Oliver C. Yocum – Mount Hood Photographer

Oliver C. Yocum, Mount Hood Photographer – I love Mount Hood, history and photography, and when I can bring all three together in one place I’m happy. Loyal readers of my blog may remember the article that I wrote about Jennie Welch and her photography and its importance to the history of Welches and the Mount Hood area. Before Jennie Welch took her first photo another Mount Hood icon, Oliver C. Yocum, was bringing cutting edge photography technology that would eventually allow consumers, such as Jennie, an easier method to create their own photos to the Pacific Northwest.

Oliver C. Yocum, known to everyone as “OC”, came to Oregon in a wagon on the old Oregon Trail as a five year old child with his parents in 1847 and by the time that his life ended became a legend indelibly etched into the history of Mount Hood. His family settled in Yamhill County where he spent his childhood working on the family farm and odd jobs in between. By the time he was 17 he had worked as a clerk in the family hotel in Lafayette, was an apprentice saddlemaker, a builder and in his spare time studied law. In time he struck out on his own. He loved Shakespearean novels and travelled mining camps with a troupe reenacting the plays on a portable stage for the miners.

He eventually made it back to Lafayette where he met Ann Robertson, herself an Oregon Trail immigrant who travelled to Oregon as a two year old, and they were married. OC did some building, cabinet making and grain buying before the couple moved to Portland in 1881 where OC became a photograph printer and eventually a professional photographer.

Photography, back in the old days, was a messy and complicated procedure. It required a glass photo plate to be prepared with chemicals, exposed and developed all within a 15 minute period of time and required a portable darkroom in the form of a tent if you were taking photos in the outdoors. This form of photography was called wet plate photography. But in 1871 a process called dry plate was invented and by 1879 factories were being made to manufacture glass dry plates. Oliver Yocum was the first person in Oregon and, perhaps, the Pacific Northwest to manufacture dry plates. Dry plates were portable and able to expose the photo quicker allowing for hand held photos and were able to be stored for a time after the photo was made before it needed to be developed. This allowed more people to be able to enjoy photography and even though the cameras were still rather bulky, they allowed folks to carry their cameras into the outdoors.

In 1883 Oliver C. Yocum climbed Mount Hood for the first time. During the trip he carried a large 8” x 10” wooden camera and all of it’s accessories weighing close to 50 pounds. It was on this trip that the first photos taken on the summit of Mount Hood were made. It was also on this trip that Yocum fell in love with the countryside on the south side of Mount Hood.

For several seasons Yocum did photography in Portland during the Winter and came to Government Camp in the Summer. He took every opportunity to climb the mountain. In 1887 he was a member of the party that illuminated the summit and was one of the founding members of the Portland climbing club, the Mazamas, in 1894. He guided people to the top of Mount Hood until he turned 67 years old.

In his quest to spend time outdoors in clean air, due to “pulmonary problems” caused by smoky air in Portland, and no doubt the chemicals from the photography process, he changed his occupation to surveyor and in 1890 Yocum moved to Mount Hood, homesteaded, operated a sawmill and started guiding people to the top of Mount Hood. In 1900 he built the first hotel in the town that was named Government Camp.

Oliver lived on Mount Hood until 1911 when he sold most of his holdings in Government Camp and moved back to Portland where he decided to study dentistry and accepted a position at the North Pacific Dental College. He was 69 years old at that point and had sold most of the business to the soon to become legendary Lige Coalman, including the hotel.

OC lived a long and varied life and will forever be associated with the history of Mount Hood, but will also be a part of Mount Hood’s photographic history. OC died in 1928 and was followed into eternity by his wife Ann two years later.  Although his legacy rarely mentions his contributions to photography, his name will be preserved in some of the geographic locations on and around Mount Hood. Yocum Ridge, a very challenging ridge on the southeastern side of the mountain was named for him as well as the picturesque waterfall on Camp Creek, Yocum Falls.

Yocum Falls (Clackamas County, Oregon) – Wikipedia
Yocum Falls, is a waterfall located in the heart of the Mount Hood National Forest, … the west slope of Mount Hood, comes from businessman Oliver C. Yocum.

