Sunny Valley

Summer is a wonderful time because it means I can go and visit my father again. He lives in the mountains above a little spot called Sunny Valley. He and Leslie, my step-mother, are not connected to the grid in any way. They get their electricity from solor panels and generators. Hot water comes via propane and heat from the wood stove. My father has even rigged an old hot water heater to run off propane so they have a bathtub which sits in the middle of yard with a lovely view of the creek. They also have the traditional outhouse just a ways off from everything else, because, as my father says, only disgusting city people would do "that" inside the house.

They live in a very small trailer and that doesn't leave much room for guests so when I visit I generally sleep outside. When the weather is bad I can bed down on the living room floor, but this is inconvient for everyone one as the room is so very small and they are generally awake by 5 a.m. or earlier. Having grown accustom to slothful city habits I generally want to sleep in until 7 a.m. and I certainly don't want to go to bed by 8 p.m. Add to this the several feet of snow and ice that can fill the pass and block their roads in the wintertime coupled with the fact that I drive an old toyota tercel and it becomes easy to see why visits are best left until the snow and rain largely dissapear for the summer.

Sunny Valley is aptly named, for it is indeed a small, sunny valley containing mostly fields, trees, homes and often deer and elk. The "town" consists of one old country store with a filling station with a motel across the way. Although it is only about 15 or 20 minutes from my Dad's place we never stay there because everyone on knows it's frequented by less than savory folk. Just down from the store is the old "radio hall" where folks used to meet in the 20s and 30s to listen to the only radio around. Its not used much any more but kept in good repair. Then there is the one room cabin that is "City Hall" which is also not used much, but did see a lot of action a few years back when the state tried to close down their covered bridge. Next to City Hall is the town museum and the covered bridge. There are also two churches, one burger stand that is open whenever the lady who runs it feels like showing up and a bar that is closed down. Some out of town folk bought it and tried to make it a strip club and quickly discovered Sunny Valley folk don't give their money to such trade, so the building waits for a new owner. Its a friendly place and even though I did not grow up there and only visit in the summer, people remember me as "Terry's daughter" and always say hello.

During my last visit I decided to finally stop and see the museum. The valley folks are pretty proud of it and put a lot of work into the project to get it off the ground. I have driven past it often but never stopped, however; I recently have become very interested in the Oregon Trail and since their focus is the Applegate Trail I decided to stop and give it a look see.



The museum is a small one but modern and fairly well done. There is a gentleman who mans the musem and he is very nice and knowledgeble. I wish I could remember his name, but regardless, you won't miss him since he wears pioneer garb. Most of the displays were donated by locals and the Oregon Historical Society also assisted in getting them copies of relivent paintings, photos and such. There are some radom taxidermy displays that don't give too much information but are fun in their way, if one does not have issue with dead animal displays. They have two stuffed oxen hooked up to a light covered wagon and when you come close a motion sensor makes cow and wagon noises at you, which I suspect children would enjoy. There is a short movie to watch about the Applegate Trail with local folks playing the pioneers.

While most of the displays are not attributed to any particular pioneers, they do have a very good display of James Twogoods things, on loan from his family. Mr Twogood was the first person to make a land claim in Sunny Valley and the museum acutally sits on part of his original claim. They also have the ledgers from the original store. It seems the gentleman who ran it kept very detailed accounts for most of his life and the volumes give a very good picture of what local folks bought and the nature to the local economy.

There is also a pioneer woman's grave just down the way from the museum, past the covered bridge. It belongs to Martha Leland Crowley who died in the valley from typhoid when she was just 16. She was part of the first wagon train to travel the Applegate Trail, which was built as an alternate route, so that folks could avoid the dangerous float down the Columbia River. She was buried near an oak tree in a coffin her intended, David M. Guthrie, made for her from parts of old boxes, as the party had no boards left to spare from the wagons by the time she passed away.



The settlers penned their cattle over her gave after she was buried in hopes that it would keep animals and Indians from finding and disturbing it. Sadly this did not work because a later party found her scattered bones in the valley and reburied her. Since that time the creek has always been called Grave Creek. For a while the state attempted to name if something less "morbid" but everyone just kept calling it Grave Creek so eventually they gave up.Martha was said to be very beautiful and well loved by all who knew her. Her family always ment to come back for her once they were settled but sadly her father died just a few short months after they made it to the Willemette Valley so that never happened.