10 years ago this week — 2014

Through a state grant, Clatsop Community College bought a $50,000 VRTEX 360 Virtual Welding Trainer from Lincoln Electric.

The VRTEX, designed from similar technology used in flight simulators for the U.S. Air Force, takes the place of a welding machine, with an endless supply of metal as inexpensive as the electricity used to power it.

For welding instructor Jesse Fulton, the system offers an inexpensive and more sustainable way to build muscle memory skills in his welding students.

“A student can spend an hour and a half prepping a pipe to weld on and screw it up in two minutes,” said Fulton, adding that a 21-foot section of that pipe can cost $600.

The VRTEX 360 includes a welding gun, a stinger, welding stand and plastic props standing in for pipes, plates and other welding platforms. It simulates multiple welding processes, positions, joint configurations and working environments, from a desert base to a welding booth.

CANNON BEACH — A draft plan that calls for the development of Cannon Beach’s 58-acre South Wind site may come before the City Council in February, but before any buildings can be constructed, at least $5 million may have to be spent for improvements.

After a several-month hiatus, the master plan advisory committee, tasked with developing the South Wind site, met Dec. 8 to support the draft plan for the property.

WARRENTON — Previously forested land at Lewis and Clark National Historical Park is now a 2-mile path, extending the Kwis Kwis Trail to the park’s famed Fort to Sea Trail.

The new extension means hikers can walk about a dozen miles in a loop around the entire park without backtracking along the same routes.

The new route features a hike along historic old-growth trees and a walk on bridges over a large pond. Park visitors can now experience an entirely unique part of the national park, Superintendent Scott Tucker said.

ILWACO, Wash. — A mammoth reconstruction project is underway at the North Jetty near Ilwaco.

Trucks loaded with rock and sand lumber down the winding road into Cape Disappointment State Park, dump their loads and head back across the Astoria Bridge to Oregon to do it all again. Jetty Road is partially closed and half of the parking lot for Waikiki Beach has been taken over by contractors working to fill a lagoon on the landward side of the jetty.

Across the river, Oregon’s South Jetty, located in Fort Stevens State Park, will undergo rehabilitation work beginning in 2017. On the south side of the jetty, along the beach, waves have pounded holes in the 6-mile-long structure.

50 years ago — 1974

A driving rain, intermingled with hail and snow in higher elevations, pelted the entire lower Columbia area Friday night and much of the day Saturday, while frost showed up today.

Surprisingly, little damage occurred from gusts that reached almost 80 mph, according to the National Weather Service at Clatsop Airport.

SEASIDE — A Seaside man got out of his car to mail a letter this morning on Holladay Street and his car took off without him — in reverse.

By the time the commotion died down, the car had hit two other cars and a telephone pole in a parking lot across from 711 Broadway and came to a halt without hurting anybody, Seaside police reported.

John Bartsoff got out of his car near 210 S. Holladay to mail a letter. The car pulled away northward on Holladay and wheeled into the parking lot.

It ripped the door off a car owned by Keith Mendenhall as some people were getting out of that car.

The runaway car then spun around and bashed into a telephone pole.

It spun around again and slammed broadside into a parked car owned by Harry Wahlstrom and pushed the Wahlstrom car within inches of the windows of a vacant supermarket building.

That’s where it finally came to a halt, side by side with the Wahlstrom car. Bartsoff, hotly in pursuit of his runaway vehicle, squeezed in through a back window and shut off the ignition.

It isn’t every day that a man steps out on his porch to the sounds of accordion music, children singing and Santa ho-ho-hoing.

But then a man doesn’t turn 90 every Christmas Day either.

And fifth grade students at Astor Elementary School wanted Harry Entler, of Astoria, to remember his doubly special day in a very special way.

They decided a big celebration was in order to honor Entler’s birthday and Christmas and a big celebration it was.

Some 40 students of Hasahim Shawa and Richard Hansen marched down the alley leading to Entler’s house singing carols and shouting greetings.

Their arms laden with a Christmas tree for Entler and a “Happy Birthday” banner, the smiles on their young faces showed pure delight.

A consulting firm working for AMAX has concluded that the emissions from the proposed aluminum plant in Warrenton “will probably not even have subtle effects on the organisms residing in the waters of Youngs Bay.”

An Oregon State University official who is working on an estuarine research project in Youngs Bay funded by AMAX said today that the conclusion is accurate, but cautioned it is only as reliable as the assumptions used to reach it.

And, the Clatsop Environmental Council, the major opponent of the AMAX plant, said today the assumptions used by the consulting firm are questionable and understated and charged AMAX with exploiting prematurely released findings from Oregon State.

An AMAX press release issued Monday comes after the Environmental Quality Commission voted unanimously Friday to declare its intent to designate the area around the aluminum plant site a “special problem area” and limit fluoride emissions to “essentially zero.”

75 years ago — 1949

The dairy industry in Clatsop County and this section of Oregon is one that has separated itself from the parent industry, agriculture, and is second to none as the major producer of cash to the Clatsop County farmers.

The dairy industry touches the life of everyone living within the confines of the state of Oregon as there is not a family that does not use dairy products, in one form or another, every day of the year. The dairy farmer always has some cash, every week, from milk and cream, with which he is able to buy the necessities of life where cash is in demand.

With more than 5,000 dairy cows and heifers in Clatsop County producing over 3 million gallons of milk, annually, shows the importance of this phase of agriculture to the economic status of this section.

Two University of Wisconsin zoologists said today migrating salmon may smell their way back home.

Coastal salmon long have puzzled scientists with their habit of growing up in freshwater rivers, migrating to the ocean for four years, then returning unerringly to their home waters to spawn and die.

The U.S. Air Force hoped today that “flying saucer” stories have been spiked once and for all.

It said an exhaustive two-year investigation shows that reports of strange, disc-like objects flashing through space either were hoaxes or resulted from “mass hysteria” and a “misinterpretation of various conventional objects.”

Ship traffic across the Columbia River Bar was halted for 48 hours, three electric transformers blew out at Warrenton and a trace of snow was reported falling in Astoria Thursday morning as a continuing Arctic storm brought ice and the threat of floods to other sections of the Northwest.

SEASIDE — The city is a step closer to installation of parking meters in the business district by a decision made by the City Council Wednesday evening, when that body instructed City Attorney Cecil Wright to draw a resolution to enter into a contract with the Duncan Parking Meter Corp., of Chicago, Illinois, for installation of 250 meters.

Several claps of thunder and lightning punctuated Astoria’s snowstorm this afternoon in an unusual weather incident.

Lightning and thunder seldom occur in winter, especially during a snowstorm, and in this area, electrical displays are seldom seen even in warm months.

HAMMOND — The Hammond Town Council postponed a final decision on accepting the offer of 155 acres of Fort Stevens reservation for $51,000 at a meeting Thursday night, when differences of opinion among citizens developed.

Some of the 30 people at the meeting felt that the town should not accept the offer of Jacob Bosshart, of Warrenton, to put up the money for the town to acquire the property in exchange for a lease upon it. Bosshart plans to develop it into rental dwellings.

Gas fumes in the bilges of a 38-foot U.S. Coast Guard picket boat were blamed today for an explosion yesterday that injured one sailor slightly and did minor damage to the vessel.

An investigation, held at the Fort Stevens dock, where the vessel was tied up, reported that Engineman Third Class Bruce D. Murphy received a bump on his head and a slight cut when the fumes exploded at 2:18 p.m.

A report that a Japanese mine was seen drifting 50 miles west of Tillamook Dec. 24 took the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Balsam out of Astoria for a three-day search, Coast Guard district headquarters in Seattle revealed Friday.