Your Voice, July 21, 2021

The progressives have been spreading phony climate predictions ranging from global freezing to global warming since the 1970s. None of them have come true.

Kenton Mathewson

Dallesport

Editor’s Note: 104 degrees in mid-July was unusual enough in 1941 to warrant a page 1 headline in the newspaper.

Summer rest

I’ve recently visited your beautiful and ravaged county and Mount Hood and I was inspired to write a poem. I present it here to you beautiful people!

And Still The Flowers Grow...

The mountain stands stalwart and tall. The tree stumps & stalks abound, their branches & leaves burnt to the ground.

Over the mountainside, down the hills, from the top of the mountain to the water’s still, the old and gray fall to the ground.

And still the flowers grow, beneath their feet. The purple, the yellow, the white are a feat, Of survival amongst the Treacherous rocks, as the sun beams down on the burnt tree tops.

Mount Hood stands tall amongst her friends: Mount Ranier, Mount St. Helens and Mount Adams again ...

The guardians of the lands of the north and west, God’s lands are now taking a summers rest. And still the flowers grow.

Darlana Fiehtsam

Columbia, SC

Thank you

My friend Donna and I went to Shari’s Restaurant on July 14 to celebrate our birthdays and to enjoy a meal, sitting at a table for the first time in a long time. We placed our orders and shortly after our server came to table to say a gentleman had paid for our tickets! We want to say thank you kind sir, you made our day!

Lorna Elliott

The Dalles

Essential news

The combining of newspapers in the area seems to be going well, and I hope is making a profit. I like the focus on local news and events.

The June 2021 Hightower Lowdown has a suggestion that might add to this, a “regular section that digs into the area’s wages, job losses and openings, workplace conditions ... affordable housing, worker safety, job discrimination, childcare availability, abuse hotlines, unionizing efforts, and the myriad of other real-life issues that confront this majority on a daily basis ...” This would be something like the business section of many newspapers, only with policy, money and economics news essential for most of us.

Or would it be better not to have such a specific section, but instead give sufficient attention to such topics throughout the paper? This approach sort of seems to be a healthy trend in the paper already.

I’m not sure, but I suggest the concept for discussion.

Jerrold Richards

Lyle

Thank you, firefighters

I want to thank those firefighters and other volunteers who helped keep the Strawberry Mountain blaze at bay and eventually put it out. It nearly overtook our little area near the city shed on July 8.

USFS happened to be fueling up just down the street at Hunsaker’s Oil and answered the call within moments. Volunteers from White Salmon were also on the scene in short order. To all of them who I know were there — Ryan Kreps, Tyson Trout, Zach Landgren — and to Jay Holtman for manning Hunsaker’s D9, thank you so much. And thank you Bill for the use of the dozer.

And thank you to those whose names I do not know, but that were there, either a part of the USFS team and/or there to help in some other capacity. Thank you, thank you and thank you!

Kevin Herman

White Salmon

Thank you, Gov. Brown

I would like to thank Gov. Kate Brown, The Health Division, local health departments, doctor offices and the many volunteers who helped to vaccinate Oregon. It is wonderful that after a terrible year with COVID, many deaths, sicknesses, and so much loss to our businesses, that Oregon can go back to a more normal life.

It is nice to give each other hugs, smile at each other, see each other at church, go to the theater and many other places that we missed over this past year.

I think it is important to wear face masks if requested since some still do not have the vaccine and some have compromising health conditions. It is so easy to wear a mask if requested to do so. We want everyone to be safe and we are a better community when we think of each other.

We do need to be careful since the COVID Delta Variant is alive and spreading in the United States.

It would be refreshing if some of those who criticized Gov. Brown so strongly about COVID state regulations would say something positive about the recent statewide lifting of COVID restrictions.

Oregon is healthier and safer because of a lot of hard work by a lot of people. Thank you so much!

Nancy Johanson Paul

Hood River

Letters appreciated

I appreciate those who write letters to the editor, whether I agree with you or not. I appreciate Peter F. who pointed out the missing little birds, as we were likewise worrying about their absence from our bird feeders. Here’s the good news — they have returned to us, the Juncos, the Nuthatches, and the Chickadees. Maybe they took a leave of absence to make nests and rear their families elsewhere, away from the Stellar Jays?

I also enjoy Benjamin Sheppard’s letters, especially the last one where he points out the inconsistency of some in blaming the insurrection of Jan. 6 on the Black Lives Matter supporters and then not being willing to look into the matter.

I do wonder why the paper feels it necessary to point out “Benjamin Sheppard is employed as a social worker.” No other letter writer has his occupation delineated like this.

Joan Chantler

White Salmon

Editor’s note: There are two men named Benjamin Sheppard in Hood River and the note is to identify which Benjamin is writing, an arrangement worked out years ago at the Hood River News.

Proud to be an American

My family has many nationalities in it. I’m very proud to say my family and relatives are made up of not just white Americans, but also Australian, German and Mexican.

We need to put our hard earned money to protect all of America, men, women and children of all colors and nationalities! Even the families trying to come to America from Mexico and other countries as they did in the 1020s, 1930s and 1940s. Did we treat them with disrespect as in Germany with the Berlin wall?

Stop putting money building a wall and police force. The drugs will find their way over, under and around the wall, even the unwanted criminals. Also, look at what that wall is doing to America. This is also dividing America, a country of many races, colors and nationalities.

All of us are related! Men, women and children in America and beyond. Remember, it started with two people, a man and a woman, who also loved each other! We are one family, no matter the country or color.

I just want to say, with tears in my eyes, my son and late brother’s son both had very close friends at The Dalles High School who were Black and Hispanic, and part of our family. Our boys were also part of their families!

God bless America and all of you.

Steve Cochenour

The Dalles

More entertainment

For years, the Hood River News had a weekly article on an artist somewhere in the Gorge. It was such fun to read about all the different ways we are creative. And when there was a major show in local galleries, we could plan to attend.

So when I had a show in June, I looked in your Wednesday papers only to find out, no art section!

Just recently I got a postcard about Gorge Artists Open Studios. There are 42 artists exhibiting this September. And I am sure there are 10 more, even in the Dalles, which means you could write a story once a week and cover all sorts of different creative work.

Art brings folks to our communities as well as revenue.

I hope you will add an art section to your paper.

Seddon Wylde

Hood River