On The Summit of Mt. Hood in 1915

A Glass Slide of The Summit of Mt. Hood

The Summit of Mt. Hood circa 1915 – This is a “Magic Lantern” slide from my collection. It shows a climber standing on the top of Mount Hood with the old Summit House fire lookout station built by the legendary mountain man Lige Coalman.

All of the lumber was carried up the mountain by hand, with Lige doing most of the carrying. Lige found it difficult to find men who would work as hard as him. Most of those whom he hired lasted only a day or two before quitting. Once the building was built Lige routinely carried barrels of heating oil and other supplies to the lookout.

This structure was built in the Summer of 1915. By 1941 it had deteriorated to bad that it was pushed over the edge.

Climbing Mt. Hood FAQ | Mazamas
Standing on the summit of Mt. Hood, the highest point in Oregon at 11,250 feet, is a lifelong dream for many aspiring mountaineers. The Mazamas have been …

Jennie Welch Mt Hood Photographer

Jennie Welch – Mt Hood Photographer

Not as well know as some of her contemporaries, Jennie Welch deserves to be remembered as one of Mt Hood’s early Photographers. We’re all photographers in the 21st century. In 2018, the day of cell phones and their cameras, we hardly think about it when we pull out the phone to get a photo of friends, family and places that we visit. A hundred years ago it wasn’t so easy. Back then cameras were bulky and film was inconvenient. Not all photos turned out and you didn’t know what results that you would end up with for a long time while your film was away being developed, if you didn’t develop your own. But, of course, there enthusiasts.

There were photographers that ranged from full fledged professionals to home hobbyists with their own darkrooms. Most professional photographers provided services to those who didn’t have their own photography gear. They would travel and offer their services, sometimes door to door. They would photograph anything from individual portraits to family groups. Even photos of prize possessions such as their home, pets or a brand new automobile.

At the early part of the 20th century postcards were a big deal. Many people would order a set of the photos printed as a postcard to provide a way to send a photo to a friend or a family member that lived away.

Many of these same photographers provided photo postcards to souvenir shops of local iconic landmarks frequented by tourists. Afterall it was easier to just buy some picture postcards than it was to fuss with a camera and the subsequent rolls of film.

Some of these photographers made a name for themselves that has endured through the years but some of them were a little bit obscure. Some churned out massive amounts of these photo postcards while others only made enough to sell in their own roadhouse gift shops or country stores. Billy Welch’s Hotel was no exception.

Back in 1905 the Welches post office was established at Billy’s Ranch with Billy as postmaster. Billy married Jennie Faubion, the daughter of Oregon Trail pioneers and local homesteaders, and in 1940 became the Welches postmaster. Jennie was the Welches postmaster until 1960. Jennie Welch loved antiques and enjoyed collecting daguerreotype, ambrotype and tintype examples of early photography. It’s obvious that Jennie enjoyed photography.

Most people who remember Jennie remember her primary passion being antiques, but what a lot of people don’t know is that Jennie Welch was also one of the first local photographers of her day. She took photos and most likely had someone else develop them and apply them to a postcard backs to be sold to tourists in the Welches Store and Post Office. They’re quite rare as she didn’t make volumes of them like some of the other pro photographers did and they’re hard to take notice of when you see one, but every now and then one is recognized by the keen eyed postcard collector.

Although not recognized as such, Jennie Welch should be included in the list of early 20th century female photographers. Her photos capture the history and beauty of the Welches. Without her photos many early scenes would be lost with the passing of time.

Today her photos are considered rare and collectable. Gone or the days of pictures postcards and travelling photography salesmen but thankfully their work lives on. Jennie Welch – Mt Hood Photographer

Oliver C. Yocum – Mount Hood Photographer – Mount Hood History
2 May 2019 Before Jennie Welch took her first photo another Mount Hood icon was … Oliver C Yocum, known to everyone as “OC”, came to Oregon in a …

Steven Mitchell – Husband of the Hills

Steven Mitchell, Mount Hood History

Steven Mitchell
Steven Mitchell

Steven Mitchell was legend on Mount Hood in his times, as well as his son Arlie, who was the last tollgate keeper at the Rhododendron Tollgate of the old Barlow Trail Road. Lige Coalman, who was raised by Steven, was also a legendary mountain man on Mount Hood in his own right.

