Restoring the Sandy River

I was gratified to hear this recent story on Oregon Public Broadcasting about plans to tear out two dams on the Sandy River and restore it to a free-flowing state.

I have written a few times on this weblog about dams on the western rivers and their effects on the once-abundant salmon and other wildlife observed by the Lewis and Clark expedition. The article linked to above doesn't mention it, but the Sandy River was named by Lewis and Clark when they camped on it in November of 1805 near its confluence with the Columbia.

The Sandy rises on Mount Hood and flows into the Columbia a few miles east of Portland. The site of the expedition's camp is now Oregon's Lewis and Clark State Park. I've been there, but not since the bicentennial, so I do not know if there are any new interpretive signs or markers. But I will check that out soon and post some photos here.

Readers, please be patient with me! We are in the home stretch of spring term here at EOU and soon I'll be able to hit the road again and cover some of the remaining L&C sites that I have not yet mentioned on this blog.

I'm also interested in seeing what some sites are doing in terms of post-bicentennial interpretation, so I'll be going back to some familiar places as well.