Fire burns historic barn

Pat Arnold, 395-2233

greenpastures@gorge.net

Maxine Bulick, 395-2101

Maxine@gorge.net

Sarah Burr Arnold, 395-2669

sba_352@gorge.net

It's likely that everybody in town already knows about the fire which burned the Trout Lake Farm dryers at the Schweighoffer place, which until maybe 25 years ago was a functioning dairy. The fire started in the early morning of Aug. 26, and the historic barn and the crop that was drying upstairs (feverfew, I think) were destroyed very quickly.

A Trout Lake farm crew had come around midnight, as usual, to turn the drying crop. The burners were turned off while they worked upstairs. When they left, around 1:30, the night man turned the burners back on, and then went into the milking parlor to complete the paperwork. He smelled smoke and went outside to investigate and found the fire already burning strongly. He called 9-1-1, and the Trout Lake Fire Department, bless their faithful souls, showed up in force in about 15 minutes, but by then the damage was done. They did protect the very large propane tank and a nearby lean-to used for vehicle and equipment storage and amazingly only one bush on site is singed and a large tree at the old house site is fine.

My family and I lived at this site when we first came to Trout Lake. I was working for Trout Lake Farm, under its first ownership, and we were offered the Schweighoffer house as living quarters. We had a party line for a telephone, for first few weeks, no stove, no locks on the doors, a chimney that leaked creosote through the living room wall, and an upstairs that was so full of flies that even a daily vacuuming couldn't keep the floor from being littered with them. Nevertheless, we loved the house, with the irrigation ditch running right by the back door and the river across the street, and the barn, which was already in use as a dryer, and the old trees, and the view of the two mountains, north and south, from the field west of the house. Our neighbor, Bonnie Reynolds, came riding over on her horse one day to welcome us and invite us over to meet the other neighbors, which we did and heard Bijee Burns-Willner explain her nickname (and please excuse the hyphen). When we had to move, the legendary generosity of Trout Lake sprang into action, and we moved to the Creek House and learned about Eva and Eava Schmid, but that's another story and from there to my present house where Trout Lake School reunion attendees stop by and tell me where the outhouse used to be and other bits of old history, but that's another story too.

There are old property maps of my end of the valley, and the properties look very different now. We tend to have a sense of permanence about property, but just in the short Anglo history of Trout Lake houses and barns have been moving around, coming and going, burning and being built. Human beings have inhabited this area for thousands of years, but the reality that exists in any given lifetime is fleeting. The disappearance, in less than 10 years, of both house and barn at the Schweighoffer place, and the old owner himself having died, reminds us to honor the past, but live in the present.

As always, when I start looking at the old columns, I submerge in all the interesting things and come up for air completely confused as to what I will mention here. In 1989, the community council urged fish agencies, in the event that anadromous fish were introduced above Condit Dam, to limit the fishery to native, not hatchery stocks. This is now the exact strategy that has been adopted by the agencies and the Yakama Nation as Condit Dam is being removed. Jim White, Joe Esteves, and Kathy Bauer were coaching softball, Mt. Adams Riders were sponsoring endurance rides, making that, along with dairy farming, one of the longest-lived activities in Trout Lake, and Earl and Marcie Nordwall were taking over the Getaway Inn from Hopey and Steve Chubb, and Tom Reynolds and Ken Belieu were among the first 1000 finishers in the Portland Marathon.

These old columns are fascinating to read, and are one little part of Trout Lake history, along with the work of the Grange, the West Klickitat Historical Society and Betty Schmid, Esther Schmid and her family, the paintings of Rowena Sandford who has been doing on-site paintings of Trout Lake for many years, and the work of local historian Jeff Elmer. There's plenty of material for a great senior project, maybe more than one. Any takers? Pat Arnold, newswriter.