Steven Mitchell – Portland Oregonian Sept 12 1920

“Steve Mitchell – Husband of the Hills

Man of the mountains

Whose Life Near Mount Hood Is a Story Book of Many Treasures

By Earl C. Brownlee

For 60 years Steve Mitchell, husband of the hills, has been fleeing, terrified, from civilization.

Yet the dreaded ogre as pacing at his heels again, debauching the icy waters of his streams of melted snow, defacing the majesty of his brilliant autumn hills, slaughtering the game that gave him his meat and heaping its insults upon injuries suffered at its hands.

The dusty road before his cabin door, an artery that helped to carve from the wilderness of woods, is leading multitudes of folk through the most wonderfully romantic section of the land of the last frontier.

And from end to end of the timber bordered highway of delightful vistas there is nothing or no one so romantic as Steve himself; Steve Mitchell, as old as the mountains he loves so well-the last of a sterling generation of brave men who revered the quiet grandeur of the hills above all other things.

Far from the paths of man’s progress Steve Mitchell many years ago sought the realm of heart’s desire. To achieve his goal this man of the mountains first cut his way as a workman over what became, by dint of labors like his, Portland’s Hawthorne avenue. With the street completed, civilization advanced and Steve Mitchell fled to far places again, cutting roadways as he went, into dark forests the circled Mount Hood.

There he found his glorious freedom and there he has remained, while time has etched its wrinkles on his face and has woven a mantle of white for his brow.

Meanwhile, he has reared and sacrificed to man’s estate four splendid sons and two accomplished daughters, among whom are those who have forsaken the ways of their grizzled father and have found success in the hated city.

“Confounded thunder buses” roll by his forest-bound home in ceaseless numbers nowadays as Steve Mitchell peers peacefully into the future for a spot where the profits and pleasures of men cannot be encroached.


In the ‘60s Steve Mitchell looked into the west from his home in Iowa. He kept faith with the vision and from a point near Cleveland, Ohio, he started the pilgrimage.

“And I’ve been tinkering aling ever since,” he says, as he declares he has other distances to gain.

Briefly, his tinkering was centered in mines of gold in California, but in 1866 he came to Oregon. He helped build streets through the timber and then built roads to and through Sandy to the mountains.

About the man and his life many tales are told, but none more truthfully nor well then Steve can tell them. There’s the story of his gold claim to entrance the mountain novice.

It is said that far back on the Salmon River, concealed for nearly half a century against the prying eyes of friends and enemy, Mitchell has a gold mine.. There, the story has it, he chips great nuggets from a rocky wall whenever he’s in need of funds and brings them to the counting house. The claim is a priceless treasure, we are told, that would yield the cost of every comfort if its owner chose.

“Bah!” Steve Mitchell will exclaim if you inquire into the story. “There are more lies in these hills than there wever were cougars.

“Liars, thunder buses and a new kind of man-animal with a whooping sort of holler are the torments of civilization. There’s too much civilization in the world.
“If you write articles tell about these man-animals who have come into the hills to pollute God’s creeks by washing their unworthy feet in them and tearing the quiet night with their whooping hollering. They’re ornery-worse than a cougar, and a couple of ‘em aint very far away.”


Folks don’t know the mountains, Steve Mitchell says, and can’t love their dim trails and rocky peaks as he does. Wedded to their wonders, Mitchell has learned their lore as the schoolboy learns from books; in them he has built his home and in them he will find his grave.

In the interim, though, there has been a lifetime of marvelous days, attended with thrills at times, yet always mandatory in their hold upon the heart of this fine fellow.

Steve was bent over a kitchen stove, when by inquisitiveness born of long acquaintance, he was interrupted, and his story elicited by many questions. Upon the stove a frying pan, containing a stewing portion of carrots, simmered as Steve jammed more firewood into the blaze that was heating his dinner.

He hauled forth a shaggy, yet sadly worn pipe for himself and from his seat on the end of a wood box, fanned romance by his talk.


