SALEM in 2012

World Events

• Costa Concorda cruise ship, just beginning a tour around the Mediterranean, wrecks near Tuscan island of Giglio causing the largest shipwreck in history. The ship had diverted from its planned route and struck a rock. Compensation for lives and property rose to $2 billion.
• Arab Spring uprisings continue with civil war in Syria, elections disputed in Egypt and the Tunisian president imprisoned. In Libya, the Benghazi US Consulate attacked with loss of Ambassador Chris Stevens and 2 other American staff members.
• Disaster strikes the Philippines when super typhoon Bopha causes 170,000 people to flee to evacuation centers. Destruction in the city of  Mindanao leaves thousands homeless
• 2000 American casualties in our 11th year of war in Afghanistan.
• In Connecticut, the Sandy Hook School shooting kills twenty children aged 6 and 7 as well as 6 adult staff members and the 20-year old shooter. Despite public and congressional debate about the availability and sale of semi-automatic guns, no legislative change is made.
• After 246 years of publication, the Encyclopedia Britannia discontinues print publication.
•  Academy Awards: "Argo" (US), "Amour" (Austria) Prize-winning book: The Round House, Louise Erdrich.

In Salem 

 The Salem Chamber Orchestra brought Play Me, I'm Yours to Salem with 11 street pianos distributed across the streets of Salem and Keizer. Located in public parks, streets and even on the Union Street Bridge, the pianos were there for the public to play and enjoy. After being in place for two weeks, the pianos were donated to local nonprofit organizations.

Piano on Union Street Bridge decorated by Gilbert Children's Museum

When You Visit

The pianos were located in the places listed in the following link.

http://streetpianos.com/salem2012/ 

Other Local Events

• In January, heavy rain caused many streams, including Mill Creek, to overflow their banks. Muddy water covered several Salem streets and parking lots. Homes and basements were flooded. 
• KMUZ, our local non-profit, public service radio station was flooded out of its basement quarters.  A move to 245 Division Street provided the crew and their equipment with a permanent home. The KMUZ archive, available here allows listeners to check up on their favorite programs and be introduced to new ones.
• Janet Taylor, our previous mayor who served an unprecedented four terms, was named First Citizen of the Year by the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce.
• Anna Peterson is re-elected to serve as a second term as mayor without opposition.
• The recently completed renovation of the Oregon State Hospital's only original structure, the Kirkbride Building, as shown below, has a new cultural exhibit.

The Museum of Mental Health at the Oregon State Hospital was opened in October of this year. It is dedicated to telling the stories of the Oregon State Hospital and the people that have lived and worked here. Our 2,500 square foot museum, located in the oldest building on the Oregon State Hospital campus includes permanent and changing exhibits.  The museum effort was headed by Hazel Patton and is currently run by volunteers supported by the generous donations of community members and competitive grants. It contains artifacts from the award-winning movie, "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest" which was filmed at this hospital. See more references to the renovated hospital in the information for 2009.

• Originally constructed by Karl J. Peters, the modest bungalow above has served continuously as a residence since 1925.The Peters owned the house until 1937. It changed hands five times through the 1940s until it was purchased by Ole P. and Dorothy Nielson in 1950. They owned the house for the longest period of time, 45 years. The house is a typical example of the modest housing that was constructed in the mid-1920s in this neighborhood for blue-collar tradespeople. Even though this block was excluded from the Gaiety Hill/Bush Pasture Park National Register Historic District, just to the north, it represents a period development in South Salem which defines the character of the neighborhood. It was placed on the city's list of Local Landmarks in 2012.  

• Bridges, pro and con, are subjects of action and debate. Friends of Two Bridges announces OYFF  (On Your Feet Friday), a series of events intended to help increase awareness and funding for the proposed Minto Bridge. 

• In contrast, local groups, organized under the banner of "No 3rd Bridge" are protesting the City Council project of many years past for a pass-through, heavy traffic highway from the Salem Parkway in North Salem (crossing Front Street at Pine Street) and  continuing over the Willamette River to a landing in West Salem. This would facilitate commercial transportation between Portland and Highway 22 to the coast. Opponents of the "3rd Bridge" cite the damage to the North Salem residential area, the interference with Willamette River natural resources and disruption of West Salem neighborhoods. A diagram showing the path of this bridge can be seen here.

Salem in 1991

World Events

• US and UN forces enter Gulf War with operation "Desert Storm" to expel Iraqi forces from Kuwait. Seventh months later, Iraqi soldiers in retreat set fire to Kuwaiti oil fields. These fires put out after extensive efforts.
• The 74 year-old Soviet Union collapses as 11 member nations become independent. Russia is renamed as the Russian Federation with Boris Yeltsin as elected president. The city of St. Petersburg regains its name. Yugoslavia is divided into Croatia and Slovenia. Germany regains complete independence from WW II occupying countries.
• Exxon pays one billion dollars to clean up Valdez oil spill.
• Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice, retires. In the confirmation hearings for nominee Clarance Thomas, former aid Anita Hill testifies to his abusing her. Her testimony is disregarded and he is confirmed.
• The police beating of Rodney King is caught on tape and shown on world-wide on TV. Four Los Angeles police officers go on trail.
• The Academy Awards: "Silence of the Lambs"(US),"Mediterraneo (Italy) Prize-winning Books: Mating, Norman Rush and Rabbit at Rest, John Updike.

