Douglas County Commissioners Tim Freeman, Chris Boice and Tom Kress are excited to add another story to their series highlighting the wide-array of services provided by departments within Douglas County government. Douglas County has 26 separate departments, with an additional 19 divisions associated with those departments. For part three of “What Can County Government Do for You?”, the Commissioners would like to highlight the amazing services provided by one of our most engaging and interesting departments, our Douglas County Museums. Our Douglas County Museum system is made up of two museums our Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History and our Umpqua River Lighthouse & Coastal History Museum. For Part Three we will cover the history and exhibits of our Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History. Stay tuned for Part Four of our series on “What Can County Government Do For You” with a feature story on our Umpqua River Lighthouse & Coastal History Museum.
Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History (Museum), whose motto is “giving our past a presence,” operates under the direction of the Douglas County Commissioners, and is managed by our Museum Director, James (Jamie) Davis. Jamie has been at the helm for three and half years, but has been a part of our small but mighty museum team since 2009. Besides, Jamie, the Museum has one full-time employee, Eric Winslow, our Museum Operations Tech and two part-time employees, Karen Bratton, Museum Research Librarian, who has been at the Museum for over 24 years, and Meredith Hutchins, Department Assistant who has been with the museum for 10 years (5 as a volunteer and 5 as an employee). The Museum relies heavily on volunteers who help with museum operations, events, gift shop, collection maintenance, the creation of new exhibits, artifact restoration and cataloging items. Annually, the Museum has 8-10 volunteers that work seasonal and year-round shifts, including 30 year volunteer Janet Beebe and 18 year volunteer Nick Lehrbach. Our museum system also receives support from the Douglas County Museum Foundation. The Douglas County Museum Foundation was founded in 1982, and is a non-profit 501(3)c organization with a board of directors that help to support, promote and encourage growth of both of our museums.
The Douglas County Commissioners have always played a major role in the development and growth of our county, and the Museum is no exception. Over five decades ago, Douglas County Commissioners, Stanford Buell, Al Flegel, and Ray Doerner laid the ground work for the establishment of a historical exhibition hall that would provide a safe-harbor for the numerous artifacts, collections and oral accounts that pay tribute to the rich and diverse history of the Umpqua Valley, its lands and its inhabitants. In August 1969, under the supervision of the Douglas County Commissioners and the Museum’s first curator, George B. Abdill, the Museum's first building was completed. With everyone anxious to see the new facility, they decided to open to the public on the first day of the 1969 Douglas County Fair. An official open house and dedication was held in May 1970, after the completion of construction of the rest of the original museum design.
A point of historical fact: The iconic structure that houses our museum collection has local ’tree’ roots that pre-date the opening of the museum by almost 100 years. You see, prune orchards were first planted in the Umpqua Valley in 1878, and by 1903, over 91 truckloads of dried prunes were exported to destinations all over the west coast and beyond. By 1910, prunes were being planted, cultivated and dried on almost every farm in the region. The prune industry reached its prime in 1919, and three years later was named the largest single fruit crop in Oregon. But, by 1932, the depression had taken a toll on the prune market. Orchards were abandoned due to labor shortages and falling prices, and by the mid-1940s, most of the prune orchards were gone. Other crops and industry would soon replace the prunes, but the tall wooden structures used to dry the prunes remained. A few of the tall prune drying buildings are still standing today, dotting the valleys of the Umpqua like watch towers. Architect Howard Backen, who had grown up in Roseburg, was selected to design the new museum. Backen decided to give the museum complex a retro farm look, by simulating those prune drying buildings, as well as, hop dryers and barns reminiscent of the heyday of our agricultural industry from a century before. His modern interpretation, paying homage to the once flourishing industry, included a grand entry ‘prune drying’ tower comprised of a foyer and administrative offices. The ‘prune drying’ tower was connected via a transparent sky bridge that led to little “museum pods or barns” which held the exhibitions. The museum design was even given an Award of Merit at the 1969 Bay Area Awards Program from the American Institute of Architects. In 1978, the Douglas County Commissioners authorized the construction of a major addition to the Museum, which nearly doubled its size to 40,000 total square feet, including a 20,000 square foot storage facility, a classroom, an outdoor interactive display, expanded natural history galleries, a research library and a photography lab. Today, after a few alterations and updates the museum stands as a pinnacle monument in Douglas County….with the iconic ‘prune drying’ tower standing as the welcome beacon for visitors and travelers alike.
When people take the time to walk thru the smartly appointed 20,00 square feet of artifact and ‘limited time’ exhibit pods at the Museum, many are shocked at the scale of our vast collection. They are astonished that a community this size has a historical institution of this magnitude and quality. Many artifacts on display are so fragile that staff has to limit the amount of time they are handled or exposed to air and light (the two main enemies of preservation) in order to hang onto the relics for generations to come. Each and every item has been painstakingly cataloged, preserved and stored. All the items in our museum collection have been graciously donated or loaned to us over the years. Each item our museum chooses to add to their collection must go through a careful selection process, with the first priority being recognized as having provenance to Douglas County. It really stands as a testament to the commitment of our Douglas County Commissioners, employees, foundation members and volunteers, who have worked painstakingly and passionately over the years in preserving our local history.