Nineteen fording places in the river back of Steve Mitchell’s cabin mark the old Barlow trail, pathway of the pioneers who first crossed the Cascades around the base of Mount Hood. Mitchell can point out each ford and can tell of the days when he trod the still fresh trail of those empire builders who preceded him.

He will show from his front door the vast, timbered hill where, within his mountain lifetime, has grown a forest. When Mitchell selected his mountainous home there was no sign of woods save the blackened bulk of great trees destroyed by an ancient fire.

He has seen those hills yield heavy timber, where, within the scope of his own memory, there was but a charred reminder of a once deep forest. Over their denuded slopes he has watched by the hour while his dogs ran deer that he might have food, he lolled in their shade times unnumbered as he hauled from their roaring streams great trout to appease the mountaineer’s keen appetite. He has tracked the bear to favorite berry fields and his gun has brought the mountain lion hurtling from his tree.

He has held communion with the lords of nature’s great open spaces, and he has studies their secrets until they are his lexicon-his primer and his Bible.

From it all he has learned both hospitality and hate. He hates civilization; yet he is hospitable to a degree unlimited.


As he spread his Sunday dinner a demand to partake with him declined, he proferred (sic) a piece of his “bachelor pie” that would bring envy to the most dainty housewife. Its flaky crust enough to belittle a salaried chef, the pie he had manufactured, with filling of raisins, was a delicious morsel the he insisted must be followed by a generous slab of light loaf cake he had just drawn from the oven.

“And now,” he jocularly said, “you can stay overnight if it rains real hard.”

“Folks from the towns are taking all the fish from the creeks are we’d have a mess for breakfast too. No, ‘planted’ fish do not restock the streams. Does a hen lay all her eggs in one day, once she gets started? Neither do fish, if they’re left to their natural means, and scientific methods can’t change nature’s way.

“The same civilization that has ‘fished out’ the streams has frightened the few remaining animals back into the mountains, where these confounded thunder buses can’t chug and sputter and roar their dusty way through night and day.

“Between thunder buses and these man-animals down the road one can’t even sleep anymore.

“Civilization is coming too close and I’m about to move back with the deer and the bear and the fish. There are no neighbors there to let their people starve on their doorstep. There is no whopping holler at midnight, but the call of the mountain winds and the cougar’s cry.”


Steve Mitchell’s comfortable little cabin sits beside the road 10 miles west of Government camp, and for many miles around there is hardly a foot of ground that this main of the mountains has not trod and whose charms he has not sought.

He is known to the folk who live in the hills, but to those who come from “civilized” places his is but one of the modest homes that may be found in the wilderness.

His, though, is a home in every sense, for he lives in it in summer and winter, through snow and sunshine. Only upon “occasions” does he venture from his mountain haven and such occasions are all to frequent if they occur more than once in a decade. The sturdy sons who remain in the family drop in now and then to visit with their father or to spend an idle day under his roof. But his wife who saw his early happiness in the hills has been called to “civilization.” She lives at Sandy, where, Steve declares, he has no business. Two splendid daughters hold worthy positions in centers of “civilization”.

Three sons remain of the four reared in the Mitchell family. Lige Coalman, famous Mount Hood guide and forest ranger, whose knowledge of the timbered wilds founded on training at Steve Mitchell’s hands, was reared as a son by this mountaineer and his wife. But Coalman, too, has quit the mountains for the profits of a farm.


When the world war opened the four stalwart Mitchell boys, each loyally attentive to their father and each a convert to the nature-loving, out-of-doors creed of their forebear, were prepared with strong bodies, capable hands and a will for the fray. Mountaineers, each of them, the four enlisted for service. Two were members of the marine corp, one chose navy and the fourth wore an army uniform. The first three were overseas fighting men. Arlie, a strapping young chap wonderfully versed in mountain lore, made 11 round trips over the Atlantic as a member of the nation’s naval forces and did eight months of shore duty overseas, where he visited almost every important city on the continent and in the British Isles.

“I hadn’t been out of the mountains much before,” he says, “and I never want to be again.

The sons who were marines, members of the mow historic fifth regiment, were also initiated to the ultra-modern delights of the world’s capitals, but they gleefully returned to the mountains of their childhood and resumed to their work in the forests.

