Historic Hood River

Notes

The 1958-1959 remodel of the United Telephone building at 601 State Street (which we saw yesterday) absorbed the old building without leaving a clue it is inside.  They ripped off the north porch and extended the building to the street, added a stairwell and entrance to the west, and sheathed the east wall in a modernized facade of brick and industrial window panels.  While we don’t have any photographic evidence, it’s clear they removed the wood frame house to the south and also extended the building to the Sherman Street line.

To orient yourself, the current building entrance is just to the right of the curved brick wall in this image.  In 1971 the building was further extended to the west, with a two story section to the west of the entrance and stairwell.

All traces of the old facade have been covered with nothing left to hint at the historic building entombed inside this structure.  In my calculation, when you climb the stairwell and walk down the hallway to pay your taxes you are outside of the old structure, but when you enter the room where you pay you are in the old structure.  If you continue down the hall to check old deeds or discuss assessments, you are outside of the old structure.  Community Development and Board of Commissioners chambers are within the old structure, county administrator’s office is outside.

The original building was from 1912.  This article describes the structure and charming detail of the modern new equipment it housed.  It’s interesting to note the phone company was entirely on the first floor, with 3 apartments on the second floor.

Clearly historic preservation was not the reason they left the old building inside the new.  I have two theories:  either it was cheaper to build it this way, or they needed to keep the existing telephone switchboard running as they expanded the building around it.  Or do you have a better guess?

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