In Salem

Oregon State Archives Building

In 1991 the Cecil L. Edwards Archives Building was completed. Prior to 1946 Oregon had no Archive structure, no unified approach existed for preserving historical state records. The Secretary of State had custody of the records of the Legislative Assembly and the Governor. All other departments and agencies cared for their own records or placed them in the State Library, however many were presumably destroyed. Moreover, the fire that destroyed the state Capitol in 1935 consumed additional valuable records. The 1945 Legislative Assembly allocated a small amount of money to start the program under the State Library. David Duniway was hired in 1947 as Oregon's first state archivist and served for almost thirty years. He set up shop in the basement of the State Library Building, developing policies and procedures designed to improve government record keeping and preserve the most valuable documents. Eventually, the operation moved into a large warehouse with four floors of storage. Further growth and the need for climate controlled storage areas led to the opening of the current building.

When you Visit
In the Lobby of the Archives visitors are processed into the building and its records for individuals use. Archivists within the Reading room will help find the appropriate records.

North Capitol Mall Review 1937-1991

North Capitol Mall before 1984

North Capitol Mall was now complete except for one more building that would be erected in 2002-3, the Capitol Mall Office Building. This undated photograph (also featured in an earlier year)  was taken before 1984 when the state had not finished constructing buildings in the area within the dotted lines. The State Agriculture and Employment buildings are completed, facing south to Union Street. Residences remain in the blocks north, toward D Street (lower dotted line) between Capitol and Summer Streets. They will be moved or demolished for the Veterans' Affairs Building and for the Archives (see below).
At left center of the photograph above, where the Mill Creek crosses Capitol Street, stood the Cole house, now on Hood Street. To the north (toward the foreground of the photograph) was the Hinges/Kimball house, now a private residence at 1075 Capitol Street. The neighboring Parrish and Rockenfield houses, owned by the City of Salem, are at A. C. Gilbert Discovery Village. These properties are all designated as Local Landmarks.
Before the state construction, Parrish Street cut west across from Capitol Street, and many smaller houses on each side were moved to Williams Street. The small courtyard apartments on D Street (see them at left above dotted line) are in an adjoining Williams Street development created for them.
On the area between Summer and Winter streets, the State Lands Building was completed in 1990. Several houses on the east side of Winter Street escaped demolition: the historic Moon House and German Methodist Parsonage were moved to complex of older homes off D Street and completely renovated to retain their original integrity; the Stiff, Huntington, and McGilchrist house were incorporated as offices into the Capitol Mall Heritage Park at D Street between Summer and Winter Streets. This natural area south of "D" Street and bordering Mill Creek is landscaped for pleasant moments of reflection by this historic waterway. Grant Neighborhood is directly north of "D" Street.
Other events

• R.G. Andersen-Wyckoff becomes mayor.
• This busy activity of the Salem Public Library is interrupted this year by a major renovation that caused the facility to temporarily relocate for several months during construction. One handsome addition of the main floor was the Heritage Room, the result of the generosity and the foresight of the descendants of two Salem Area families. It honors Max and Martha Gehlar and Gov. Douglas and Mabel McKay. Handsome tables, chairs and cabinets were built by Dave and Bob Anderson as their contribution to the Heritage Room. The new Loucks Lecture hall was named for former mayor, Al Loucks, an active library supporter. Not so apparent to the public was the establishment of the library's database, with its Oregon Historical Photograph Collections (used generously in this feature).
• Jim Scheppke is appointed the State Librarian, a position he held for 20 years until his retirement in 2011. As a convenience for visits to the State Library and other buildings of the North Capitol Mall, an underground parking garage serving the North Capitol Mall is added at this time.
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  The World War I Doughboy at Oregon Veterans Memorial Park

  The 1924 World War I Doughboy statue is relocated to the memorial park at the Veterans' Building. It is now a part of a collection of military memorials north of the building and along Winter Street on the west side of Mill Creek. 
•  To acknowledge the health risks of tobacco use, the Salem Hospital becomes smoke-free. In the next ten years, smoking in Oregon's commercial establishments and all public buildings will disappear.
• Proposition 5 passes: Property taxes dedicated for school funding were capped at $15.00 per $1,000 of real market value per year, and gradually lowered to $5. Property taxes for other purposes were capped at $10 per $1,000 per year. Thus the total property tax rate would be 1.5% at the end of the five-year phase in period. The measure transferred the responsibility for school funding from local government to the state, to equalize funding.
• A local ballot proposal to fund a Willamette riverside park and hotel on city property purchased from Boise Cascade is defeated.
• The Willamette Landing condominium complex is completed on Water Street in North Salem offering housing directly on the shore of the Willamette River. The lack of interest in purchasing "condos" leads the owner to offer the units as rentals.