One of these, a boy respected by every mountaineer who met him, fought through all the hot campaigns in which the American marines mouled war history in France, before he returned to the wooded, romantic land of his choice.


Again in the mountains, held fast by their appeal, this youth, just a year ago, gave his life to the protection of his playground when fire swept through the forest almost within sight of his father’s cabin.

With the same strength and courage that he fought his battle overseas, Steve’s son fought the blaze that would denude his homeland. Nor did he care a whit for the danger that surrounded him when a great fir, rocked upon its fire gnawed base, crashed down upon him.

That was an “occasion,” a day of sorrow for Steve Mitchell. He was drawn to the city-hated Portland-to hear the funeral dirge. And he vows he will never return.

The lonesome trails of the mysterious mountains have felt the footfall of Steve Mitchell. He will not profane the joys the hills have given him by the belated association with the world beyond his forest bound home. “

Steve Mitchell - Husband of the Hills
Steve Mitchell – Husband of the Hills

Mount Hood – Wikipedia
Mount Hood, called Wy’east by the Multnomah tribe, is a potentially active stratovolcano in the Cascade Volcanic Arc. It was formed by a subduction zone on the …

Mrs Pierce of Welches Killed a Bear With a Hoe

Mrs Pierce of Welches Killed a Bear With a Hoe – I have spent a lot of time talking with old timers and family members of those who have lived up here in the Mountain Community for quite a few years now. In one or two conversations I’ve heard tell of a woman who gained local notoriety for killing a bear that invaded her space with a garden hoe. That’s right a woman killed a bear with a hoe.

This afternoon while perusing newspaper archives I happened across this newspaper clipping. Well what do you know? It’s a true story.

The Oregon Daily Journal (Portland Oregon) 20 March 1915

“Gresham Outlook: When Mrs. Pierce of Welches killed a bear with a hoe last Saturday she set an example for all the people of the mountain country. The usual plan of warfare on bears is a good dog and a trusty rifle, but it has been proved that they are no longer needed. The sport should become popular now, because everyone can afford a hoe, and bears are plentiful.”

Welches Oregon Bear Hoe Portland Oregon Daily Journal 20 March 1915
Welches Oregon Bear Hoe Portland Oregon Daily Journal 20 March 1915

How to survive a bear encounter (and what to do if it all goes wrong …
Jul 21, 2016 You’re more likely to die from a tick bite or a bee sting than to you are to be killed by a grizzly bear in Yellowstone park, but here are a few tips …

Reliance Mt Hood Stages

Reliance Mt Hood Stages – First Autos to Mount Hood

Reliance Mt Hood Stages – In the early days of the road to Mount Hood, after the immigrant era, the road allowed the burgeoning new city of Portland to access the mountain for recreation. Mountain climbing and hiking the trails in the foothills in those days was the primary activity in the area. Skiing had yet to become an activity on the mountain.

Reliance Mt Hood Stages
Reliance Mt Hood Stages advertising

Automobiles were starting to become a practical means of transportation, but was still primitive. Most people didn’t own a car which gave stage companies an opportunity to carry fun seekers to and from the lodges and roadhouses on Mount Hood. This also gave inn keepers an opportunity to host these people because a trip to Mount Hood wasn’t a simple day trip. Many times a trip to The Mountain was a week minimum investment in time.

Lodges such as Arrah Wanna, Welches Ranch, Tawney’s Mountain Home, La Casa Monte, The Rhododendron Tavern and the Government Camp Hotel all sprang up due to a need to recreational lodging.

The flyer below gives a great representation of the mileage, the lodging available and cost of a trip to the mountain.

Those days were primitive and simple and difficult compared to this day and age, but the life that was lived seems much more fun and adventure filled than the way we live today.

