Historic Hood River
Heights Fire
1-11-2023
Notes
Joe Young captured this major structure fire in the Heights. From the cornices peeking out at the top of this image we can identify this as 1105 12th Street, now the home to O’Reilly’s Auto Parts. At this time it appears this was a lunch counter or bar.
Will
Arthur- Do you know what year this was taken and do you have any idea what the contraption is near the chimney in the center of the photo?
Dan
That looks like a air compressor
Arlen L Sheldrake
aka Joe *oil heat* Young.
ArthurB
Best guess for date is late 1940s early 1950s. I agree with Dan the tank is probably for a compressor. There's an electric motor and two pistons with lots of heat sinking attached to the tank. I don't think the restaurant would have had a compressor, but there were probably more than one businesses in the building.
Dale Nicol
Arthur, I wonder if the building may have housed an automotive repair or machine shop business since the size of the air compressor would not be found in your average home garage. The large open frame AC motor (2 hp?) looks like 1940s vintage. You can see a hot water tank, several pipes for hot water or compresses air? Also a long shaft with mounting supports with most likely bearings, to allow the shaft to rotate for a overhead door or ??
As noted O'Rilley's is there now, but E & L Machine shop occupied the building since the 1968 time frame and the photo is much earlier.
Susie Irwin
I remember Knoll Motor Company was at that location in the 50s and 60s.
Dale Nicol
Susie, that makes sense. I knew that Knoll Motors was once in the Heights, but before my time in Hood River. However, Clarice Knoll recently passed away and she was my neighbor since 2002.
Cecelia
In a recent booklet published in lieu of the 65th class reunion for the HRHS Class of ’57 a classmate tells some funny stories of working at the Knoll Used Car lot starting just before he entered high school. He describes location being on the south side of what was then Peterson’s Auto Parts so for the record I’m assuming Petersons must have eventually sold the auto parts business to the Knolls.