After a super ugly divorce in Big Bear Lake, California – my mom was ready to go as far away from my Dad as she could – my dad seemed happy to be a single guy without kids encumbering his rock star lifestyle – so no one stood in the way of mom marrying a super tall alcoholic doucehebag wanna-be cowboy who was barely out of his teens. We left our last happy childhood home for the last time. This time there would be no return. He decided that the best thing to do with his wealthy new bride was to move her and her three kids as far away from where her family could interfere with his fucked up, violent, and drug fueled life choices. He moved us to Canyonville, Oregon – which, to be fair, is a pretty nice little Oregon town – but which for all of us became the gateway to hell. While he looked for the ranch of his dreams, we were all crammed into a tiny little house with a half dozen dogs – the house had been a drug dealers before we moved into it and it wasn’t uncommon for bikers and other shit-bags to come waltzing in the door looking for ‘Jim’ at all hours of the night. Guns were a regular part of our lives at this point. The shithole biker bar next door “The Snake Pit” was where mom and her new boss (because she just did whatever he told her to or he would beat the shit out of her) spent the majority of their time. We met a whole new class of bikers – not the friendly Hells Angels of Big Bear but the drug fueled and violent Gypsy Jokers.
On the positive side – we had a cherry tree and Canyon Creek ran behind the house. We would go down and catch crawdads by the bucketfull and cook them up with butter and garlic. I used to get old fashioned milkshakes from a place with a cow on the roof. Canyonville itself is set in a beautiful part of Southern Oregon and when we weren’t witnesses or victims of domestic violence and substance abuse – we swam in country swimming holes, hiked through beautiful pine forests, and spent time on the ranch of a family who saw the hell we were in, but werent willing to involve themselves further than letting us spend time with them. We were there for a bit less than a year (4th grade) …and then we moved to nearby Myrtle Creek – which I will write about next. Here is a bit about Canyonville, Oregon that is outside of my experience.
Canyonville, Oregon
Canyonville has a population of about 1800 people (honestly, I thought it was larger) and sits in an area known as the ‘Banana Belt’ in Southern Oregon. It is classified as having a ‘Mediterranean Climate’ though, I’ve lived in the Mediterranean and Canyonville both and would beg to differ. Winters are cold, wet, grey, and rainy. Canyonville is the third oldest city in Oregon and was a stopping point of the Applegate Trail (part of the Oregon Trail migration) It is where the North Umpqua and South Umpqua Rivers meet and is a great spot for fishing, hunting, and outdoor recreation. Canyonville sits alongside Interstate-5 which runs from Canada to Mexico and is the main north/south interstate on the West Coast of the United States. Canyonville is most famous for President Rutherford B. Hayes once having lunch there. Today the 7-Feathers Casino is the big draw in Canyonville, but it was not there when I was a kid. When I was a kid, the biggest part of the economy was logging and mining at the nearby Hannah Nickel Mine in Riddle, Oregon. Ranching, farming, and resource extraction were the lifeblood of Canyonville in those days. These days, I’ve heard that it is the casino and meth production.
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Back when you were there, in August there was a yearly celebration called Pioneer Days. with lots of booths and local logging contests. My first wife and I won the best booth contest, paying $130 dollars for supplies to win the $10 first prize! Yay. The Title of the booth was “Plants, Herbs and Comix” and had two six guns burned into the plywood sign. This might have been in the 70’s, though Pioneer Days is still running.
A favorite event during this celebration at this time was the Black Powder shootouts conducted a few times during the 3.5 days. The guns were very loud, and of course, the local actors made the most out of their dying scene. I think Fred Curry ran the shootout and some of the logging competitions: The axe throw, single and double buck saw, where you sawed through a log faster than your fellow competitors, hopefully. Sandy Petty and his brother ran the Bar-B-Q pit. Yum! I think there was also a local talent contests.
The Pioneer Days board also published articles featuring the older pioneers/relatives still alive that particular year.
If I was out of work, I could go around to various farmers who needed to fill a crew with youngsters to buck their hay. The Weavers hired folks and the women folk put on a feast at noon that was legendary!! I didn’t work for Uncle Mike, but I knew some who died, and his grandson was a good friend.
It seems that you are well traveled, so I wanted to fill in some about these two towns. I hope one day you can appreciate these towns from an adult perspective, free of the painful memories. There is of course more about these two towns that even I could fill in, in such a limited space. Of course, I could never convey the hot summer nights with the smell of glue coming from Myrtle Creek Ply. Even I missed out on some of the rich kids that attended CBA in Downtown C’ville.
Blessings,
Pioneer Days and catching crawdads in the creek behind the Snake Pit are some of my fondest memories.