Mt Hood By Motor Stage
Mt. Hood – South Side
Reliance Mt Hood Stages
Mountain Division
“The Mt. Hood Line”
10th Season of Reliable Service

Owned and Operated by
Irvington Garage and Auto Co. Inc.
J. L. S. Snead, Pres,-Mgr. Phones: East 0135 East 3410
Tickets, Reservations and Waiting Room at
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Park and Yamhill Streets
Phone Main 8611

Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert
Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert

 

Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert
Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert

 

Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert
Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert

 

Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert
Reliance Mt Hood Stages Advert

 

Six Horse Mt Hood Area Sightseeing Carriage Photo

Mt Hood Area Sightseeing Carriage – Early Oregon Tourism

Six Horse Mt Hood Area Sightseeing Carriage – SIX-HORSE TEAM AND SIGHT-SEEING CARRIAGE IN MOUNT HOOD AREA IN 1893 –

Before the days of automobiles sight-seers were taken over roads at the base of Mount Hood in equipages such as this. The late E. S. Olinger, known as one of Oregon’s most noted drivers is holding the reins.

This six-horse team pulling its crowded carriage of a summer-Sunday sightseers was photographed in 1893 in the Mt. Hood area. E.S. Olinger, one of top drivers, handled the reins.

Six-horse sight-seeing carriage in Mount Hood area in 1893
Six-horse sight-seeing carriage in Mount Hood area in 1893
Oregon Trail – Wikipedia
The Oregon Trail is a 2,170-mile (3,490 km) historic East–West, large-wheeled wagon route … on the California Trail (from 1843), Mormon Trail (from 1847), and Bozeman Trail (from 1863), before turning off to their separate destinations.

Mt Hood from Lookout Mountain

Vintage Photograph of Mt Hood from Lookout Mountain

“On Lookout Mountain with Mt Hood as a background.”

Not a lot has changed in the last 100 years once you hit the trail… well, maybe the clothing but we still get the same feeling of freedom when we stand on a place like this with Mt Hood as a background.

Lookout Mountain is on the east side of Mount Hood and was once the location of a fire look out. The look out building has been gone since 1966 but the foundation is still there.

Back when this photo was made there was no fire look out like we’re familiar with. There was most likely just the alidade, or triangulation device, and a log cabin in the field below.

You can get to there two ways. The hard way or the easy way. You can either catch a trail near Robinhood Campground on Highway 35 and hike about 6.5 miles with about a 3000 foot elevation gain, or you can drive up to High Prairie off of the old Dufur Road and walk a gentle old road for about a mile and a half.

And what a great view of Mount Hood you’ll get.

Lookout Mountain
Lookout Mountain

Reliance Mt Hood Stages
Reliance Mt Hood Stages – First Autos to Mount Hood Reliance Mt Hood Stages – In the early days of the

A signature of William “Billy” Welch from 1902

A Message from William “Billy” Welch from the grave.

A signature of William “Billy” Welch from 1902. This was prior to the establishment of Welches as a town. Billy seems to have been in a grim mood when he wrote this. Sadly his wife Mamie Kopper would die soon after.

“Salmon River

Jan 8, 1902

Think of me when this you see
Though in this world I may not be
But if my grave should be my bed
Remember me when I am dead.

Yours Truly

W. Welch”

I wonder if he really thought that people would be thinking of him over 100 years later? 

William Welch Epitaph Salmon Or 1902
William Welch Epitaph Salmon Or 1902 -A signature of William Welch from 1902

Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Tucker Sno-Cats

Classic Tucker Sno-Cats Vintage Postcards

Here’s a scene from the days before the Palmer Lift was installed of some classic Tucker Sno-Cats. The first two photos show a unique 20 passenger model 743 Transport Sno-Cat called “The Shoebox”. The third photo shows a traditional model 443 four track machine.

The shoebox carried multiple passengers up above the lodge past the Silcox Hut to Triangle Moraine and the Palmer Snowfield for Summer Ski before the Palmer Ski Lift was built.

Silcox Hut was the upper terminus for the original Magic Mile ski lift built in 1938. The Palmer Ski Lift was built in 1978.

The Tucker Snow-Cats have been used in some sort of capacity since the beginning of the ski industry on Mount Hood. They have a tradition on the mountain that is still celebrated in the form of a recently acquired meticulously restored Tucker Snow-Cat for display at the lodge.

Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats
Mount Hood Timberline Lodge Snowcats

Tucker Sno-Cat – Wikipedia
The Tucker SnoCat is a tracked vehicle or a family of tracked vehicles for snow conditions, manufactured in Medford, Oregon. Different models have been used …