The Chronicle
Sweet Lorane Community News
June 23, 2022
By Pat Edwards
What glorious weather we are experiencing the last few days. The warm, but mild, weather has allowed me to go outside and make some headway on all of the “catch-up” work awaiting me in and around our yard. Most important, though, is the fact that the farmers are finally able to go into the fields and begin cutting the hay crop that is on the verge of being overdone. Our son-in-law, Brian, is one of them.
For Jim and I, the weather is having to take a backseat this coming week in our thoughts and plans. He is scheduled for a serious back surgery on Monday, June 27, and will have some disk work done on his lower back as well as the stabilization of a break that was discovered there, as well. He will spend a couple of days at McKenzie-Willamette until they are sure that all is as it should be before sending him home. Thank you for keeping him in your thoughts and prayers… the more the better.
I want to thank Noel Nash, the publisher of The Chronicle, for approaching me about researching and writing an article on Creswell’s “Fruit Lands” history. Neither of us expected the amount of information that I was able to find about A.C. Bohrnstedt, the capitalist from the Midwest who instigated that part of Creswell’s history. In addition, I was able to tie together the information that Nancy O’Hearn, Marna Hing and I had gathered on the Lorane orchards for our 1987 book, Sawdust and Cider; A History of Lorane, Oregon and the Siuslaw Valley. The two communities share similar histories with the exception that each was represented by different investment companies who used the same schemes with much the same outcome.
Old newspaper articles that I was able to access on-line provided a bounty of detailed information on the impact these orchard companies had on both communities. The stories eventually grew to the point that I knew I had gathered enough to put into a book, and Picking the Orchard Clean became a reality.
I hope that you enjoy these stories as much as I did in putting them together. The orchard industry was a large part of the histories of both Creswell and Lorane, even though it did not carry on to today’s economies as it did in the Hood River and Medford, Oregon areas which are still known throughout the state for their award-winning production of fruit.
I’ll be at the Lane County Fair’s “Oregon Authors’ Table” to sell some of my books on local history (including Picking the Orchard Clean,) all day (Senior Day) on Thursday, July 21, and I hope that some of my readers will stop by and say “Hello.”
In the meantime, I wish us all a “Happy Summer!” and a special “Congratulations” to newlyweds, Erin, our amazing editor, and her husband, Lance.
All Things Lorane 