Being at the heart of a natural resource-based economy, the Museum pays homage to the mining, fishing, farming and timber industries in Douglas County. The Museum boasts Oregon’s largest natural history collection with more than 7,500 items that help tell the ancient and contemporary stories of the Umpqua River Valley. It showcases the wonderful ecological diversity of our county, as it traverses an amazingly wide range of elevations, environments, vegetation and creatures from the snowcapped peaks of Mt. Thielsen in the Cascade Mountain Range, through the Umpqua Valley – which is defined by the watershed basin of the Umpqua River, then over the Coastal Mountain Range to the crashing surf of the Pacific Ocean in Winchester Bay. Visitors can check out mammoth tusks and ancient fossils, creature mounts featuring native beaver, elk and harbor seals, interact with interpretative dioramas, play in the hands-on archeological dig area and revel in one of the Northwest’s most comprehensive plant collections in its research herbarium with nearly 3,000 catalogued specimens.
The Museum also features cultural and period relics from a time when Native Americans inhabited the mountains, streams and shores of the County. Home to humans for more than 10,000 years, the valley is named for the Umpqua Tribe that still call this area home. It also chronicles the journey of the first non-native explorers, pioneers and settlers that came to our area as fur trappers, missionaries, prospectors, loggers, farmers and fishermen. Their epic stories are told through cultural artifacts ranging from prehistoric spear points, traded beads and expertly woven baskets to family quilts brought over the Oregon Trail; from life-size displays featuring covered wagons, farming tools and oxen yokes to the last standing depot of the Oregon & California Railroad; from actual blast remnants to an entire archive of photos of the catastrophic 1959 Roseburg Blast. For History Channel fans, it’s as if you are at a live taping of ‘Mysteries at the Museum,’ when you discover a strange artifact and read the sordid tale associated with it – visitors should ask about our rare beaver coin or the preserved hair wreath!
Did you know that at any given time, only about 5% of the Museum’s vast collections are on display? That’s right, in order to keep the museum relevant to locals and tourists alike, as well as preserve the integrity of artifacts, the museum staff continually updates the exhibit halls and offers ‘limited edition’ viewings of certain collections 2-3 times a year. In recent years they have showcased limited time exhibits featuring antique wedding gowns, curios and curiosities, bicycles, snakes, pioneer medical tools, one room classrooms, vintage lithographs and quilts. Just this last month they opened a brand-new exhibit highlighting the pioneers of the wine industry in Douglas County. Coming this Fall they will be collaborating with Douglas Timber Operators on a special exhibit about the 2020 Archie Creek Fire.
A unique feature of our Museum is our extensive research library. It holds Oregon’s second largest historic photograph collection with more than 25,000 images going back as early as the mid-19th century. The Museum provides public access to research materials for those who are interested in the people, places and events of Douglas County. Through the Lavola Bakken Research Library, public access is granted for a wide array of printed materials including books, manuscripts, photos, ledgers, newspapers, audio tapes and much more. Lavola Bakken was a local writer and historian who wrote extensively on the history of the Native Americans and early pioneers of the North Umpqua. She was the first Research Librarian at the Museum and was responsible for acquiring and cataloging the first of the Museums extensive manuscript, book and ephemera collections. After her passing in 1980, the Library was named in her honor. The Museum is an annual field trip destination for third and fourth grade classrooms across the county as students study the Oregon Trail. It is also home to the Umpqua Edventure Academy, a nature-based preschool. The museum often hosts summer educational kids camps and programs, outdoor family movie nights, event and meeting space rentals, winery tours and special events.
“Our Douglas County Museum is more than just a place to stop and look at ‘old things.’ It is a monument to our living history. It represents our heritage and provides a sneak peek into a way of life and industry from yesteryear. Together with our dedicated museum staff, foundation and volunteers, the Douglas County Museum has had, still has, and will continue to showcase our amazing Umpqua Valley, and most important of all, the pleasure of inviting visitors from far and wide, so we can share our stories, our land and our people,” stated Douglas County Museum Liaison Commissioner Tom Kress.
The Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History is located at 123 Museum Drive in Roseburg, Oregon (adjacent to I-5 off Exit 123 and the Douglas County Fairgrounds). It is open Tuesday through Saturday 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. It can take 1-3 hours to tour the museum depending on your pace. The Lavola Bakken Research Library is open Tuesday through Saturday 1:00 pm – 4:30 pm. Admission is free for members, ages 0-4 are free, students 5-17 are $2.00, adults are $8.00, seniors and veterans are $5.00. The "Museum Mercantile", our Museum gift shop, offers the area’s leading source of books on Douglas County’s natural and cultural history, as well as a wide range of Oregon souvenirs and other great gift items including educational and historic toys. For more information or to volunteer at our Douglas County Museum of History & Natural History check out our website at https://umpquavalleymuseums.org/ or call the Douglas County Museum at (541) 957-7007.
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