Historic Hood River
Rooster Rock Pre-Dam
9-2-2022
Notes
This early postcard is captioned, “Looking Up the Columbia River from bluff near Rooster Rock.” You can see a good view of the cannery which appears to be undergoing an expansion, and if you look closely you can see Beacon Rock in the distance.
This view really highlights how much the Bonneville Dam has changed the lower Columbia. It’s hard to even see how the highway and the state park even fit into this image.
L.E.
October maybe when the River is at its lowest?
Arthur….I don’t understand what you mean by Bonneville Dam changing the lower Columbia?
Are you referencing the sand that used to wash down the River? Which I think is what actually closed the Rooster Rock cannery.
Maybe the cannery is already abandoned in this photo. It doesn’t look very approachable.
For me, the bare hillsides on both sides of the Gorge, stand out.
ArthurB
Yes, LE, that’s what I mean. The lower Columbia used to have blowing sand dunes and broad shoals. Now many of those shoals are forested, and the sandbars are covered with grass.
L.E.
There is a book published: "Flight of the Bumble Bee : The Columbia River Packers Association & a Century in the Pursuit of Fish" by Irene Martin and Roger Tetlow.
Chapter 4 talks about the Rooster Rock Cannery and describes where the fish wheels were located on both sides of the River. The cannery was built in 1900. Because of the shoal of sand moving in, a trestle was built out to deeper water. The cannery closed in 1915 with the owners admitting they had not built in a very good place.