Historic Hood River
“Gus Miller House”
Notes
This house doesn’t look like it has changed much in the last 100 years, though a forest has grown up around it. This was the “Gus Miller House” when it was photographed about 1928. It is located at 436 Country Club Road. Unfortunately it does not appear in the Oregon Historic Sites Database so I don’t have more information about its history.
Gus Miller was a west side orchardist who was active in the movement to bring the Columbia River Highway to Hood River. When it opened, he ran a “truck garden” at the top of Ruthton Hill, selling his produce at the Columbia River Hotel. According to this article in the Hood River Glacier he also had stocked trout ponds there. I wonder if there are any signs of those ponds today?
Miller purchased this property from M. R. Noble circa 1920. Noble called the site “Clifton.” Country Club Road, as we know it, wasn’t built until 1922.
A curious note about Mr. Miller: in 1919 he was appointed “county road viewer.” I’m unclear what responsibilities that appointment entailed.
In a side note, Gus Miller served as a juror in the arson trial of Reverend J. L. Allen. It was quite a tangled tale.
Jeffrey Bryant
Gus Miller farmed at Belmont and Avalon in 1914.
https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071110/1914-05-28/ed-1/seq-3/
L.E.
I wonder if his truck garden was in the flat area down below the house, along Country Club Rd? I think there is a winery there now. Phelps Creek would have been right there to make ponds.
BethH
Interesting-
At the end of the newspaper article it mentioned a picture was taken of Mr Miller in his “ Knights of Templar” outfit and the “ red man “ in his “glad togs” (impressive beaded and leather clothing) regalia…..
I wonder if that picture is still around….
What’s Knights of Templar? I can’t help but think of the KKK….
Alan Winston
Re “What’s Knights of Templar?”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_Templar
Jeffrey Bryant
Hood River Glacier, 1925-12-17, page 3 – Clifton is being beautified. https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071110/1925-12-17/ed-1/seq-3/
Jeffrey Bryant
Hood River Glacier, 1927-04-07, page 10 – “Wildbrook is Appealing Home” describes the Gus Miller home.
https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071110/1927-04-07/ed-1/seq-10/
Jeffrey Bryant
Hood River Glacier, 1927-08-25, page 1 – Gus Miller built a stone masonry concrete bridge over Phelps Creek in 1927 as part of Country Club Road.
https://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn97071110/1927-08-25/ed-1/seq-1/