John Day Fossil Beds Historic Resources Study

Chapter Eight:
TOURISM AND RECREATION (continued)

Cultural Resources Summary

Owing to late settlement and difficult travel, tourism and recreation in Grant and Wheeler counties was slow to begin and limited in scale. To date, recreation and tourism has left a far less visible imprint on the landscape of the area. Surviving cultural resources associated with this theme are less prevalent than those linked to ranching, mining, and lumbering, and for the most part are more recent in date. Buildings and structures related to traveler services especially tend to be clustered in towns.

Early residents and a small number of visitors from outlying parts of Oregon quietly enjoyed the handful of mineral and hot springs resorts tucked into high valleys. Some of these facilities continued in operation into the middle years of the century and may still retain extant features. State parks at the John Day Fossil Beds, and other small private camps, county parks, forest camps, and state park waysides took shape along stretches of improved roads from the 1930s through the 1970s. The earliest of these was Pioneer Park, established in 1903. The land for Shelton Wayside State Park on SR 19 was donated in the 1930s by Kinzua owner E.D. Wetmore in honor of his timber cruiser Shelton (Stinchfield 1983: 256).

Fig. 70. Independent gas station in Canyon City, c. 1925. F. K. Lentz, 1996 (National Park Service)

In the early decades of auto tourism, gas, food, and lodging services sprang up at many small crossroads hamlets. In more recent decades, overnight facilities for travelers have concentrated in the incorporated communities of Fossil, Mitchell, and John Day, with limited gas and food available in the smaller towns like Dayville and Kimberly. Period gas stations and garages; hotels, motels and tourist cabins; cafes and restaurants dating from the 1920s through the 1960s can be found scattered along the main streets of most of the larger communities in the two-county area.

Today, tourist interest in and around the National Monument continues to depend on its paleontological and scenic values. Within a wider circle, however, outdoor recreation and cultural tourism are increasingly important draws as well. Grant County's promotion of its early gold mining and cattle ranching history has helped to elevate heritage tourism to an important element of the local economy. The federal designation of the John Day River as a National Wild and Scenic River in the late 1970s has spawned a local river rafting industry, and boosted Wheeler County's share of the recreational tourism dollar.

In 1997, local governments and chambers of commerce, funded by a USDA Rural Development Grant, pooled information and energies to develop an interpretive driving tour called Journey Through Time: Tour 50 Million Years of Oregon's Past, Points of Interest. The program is promoted as a 286-mile-long loop tour through the Oregon Department of Transportation's Scenic Byways Program. The tour route enters the Monument area at Fossil, and follows SR 19 and US 26 past Sheep Rock, the Cant Ranch, and Picture Gorge, and on to John Day. Distinctive interpretive signage along the route identifies some forty-four natural and cultural attractions, including the units and features of the Monument.

Fig. 71. Advent Christian Church, built in 1898, now a tourist attraction in the town of John Day. F.K. Lentz, 1996 (National Park Service)

No cultural resources specifically associated with the history of tourism and recreation in Grant or Wheeler Counties are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

No cultural resources associated with the history of tourism and recreation, other than several turn-of-the-century hotels presented in previous chapters, are listed in the Oregon State Inventory of Historic Places for Grant and Wheeler counties.

Area tourism literature for places associated with the history of recreation and tourism (in addition to scenic overlooks within the Monument, and various picnic and campgrounds of uncertain date) list only two sites:

• Shelton Wayside State Park, dating from the 1930s

• Julia Henderson Pioneer Park, established 1903

Two suggestions are made with regard to cultural resources associated with the context of Tourism and Recreation:

1. 1. Consider working with the Grant County Historical Society to support research into the early mineral and hot spring resorts in Grant County. A field survey of known locations and a recording of extant features would be an important first step in this process. As a final product, a well-documented, pictorial booklet would add much to visitor understanding of early recreation in this remote setting.

2. 2. Develop an inventory of any early State Parks era features such as landscaping, signage, camping and/or picnic structures in the units of the Monument. Over time, retaining such features whenever possible will help to preserve the tangible history of the human origins of John Day Fossil Beds National Monument.