Historic Hood River
Turnaround Point, Hood River to Cloud Cap
9-5-2012
Notes
This is where travelers from Hood River to Cloud Cap Inn trade the relative luxury of a motor car for a bumpy ride in a wagon drawn by a team of mules. This print bears crop marks and touch-ups from a newspaper editor who was preparing it for publication.
l.e.
I wonder if Charlott will know right where this spot is located.
I see two spare tires.
Mountain roads in the summer are so dry with that powdery dust.
Mules are not as elegant as horses, but those are nice mules.
I am curious about the mule driver’s haircut?
db
Mules don’t get near the credit they deserve for the settlement of the west. I don’t know much about harness, but those straps connecting the collars to the crossbar on the wagon tongue look to be extra heavy duty . . . a requirement for steep downgrades I wonder.
charlott
I don’t know where this would be. Probably somewhere along what was called the ‘wagon road", only road to Cloud Cap in that early era. I think the man in the car must be quite wealthy, probably someone from Portland as he has a driver.
I think that might be a cap of some sort that the wagon driver has.
A good team of mules could out work a good team of horses. I agree they don’t get the credit due them . During the Civil War, some of the commanders of the field artillery preferred mules to horses. They didn’t move as fast as horses, but tended to have more stamina over the long haul.
l.e.
Did our earlier cars have the steering wheel on the opposite side?
I bet you are right Charlott about the wealthy man with a driver. And the wealthy man is holding a cup of coffee.
Do the letters MC mean anything?
ArthurB
I don’t think those are actually the letters MC. They are touch ups done before the print went to the lithogrophers. They help the car stand out more instead of getting confused with the background.
charlott
If we knew the type of car it is, we might be able to determine if it is an American car or an import.
PK
Ron Kikel, USFS Ranger gave an outstanding tour of Cloud Cap Inn this past Sunday. As part of his presentation, he told of how a Pierce Arrow automobile began the first automobile trips to Cloud Cap, and he pointed out that the car wasn’t capable of making it all the way up, but transferred passengers to wagon, as this picture documents. If I recall correctly, the first automobile trips began in 1911. In 1911 both right and left hand drive vehicles were produced in the US, but Henry Ford’s Model T, beginning in 1908 was left hand drive. The overwhelming popularity of the T brought about the standardization of left hand drive, but it didn’t become standard until the late 20s.
j.f. macdonald
In my book "Stage Coaches and Stage Stations of Eastern Oregon 1850-1920"
The traveler could drive a car to the China Fill area on the road to Cloud Cap, then had to take a stage to the inn. I wish I would have had a copy of your photo for the book, great photo.
Jeffrey Bryant
Is the book "Stage Coaches and Stage Stations of Eastern Oregon 1850-1920" still available? One of my relatives, Miller Vaughan drove stage in Pendleton. His brother in law, Martin VanBuren Jones, did freighting between Junction City and Crescent City.