Friday, August 5, 2011

Independence, Oregon

Thank goodness for tall trees; it makes building bridges like this a lot easier. This photo of the bridge and three young women (?) was taken in Independence, Oregon. The date was sometime between 1904 and the 1920s, based on the stamp box on the backside. Independence is a small town with a current population of about 6,000 on the Willamette River near Salem, Oregon. This picture was probably taken somewhere along Ash Creek.


Independence was a center for hops growing for several decades, so much so that the population would increase by over 40,000 during harvest season. For some reason production declined in the 1950s, and the influx stopped.

Here's the back of the card.

7 comments:

  1. I was going to ask if you had any postcards depicting the Allied occupation of Japan (from 1945 to 1952), but then I realized I could do a search of your blog. You have some cool stuff! I didn't notice anything that specifically pictured the occupation era. Did I miss something?

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  2. Hi Debbie,
    I have a fairly large collection of Japanese postcards. The problem is that I don't know what they say. Some of them are from a neighbor who was a young man at the end of WWII and had a Japanese pen Pal. I'm so glad you asked. I will post some of them, though I may not have a lot to say about them. maybe you will!

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  3. Those lace up boots! Always loved that look, came back big in the 1960s-70s.

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  4. Great moment!

    Oh, it will be great to see the WWII era Japanese cards!

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  5. It really does sag a little but I bet holds up ok.

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  6. Interesting about the hop production declining. I live in Kent in England where hop growing and picking was a huge tradition. Half of the East End of London would empty to go "hoppin' down in Kent". The harvesting was taken over by machine in the 1950s and after that production declined because lager became more popular than beer, and lager production uses smaller proportions of hops.

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  7. Sheila, I have some Kent's Gold growing in my yard. Now I know where it originates. It's trying to consume the house!

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