Blaze Oregon Trail at Baker City info center

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Blaze Oregon Trail at Baker City info center

By WILL SWARTS
Herald staff writer

BAKER CITY - Visitors rolling into this tiny Northeast Oregon town are immediately reminded of folks who arrived before them. About 150 years before them.

Nearly 300,000 frontier settlers trudged, wheeled and rode along the Oregon Trail near Baker in the middle of the 19th century. Now that long-ago migration has transformed the mining, ranching and logging community of about 10,000 people into a natural destination for historically minded tourists.

The centerpiece of the frontier-era attractions is the National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center, five miles east of downtown Baker City. But the town and surrounding areas also have a number of attractions that revive the past, from a train that tours a ghost town to a country museum that takes a scattered approach in preserving unusual and obscure domestic artifacts.

It's three hours by car from the Tri-Cities to the place where the emigrants could start thinking about their destinations. Take Highway 395 south until it meets Interstate 84, then drive east, through hilly forests and fields of wildflowers. When you reach Baker City, take Exit 302 and follow the signs to the center.

The Bureau of Land Management opened the interpretive center in 1992, a year before the 150th anniversary of the 2,000-mile route from Missouri to the Willamette Valley. The center sits on Flagstaff Hill and overlooks sections of the actual trail.

It's not just the tracks which pull in over 200,000 visitors each year. "Rut nuts," as Oregon Trail enthusiasts are referred to, are drawn to the well-researched exhibits inside.

Several films, dozens of illustrations and models, drawing heavily from emigrant diaries, display most aspects of the arduous trek, which took most families about six to eight months to complete.

A "prairie schooner" wagon carrying supplies for a family of four was typically loaded with 2,000 pounds of flour, lard, salt, pepper, beans, bacon, dried fruit and coffee. Combined with the necessary cooking gear, clothing, guns and ammunition, the weight forced many families to use two wagons.

The center emphasizes the difficulties settlers faced throughout the trek, from the hazards of over- or underpacking a wagon to the harsh and unforgiving landscape the trail covered. Even the displays of settlers marching along their oxen and wagons include muddy clothes and model flies, buzzing forever around the livestock's eyes. One in 10 would-be Oregonians died before reaching their destination.

Survival was no simple matter. Comfort was rare, and settler diaries often contained litanies of hardship.

Marihelen Ciesiel and Jean Van Biene, Baker City residents who volunteer at the center, sum up the experience in "No Turning Back," a 25-minute play based on the diary about two emigrant sisters. The center features many presentations and demonstrations related to the Oregon Trail.

Both performers say the center has transformed the once-sleepy town.

"On the weekends, it's wild," Van Biene said. "This is the season when it really picks up. Sometimes at the center you can't even budge your way through to the stage."

The center is open daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Admission is free, but donations are welcome. Call 503-523-1843 for more information.

Ciesiel, who runs a bed-and-breakfast with her husband Bob, a retired mining engineer, can rattle off a list of suggested attractions that could easily take two or three days to visit. Here are a few:

Sumpter, a former mining boom town about 30 miles west of Baker, boasts a steam railroad and a gold dredge that gave the valley its livelihood. The train runs on weekends and costs $7 a person. For information, call 503-894-2362.

The Oregon Trail Regional Museum in town offers a peek at other aspects of local history in the tradition of great catch-all country museums in the Northwest. Mementos from early Chinese families, Indian artifacts and a massive rock collection are only a few of the exhibits offered for visitor attention.

Outside the museum, the Oregon Trail Trolley offers horse-drawn tours of the city's historic buildings Fridays through Sundays. Cost is $7. Call 503-856-3356.

For a more hands-on approach to historical preservation, don't miss the Eastern Oregon Museum in Haines, about 10 miles north of Baker on Highway 30. The brochure for the donation-fee museum promises a collection of mining farming and pioneer artifacts like a grandma's attic, and does not disappoint. Wilma Hildebrand's 1920s-vintage collection of covered dishes in the shape of hens sets the tone for the time of household history that evolved from the first days of the pioneer exodus.

For more information, call the Baker City Chamber of Commerce and Visitors Center at 503-523-5855.

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