[or-roots] Pass Creek stories - more details

[Leslie Chapman]

Ray and all;

I guess I should have spelled out the nature of my question in a little more
detail; Yes I know where Pass Creek is, I grew up crossing the headwaters of
said stream every time I went to School or town as the stream is kind of an
odd one, in theory it may be a "pirated" portion of the Willamette River,
some geologists believe that the Umpqua or a branch theroeof once emptied
into the Willamette and then was stolen to flow out to sea at Reedsport,
which ironically is where I live now.

And yes, the Pass Creek Covered Bridge is relevant to the same stream, Pass
Creek flows under said bridge about a hundred feet before it empties into
Elk Creek in downtown Drain Oregon, named for the Drain Family of "Grandma
Drain" from the lost needle story.

As to Shadybrook, I am not surprised it doesn't show up in any reference, it
was a mill site mainly though I believe in the early 20th century at least a
few families actually lived there. As I said I have never been there, though
I grew up just a couple of miles away. One of my cousins that was spending
the summer with us wandered off and got lost and ended up spending the night
near there when I was a child, but all of my life it has been essentially an
unroaded area that I never had any reason to visit. I just looked on the
topo map to see if I could figure out just where it is and suspect I have
been within a quarter mile or so of it as I believe I wandered out the ridge
to the south of it once while deer hunting when I took a wrong turn in the
brush up on the divide between Martin Creek and Bear Creek. Anyone really
curious where it is I would place Shadybrook at about 43 degrees 44' 9.51"
N. Lat, 123 degrees 10' 35.16" W. Long. give or take a half mile. I was
always going to go there with my father and never got around to it.

The reason I am interested in the Pass Creek Inn location is manyfold; one,
I find that cousins from one of the more colorful branches of my family are
listed in the 1880 Census as managing said Inn, which would place a part of
my mother's family just a whoop and a holler from where my father's family
would end up 25 years or so later. Also we have a story that my great aunt
Nora and her family would always stop "somewhere on Pass Creek" to visit
relatives whenever they came to the Valley. This actually adds more puzzle
than it resolves issues, as by the time the cousin who passed on this
information was born, the Inn managers were in Washington, so it couldn't
have been them Aunt Nora was visiting. (see my agonizing search for these
folks in the census in nauseating detail in the Or-roots archives, probably
under subject Llewellyn in Wa or some such)

The third reason I am interested in pinning down the location of the Pass
Creek In is that I recently read in "Golden was the Past" a Cottage Grove
Historical Society publication, that one of the earliest trails through this
region ran along the south side of the ridge that runs between the head
waters of Pass Creek and the south fork of Martin Creek where I grew up,
which means I have wandered all over large portions of this historic trail
and never noticed it. In point of fact I suspect that the 'jeep trail' that
my father and I improved so that he could take me up to spend week days with
my little sister on Wards Butte Lookout while he and mom finished there
college educations they had started thirty plus years before, might have
been a portion of that trail known as the Scott Trail. Somewhere in the
vicinity of our ranch, ("Golden was the Past" was a little vague on that
point) was a stage stop on the Scott Trail, if that turned out to be the
Pass Creek Inn I think it would be a real hoot.

I am terribly afraid I spelled this all out in boring detail the last time I
posted a question about the Inn to this list, but I hope some of you found
this narrative at least a little amusing.

Les C

PS. I have always been fascinated by the name 'Shadybrook' and when I became
a fan of whatever you would call Quicksilver Messenger Services style of
music, especially "Shadygrove" I thought the name even more interesting. So
I guess the big question is, why haven't I ever been there?

LC


-----Original Message-----
From: or-roots-admin at sosinet.sos.state.or.us
[mailto:or-roots-admin at sosinet.sos.state.or.us]On Behalf Of Ray Powell
Sent: Thursday, January 13, 2005 8:06 AM
To: or-roots at sosinet.sos.state.or.us
Subject: Re: [or-roots] Pass Creek stories


Leslie,
I was unable to find Shadybrook anywhere in Oregon. I did find a Pass Creek
and a Pass Creek Shelter as well as a West Pass Creek Rd and a Pass Creek
Trail. The were all in an area about 35 miles east and a little north of
Sutherlin, OR. The lat/lon of the shelter is
N43° 29.25'
W122° 47.28'

There may be other places that went by the same name for a short period of
time but never were recorded as such. Good luck!

Ray Powell
Researching the Calvin Powell line that came out of MA.
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