Washington County Oral Histories

Walt Vandervelden oral history recording

An audio recording of an oral history of Walter Vandervelden, volunteer fire chief of the Forest Grove fire department, who experienced the first hours of the 1933 Tillamook fire. The interview abruptly starts in the middle of a conversation. Forest Grove fire department had very limited equipment at the time so did not take anything with them when they were first sent out to the scene of the fire to see the seriousness of it. It would take the firefighters three to four hours to get to the location of the fire with the equipment lent to them by the Northwest Forest Fire Association. Men who would stay overnight would wake up unable to see because of the damage done to their eyes due to the fire; an easy fix of dampening a handkerchief and resting on their eyes for fifteen to twenty minutes. After the fire was contained and put out 73 million trees were hand planted along with seeds being dropped from planes flying above. The audio interview cuts out at 31:02 and 45:58, to start again in the middle of a conversation.

Vandervelden, Walt

Ellis Lucia papers

Forests and forestry

Forest Grove (Or.)

Forest Grove (Or.)

1 sound cassette (51 min.)

English

PUA_OH_53

In Copyright

http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Pacific University Archives

Lucia, Ellis

Audiocassettes

Sound