[All-Gorge] 🍎 The Town That Was: Remembering Underwood's 1946 Fire - 5/5

Today marks exactly eighty years since the devastating May 5, 1946 fire that wiped out the bustling riverside village of Old Underwood. In this special anniversary episode, we explore the sheer ambition of the early Gorge fruit growers, the “Sunday conflagration” that changed the town's trajectory, and the new life taking root on the waterfront today.

In This Episode:

• The ancient Indigenous roots of the Underwood crossing.
• How a pioneer boat landing became "The Most Famous Fruit Belt in the World."
• The perfect storm of economic shifts that kept the lower commercial core from rebuilding.
• Underwood’s hopeful next chapter, happening right before our eyes
• A shoutout to our favorite local historical archives.

Resources & Links:

• Read the full written Dispatch at SkamaniaDispatch.com
• Underwood Through the Years by Mary Kapp and Kathy LaMotte
• The Upbuilding of the White Salmon Area: Historical Misinformation Exposed by Ralph Brown
• Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center Museum
• Confluence Project
• Yakama Nation Cultural Center
• Columbia Inter-Tribal Fish Commission
• Underwood Park and Recreation District (UPRD) 
• Gorge Heritage Museum
• HistoryLink.org

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_00 0:01

If you drive along Highway 14 today and pull off at the Underwood intersection, what do you see? A wide stretch of asphalt, a couple of parked cars, maybe someone waiting to turn up the hill on Cook Underwood Road. But if you're standing in that exact spot exactly 80 years ago today, on May 5th, 1946, you'd be standing in the middle of a bustling riverside village. Welcome to Open Gorge. I'm your host Kate, and today at this very special edition, we are looking back at the day old Underwood burned to the ground and exploring why this once vibrant town center never quite made it back. Most of us living around here know Underwood as a dispersed, quiet community perched up on the heights. But the original town center sat right down by the Columbia River. In the 1920s and 30s, it was a major hub of local commerce. Photos from the era show locals gathered in front of the Underwood Mercantile, waiting for the SPS train to arrive. Towering in the background is a grand three-story 1905 Underwood or Rockwood hotel. It was a dense, vibrant little block, with butcher shops, mercantile, two taverns, and a lot of services that were serving a growing little community. To understand what was lost, you have to understand the sheer ambition of the town that burned. Looking back at our region's roots, long before it was a pioneer settlement, the stretch of the river was an ancient crossing and gathering place for the indigenous peoples of the gorge. The modern footprint of the town began to take shape in the late 1850s when a pioneer named Amos Underwood arrived. He settled near the mouth of the White Salmon River and married Taswatha, the daughter of local Cascade chief Waliwa, often called in our local historical documents Chief Chenowith. It's important to note that we don't just view this as pioneer history. For thousands of years before any survey stakes were driven into the ground, this landscape was and still is the home of the Sapatan speaking peoples. To this day, the area around the mouth of the White Salmon remains a vital place for the Yakima, Warm Springs, Yumatia, and Nez Perce tribes. If you look down the river today, and in the photos on the newsletter edition of this episode, you'll see the Treaty Fishing Access Site. These sites were established to ensure that tribal members could continue their ancient tradition of fishing the Columbia, a right guaranteed by the treaties of 1855. It was in this area that Amos established a boat landing that would eventually bear his name. By the turn of the century, this small landing had blossomed into a crucial transportation bottleneck for the entire region. And the culture of this place, I was incredibly proud. During the early 1900s, this region was booming with the promise of agriculture. Underwood was fiercely marketing itself as the gateway to the White Salmon Valley. In a 1910 issue of Better Fruit Magazine, full page ads proclaimed our stretch of the Columbia to be the most famous fruit belt in the world. First-class fruit growing land near the river was selling for $40 to $150 an acre, which was astronomical back then. The town was built entirely on the logistical engine of this agricultural boom and its vibrant civic life, which makes what happened next all the more devastating. Turning out to that fateful Sunday, it was the morning of May 5th, 1946. A fire broke out near the chimney of a local general store, and we all know the gorge from winds. Banned by a strong, relentless west wind, the blaze quickly became an uncontrollable conflagration. Fire departments from Bingon, Whitesalmon, and Hood River rushed to the scene. They fought the flames for three hours, but it was not enough. The lower town was decimated. Seven large buildings were consumed entirely, the general store, the post office, two service stations, a beer tavern, and the historic Underwood Hotel. The only saving grace was that the fire did not jump the highway. The railroad station, delivery, fish hatchery, and vital fruit warehouses on the riverside were spared. When a disaster of this scale strikes, the immediate question is always about rebuilding. Why is the intersection mostly just a handful of buildings and parking lots today? It's not for lack of spirit. It was a perfect storm of economic and geographic shifts. First, there was the total loss of the commercial core. Rebuilding an entire town's infrastructure all at once takes massive capital that just wasn't available in the post-war years. Second, the population had already started shifting. Even before the fire, residents were migrating up the hill to Underwood Heights for better land, and the lower corridor was consolidating as a commercial and social center. The fire just sped up a transition that was already underway. Third, the agricultural industry was modernizing. Packing and shipping operations were centralizing in bingon and white salmon, stripping the lower town of its economic engine right at a critical transition point where it was mostly going to become more of a social and civic center. And finally, surviving services just moved. The post office eventually relocated alongside the school up the hill about a mile north of the river, adapting to where community often spent their days. When you look at the side-by-side photos of the Underwood block in the 1920s versus today, it's a stark contrast. The May 5th fire pushed Underwood up the hill, leaving the bustling lower village to the history books. But, especially as a resident myself of Underwood, I am really grateful to tell you that the story of this beautiful place is not over. If you drive by today, there are signs of fresh life taking root right in the footprint of Old Underwood. We have the continued presence of longtime neighborhood favorite Manny's Lanchera, and just this past month the exciting addition of willow wine cellars to the bottom floor of the old White Salmon Valley Apple Growers Union warehouse that you might know as the Red House. As we head into summer, it's our hope that these local spots will bring back some of the community and vibrancy that once defined this historic waterfront village. Please join us there this summer. Before we sign off, I wanted to make a quick note on the local history. Preserving these stories takes a lot of work, and so I wanted to say a massive thank you to the authors and historians who helped make today's episode possible. Check out the book Underwood Through the Years by Mary Capp and Kathy Lamotte, as well as The Upbuilding of the White Salmon Area by Ralph Brown. If you want to dig deeper yourself, we have linked to the incredible local archives and these materials in our show notes. I also have to say if you want to learn more about the living cultures and ancient history of the stretch of the river, I cannot recommend the Confluence Project enough. They've done incredible work documenting the indigenous perspectives on the gorge and have also put links in the show notes to the Accama Nation Cultural Center and the Intertribal Fish Commission. These organizations provide the essential context that helps us see the gorge not just as a scenic area, but a deeply storied, sovereign landscape. You've been listening to a production of opengorge.org, home of the Scamania Dispatch and the Click A Tatler. We believe that informed communities are stronger communities. To support our work and stay up to date on everything happening in the gorge, head over to Scamaniadispatch.com to sign up for our newsletters. You can also find us on Facebook at Facebook.comslash opengorge. Join the conversation and share your thoughts on today's episode. Thanks so much for tuning in, and we'll talk to you next time.