Salem in 1974

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World Events

• Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia, highly respected by world political and religious leaders since 1916, is deposed after a critical famine. This ends the Solomonic dynasty begun in 1270. He died the following year.
• When impeachment conviction by Congress becomes certain, Richard Nixon resigns. Gerald Ford becomes President and pardons Nixon.
• India detonates a nuclear weapon, being the 6th nation to do so.
• OPEC oil rises from $4 to $12 a barrel; concern rises over nuclear energy.
• Patty Hearst, grand-daughter of publisher, Willam Randolph Hearst, is kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army with whom she participates in a bank robbery and other crimes. Imprisoned for two years, she was later pardoned. (Read the complete story in American Heiress, Jeffrey Toobin, 2016)
• Muhammad Ali regains his boxing title at the "Rumble in the Jungle" in Kinshasa, Zaire.
• After 23 years, "Here's Lucy" ends its TV series. The Rubik Cube is invented. Hank Aaron becomes all-time MLB home run leader with his 715th. Rosenkowitz sextuplets all survive in the Cape Town birth.
• The Academy Award: "The Godfather Part II" (US),"Amarcord (Italy). Prize-winning Books: Gravity's Rainbow, Thomas Pychon and A Crown of Feathers and Other Stories, Issac Bashevis Singer.

In Salem

Mill Race Plaza with SAIF building in background

The cannery industry continued to shrink. The Salem Fruit Union plant is razed for part of the urban renewal project. Photographs of 1974 show construction of buildings being completed and large landscaping projects underway. The open, raw acres are dotted with thin new trees and concrete blocks mark the edges of new paths for the waterways flowing through the city. In 1974, Salem is a city that is changing its image to become more welcoming to the visitor and provide more amenities for the residents, but it is losing a vital factor in its economy by the demise of its canning industry.

When you visit
Today it is hard to remember that for much of Salem's history there was a railroad track in the center of Trade Street. And it now seems natural that Trade Street takes a curve southward into Pringle Parkway and onto Bellevue, traveling east between the expanded Willamette University campus to the left, Shelton Ditch and the Salem Hospital to your right. At 12th Street, we meet the natural barrier that our Southern Pacific railroad tracks have made. Turning north, Mill Street is on our right with Mission Mill Museum and the historic SESNA neighborhood. Turning south on 12th Street, we are just a block away from a left turn over an overpass taking us, without railroad interruption, to Mission Street and the I-5 corridor.  Ignoring the overpass, one more block south on 12th Street will take us to Deepwood Estate and its gardens. This contemporary thoroughfare, creating in the 1970s, gives contemporary traffic easy access to important cultural features of our city. This 1970s restructuring of Trade Street and the new uses of land south of Pringle Creek and Shelton Ditch continue to have a positive effect on downtown traffic and adjoining land uses.

Other Events

• Cars wait in long lines for gas at local stations. The Capitol is the scene of protests concerning the gas shortage.
• Politics is in the news this campaign year: Robert Straub, a candidate for governor of Oregon (he wins in November) has a booth at the state fair in August; Bob Packwood (already elected) congratulates a Baker City student for winning the Centennial Essay and Art Contest during that city's celebration. Mayor Lindsey helps out the Salem Bike Club by posing by an old-fashioned penny-farthing bike while members of the club watch from their own bikes. Lindsey Towers, named for this mayor, is a high-rise, senior residential facility located at the intersection of Church and Trade streets.

Bush House Museum

• Bush House Museum and historic structures on the Bush property are listed on the National Register this year. The majority of these acres were obtained by the city in 1946 by purchase from the Bush family just before Miss Sally's death. After this death of her brother, A. N. Bush, in 1953 the "homestead" was obtained. The Salem Art Association planned to make the house into a gallery and so held a "yard sale" to depose of furnishings (many of which have been returned or repurchased). At that time alterations were made in the upper floor of the Bush residence, but the house still qualified for the National Register. A volunteer committee, under direction of the SAA, regulates the public use and the events held in the house museum.
• One more neighborhood organizes this year: Northeast Neighbors, known as NEN, stretching between Market and State streets. Urban development of the 1970s changed the Court and Chemeketa streets residential section of NEN east of 14th Street. In 1984, a federally funded street reversal project closed both streets with barriers at 13th Street, supplying a fourth boundary line. The homes on these streets were located in a natural progression from downtown, Willamette University and the Capitol. They have a unique physical presence with Mill Creek at the north and to the east, State Street on the south, and the railroad to the west. By 1986, resident historical research, led by Bonnie and Roger Hull, produced a nomination for the National Register that created the Court-Chemeketa National Historic Residential District. Other individually recognized National Register properties in NEN include the Lee Mission Cemetery on D Street, The Stratton House at 1599 States Street and the Samuel Adoph House at 2493 State Street. There are also 23 Local Landmarks and several more candidates whose history you may not know.  It is a tribute to the present owners of these NEN sites that all these properties are preserved so well.

• Among the unofficially recognized sites in NEN is the Friends Meeting House at 490 19th Street, home successively of the Nazarene Church (1913-1931), the Foursquare Church (until 1950) and the Unitarian Universalists (until 1997).