10 years ago this week — 2014

While the Hood to Coast Relay gives many different memories to different people, for Carlie Henson, a 24-year-old runner from Seattle, it is running the 2 a.m. leg that she will remember the most.

“There is something about running in the middle of the night that I love. The feeling that I’m on the road alone, yet there are thousands of other runners with me, and my team following close behind. Yet in the darkness, there is a real oneness in the running,” Henson said.

Henson was part of 12,600 other runners and 4,000 walkers who took part in the annual Hood to Coast Relay and Portland to Coast Walk Relay over the weekend. For the runners, the race begins at Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood and ends on the beach in Seaside.

With 1,050 teams participating in Hood to Coast this year, the BTC Men’s team came in first place with a time of 7 hours 32 minutes and 31 seconds, closely followed by the Google 1 team at 19:13:01.

SEASIDE — Attention is once again focused on the proposed Necanicum Estuary Natural History Park, and Mill Ponds Park will be the first site included in the project.

The Estuary Technical Committee, created last spring, held an open house at the Mill Ponds Park recently to ask people how they would want to see a natural history park develop there.

“We want to make sure people understand the legacy this site has,” Justin Cutler, a member of the committee, told the approximately 20 people who attended the open house.

The National Park Service is 98 years old, and Lewis and Clark National Historical Park threw a birthday party Saturday at Netul Landing.

The event aims to bring community members together and celebrate having a national park in the local area.

There were three-legged races, free canoe rides, a build-your-own binoculars craft, lots of music, face painting, a birding quest activity, painting ladybugs on rocks, an insect-catching contest and free hamburger, hot dogs, chips, veggie snacks and beverages — all courtesy of the Fort Clatsop bookstore and prepared by the Astoria Lions Club.

LONG BEACH, Wash. — The Kite Festival has come and gone, but the vendors, local businesses and hotel operators are still smiling. This year’s event drew large, enthusiastic crowds, World Kite Museum events director Holli Kemmer said Monday afternoon.

“It was so great. The vendors were very happy,” Kemmer said.

According to Kemmer, visiting vendors, who set up booths all along Bolstad Avenue, say record sales on the first and final days of the weeklong event.

Pleasant weather, dedicated volunteers and die-hard participants all contributed to a memorable festival with “very minimal if any issues,” Kemmer said.

Andi Day, director of the Long Beach Peninsula Visitor’s Bureau said strong attendance at the Kite Festival was another indicator that the local tourism economy is picking up speed. Day said people from all over the Northwest and a handful of international visitors came to town.

50 years ago — 1974

Astoria Plywood has been successful so far in keeping its doors open in the face of plywood plant closures throughout the Northwest and the nation, but company head Elmer Brown said this morning the economic situation is pretty grim.

Brown said the cooperative company hasn’t made any preparations for closure, but he admitted, “If this continues, it’s only a matter of time.”

He was referring to the high cost of logs, caused by exports to Japan depleting supplies, and the low price of plywood, caused by high interest rates killing the home building industry, the main user of plywood.

As a consequence, some plywood plant managers in timber-producing areas have been shutting up shop temporarily, indefinitely, or even permanently. Others, mostly with larger firms, are laying off large numbers of workers in production cutback programs.

With a last burst of summer activity this Labor Day weekend, the North Coast ends the traditional summer season.

The motels will be full, the beaches busy if the weather stays warm, the highways crowded with traffic reduced to a crawl behind unwieldy campers and the shops bursting.

Visitors and residents will find a range of activities and events this three-day weekend for just about every taste — from music and drama to rodeo action and a baseball tournament.

SEASIDE — The Seaside Beach Run is a fun run, they say.

Judging by the faces of many of the 379 finishers just after the race Saturday, it can’t be all that much fun. Faces were twisted into agonized expressions, spittle dribbled from between slack faces, chests heaved with hurt and feet were tender from pounding the hard-packed sand.

Clatsop County’s 3-year-old Jenny mule has a new home.

Cast out by Jewell residents and donated to the county, the female mule found itself at the Clatsop commissioner’s mercy last week.

Jewell residents complained that the mule ran around destroying property, ruining gardens and braying.

Its owner, Fred Miller, of Jewell, said he couldn’t see trying to build a fence for the critter, so he donated it to the county humane department.

Commission Chairman Hiram Johnson announced the county’s intentions to sell the mule last Wednesday, noting that he would like the press to spread the word around.

Since then, the story of the mule has gone out over the Associated Press wire, been told by several radio announcers, and even been mentioned by a Portland television station.

But Johnson said Monday that all the publicity didn’t seem to do that much good. He said the county sold the mule to West Lake resident Jack Kline for $32.

Kline, it seems, was the only one who offered to buy the mule. He was going to board the mule for the county until somebody decided to buy it, but then he decided to buy it himself, Johnson said.

More than 30 foreign fishing boats, the majority of them Russian, were sighted at various times last week off the Oregon Coast in the continuing aerial survey by the U.S. Coast Guard and National Marine Fisheries Service.

75 years ago — 1949

Robert Mitchell, of Astoria, is one of the few men alive today who made the infamous Bataan “death march” both ways.

Members of the Astoria Lions Club were told last night by the emaciated Mitchell about how he escaped a few days after the torture march and retraced his steps over the 122 miles to reach Corregidor and fight again.

The gaunt former Marine, who once weighed 185 pounds, still weighs only 136 pounds four years after he was freed from a Japanese prison camp. At that time, he weighed 98 pounds.

Mitchell said that out of a group of 198 marines in his outfit, only three ever got home again. He was one of them.

SEASIDE — The 37th annual Edna Dawson Memorial Dahlia parade was the major attraction in Seaside Sunday. A throng of vacationers and local people witnessed the parade, which was made up of youngsters from 12 years old and under.

The traditional dahlia flower, which prompted those of years ago to originate the parade, was much in evidence on the kiddies’ floats and vehicles.

About 21 mayors are expected to be on hand Aug. 26 and Aug. 27 for the Ilwaco Mayors’ Derby, according to Norman Howerton, Ilwaco mayor in charge of the derby.

Howerton said that he received a letter from New York’s Mayor William O’Dwyer stating that he would be tied up with business and would not be able to attend. He had previously accepted the invitation.

The most distant mayor who has announced intentions to participate in the fishing derby to date is the mayor of Helena, Montana. Howerton also said there is a possibility that the mayor of Reno, Nevada, will attend.

Boys and girls of Clatsop County 4-H clubs were streaming into the fair building today for a four-day annual 4-H fair.

Gordon Hood, county extension agent, said this morning that with a break in the weather, the fair will be the largest ever held here by the 4-H’ers.

Columbia River gillnet fishermen were working today as favorable flood times saw most of the gillnet fleet fishing at midmorning .

Reports from packers shortly before noon revealed that very few boats had delivered after the Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning drifts and no receipt figures were available.

Every dog had his day, as well as cats, turtles, frogs, fish, crows and geese, last night at the 4-H fairgrounds when the Astoria Kiwanis Club sponsored their annual pet show in conjunction with the 4-H fair.

Looking over the lineup of entries, it seemed that Noah and his ark had nothing on the kids of Clatsop County.

They practically duplicated his animal-collection fete, and it would not have been too surprising to see one of the boys or girls enter leading a giraffe or elephant.

Pre-salmon derby excitement was rising in Astoria as commercial fishermen left the river Friday afternoon.

Visitors from most of the 48 states in the union were already arriving in town, many of them people who had heard of the derby from friends who had caught fish here in past years.