Geoff Burling wrote:
On Mon, 22 Mar 2004, Ray Saintonge wrote:
Don't forget Fossil, Oregon which is the only place that I know of where the local authorities actually encourage visitors to dig in its fossil beds.
Well, I'm going to need to take a little time to verify that. IIRC, the nearest fossil beds are U.S. National Monuments.
The John Day Fossil Beds National Monuments are in that area. They're really a series of disconnected sites, and there are other places around there. It just happens that this one happens to be right in the middle of town behind the high school. Most of what I found there was plant fossils. I can't remember for sure if there were any fish..
And I could always start cribbing material from this book a friend gave me several years ago: _Mysterious Places of the West_ by Salvatore M. Trento. (I think of it as that book where the author never missed an excuse to include one of his female "Student researchers" in his pictures. ;-) That would broaden the scope of a few articles.
Another good source of local things to write about is the AAA Tourbooks.
One of these days I'm gonna have to leave the early history of Christianity alone long enough to write proper articles on Champoeg (where local government for the Orgon Territories started, & the first state park), & Neakahnie Mountain (where a legendary treasure is said to be buried, but the curious carvings have been more plausibly explained as the work of Sir Frnacis Drake).
And then there's the article on Wanker's Corner I'm sure the non-USonians would enjoy reading. (The tavern there was quite popular with the Australian tourists.)
Sounds like a great place! I'll keep an eye out. I have tons of material on US place names. It didn't appear in a list of 19th century Clackamas County post offices that I located, but I have some other things that I can look at.
Ec