Bad blood that flowed between Oregon’s U.S. Sen. Wayne Morse and U.S. Sen. Richard Neuberger in the 1950s is the stuff of legend. Senate historians say there has not been a more bitter feud.

Much less understood is the collaboration between Oregon’s U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden and U.S. Sen. Gordon Smith from 1997 to 2009. Because they began as mortal opponents for a Senate seat, their subsequent partnerships are testimony to the temperament of both men.

Smith shed light on that history in a letter recently published in The Bulletin of Bend. The Republican Smith endorsed Wyden’s reelection. Expressing disdain for the QAnon aspersions of Wyden’s Republican opponent, Smith deplored the current dark period of Senate history that is haunted by the obsessively divisive spirit of former President Donald Trump. In contrast, Smith reminisced about the positive outcomes of his partnership with Wyden.

That Wyden and Smith got along so well is testimony to their pragmatism. The relationship was contentious when the two faced off in the 1996 special election to succeed U.S. Sen. Bob Packwood, who had resigned in disgrace. During that heated campaign, Wyden overheard Smith’s disparagement of Wyden as a campaigner. That caused Wyden to campaign with more vigor in the closing days.

When Smith won a Senate seat in 1996 after Mark Hatfield’s retirement, he and Wyden became senior and junior senators. One particularly touching moment occurred when Wyden accompanied Smith to a 2004 hearing of the Senate subcommittee on substance abuse and mental health services. Smith was emotionally tender because of his son’s recent suicide. As Smith addressed the subcommittee, his voice broke. At that moment, Wyden reached out to touch Smith and he voiced his personal support. Mental illness haunted Wyden as well. His younger brother was schizophrenic and died young.

Smith was the unsung hero on a matter of significance to us on the North Coast and on the Long Beach Peninsula. Smith played a pivotal role in creation of the Lewis and Clark National Historical Park. The journey from the park’s conception to enactment began with an essay by the amateur local historian Rex Ziak, which was published in The Astorian and Chinook Observer. In a nutshell, Ziak observed that the arrival of the Corps of Discovery on the north shore of the Columbia River was the most harrowing moment of their transcontinental exploration. But that part of the story had been ignored by historians.

Congressman Norm Dicks, of Tacoma, regarded Ziak’s revelation as unfinished business for Washington state. As a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, Dicks had the muscle and the zeal to move the Lewis and Clark legislation.

During the George W. Bush administration, there had been no expansion of the National Park Service’s inventory of parklands. And it was Smith who went to the White House to urge President Bush to sign this essential piece of work.

Both of these stories — about partnerships between senators Smith and Wyden, as well as Smith’s lobbying President Bush on our behalf — are about a Senate much different than today’s.