for the young state and its residents. Fuller and Ayre captured it all. 

During its early history, just surviving in Oregon ensured that “you were already the underdog,” Ooligan publisher Anna Noak observed. The fact that Oregon’s history is laced with ordeal only makes the saga more notable.

Some of the stories read more like local legend. Life in Oregon was a challenge in frontier times. In the Ooligan press release for Oregon at Work, the team at Ooligan states that it is the “personal stories passed down through generations” that shows today’s Oregon the reality of frontier life and maybe the real history and connection between now and then.