>La Grande Observer | Union and Wallowa Counties' News Leader

Delbert Pratt stands in front of Ira Pratt Road, named for Delbert’s grandfather. Delbert’s great-grandfather, Charles Pratt, donated the three acres for Pratt School, which is now the private residence seen in the background. The first Pratt School was built in 1902, the second one in 1938. The Observer/GARY FLETCHER

On Upper Prairie Creek, snow was 4 feet deep and the strong winds had blown the heavy, wet snow into drifts 35 to 40 feet deep.

The temperature was 20 below and remained below zero for two weeks.

The ground was frozen hard as a rock. Horses could be ridden over fences. And farmers’ D2 Cats could not budge the snow off the roads.

Some ranchers were isolated for six weeks, waiting for the county to clear the roads.

School bus route roads took first priority.

In 1948, strong winds blew a combine harvester over a shed and across the road some 200 yards. The neighboring Johnsons’  garage was blown a quarter mile away.

In 1910, 3,500 people lived in the north end of Wallowa County, in and around Troy, Flora and Promise.

The road to Lewiston was completed in 1948 and finished paving in 1953.

Incredible memory

Such details are readily available from an Enterprise man with an incredible memory.

He retains these facts and many more with no log, diary or journal.

Delbert Pratt of Enterprise is a go-to guy for historical facts.

He seems to know most everything from the past, and nearly everybody here.

His family was of pioneer stock to Wallowa County. On June 1873 his ancestors homesteaded on Upper Prairie Creek on the east side of the east moraine of Wallow Lake, directly below the upper terminus of the Wallowa Lake Tramway.

The Pratts came from Fredonia, Kan., a town about the size of Enterprise. Other Wallowa County settlers had come from the same area and nearby Missouri and Oklahoma, Pratt said.

It was no accident, because they frequented the same general store.

Those families include the McFetridges, whose farm was adjacent to Pratt’s father’s; the Spicers, Zollmans, Collinsworths and Lockes, he said.

Pratt has lived here all his nearly 83 years.

The exception was his years obtaining a business administration degree at Eastern Oregon College of Education, and during his 1945 enlistment in the U.S. Navy. However, he was able to hitchhike home seven times while stationed in Bremerton, Wash.

Pratt School

He couldn’t get in the Navy right out of high school because he was only 16 years of age. That was because he took the third and fourth grades together at Pratt School. His first and second grades were taught by this reporter’s great-grandmother, Martha Jane Fletcher.

Pratt’s great-grandfather, Charles Pratt, donated the three acres for Pratt School.

Pratt’s father, Everett, married Gratia Spicer whose family came to Eastern Oregon in 1881. Everett started the first grade in Pratt School in 1902, the first year of the first Pratt School at its third and last location.

Previously it was located in the flat by Prairie Creek and was called the Creighton School after the Creighton family in the area. The road “Creighton Lane” ran from that area by a second Creighton family and into Joseph — the route of the present Highway 82.

Delbert Pratt and Jack and Betty Pace attended the newest and final Pratt School, built in 1938. It had a full basement with a 12-foot ceiling, room enough for kids to play basketball there.

Future matrimony

In September 1949, Pratt’s wife to be, Itha Wright, moved with her family from their wheat ranch near Genesee, Idaho, to establish a dairy farm on Alder Slope, Pratt said.

“Her mother, Ruby Wright, said that this area was as near to Heaven on earth as she hoped to be. She was still saying that up until one week before her fatal stroke,” Pratt said.

Pratt and Itha Wright were married Nov. 11, 1955.

For the first 9 1/2 years of their marriage, they lived in the apartment in the northeast corner of the East Main Street medical-dental clinic, which is now Rahn Hostetter’s law office.

They then lived on Grant Street for 23 years, and Delbert has lived 29 years in their “new” house on Greenwood Street near the court house.

The Pratts had five children. The youngest of their four girls, Joyce, had spina bifida resulting in hydrocephalus. The size of her head was increasing at least three-fourths-inch a week, putting pressure on her brain. The rapid growth stopped in four months.

“I believe that was answered prayer, with so many people praying for her,” Pratt said.

Joyce remained mentally and physically challenged and wheelchair bound the rest of her 42 years.

The Pratts kept her at home and cared for her. On June 6, 2004, she died in a tragic car wreck on the way to Ruby Wright’s birthday party.

Itha died Dec. 18, 2003, from cancer at age 75, Pratt said.

In 1947 Pratt became the organization director of the Oregon Farm Bureau from.

After several years he opened his own insurance agency, which in October 1979 he sold to Steve Zollman.

However, he couldn’t stand to be retired from business, and in 1986 started a copy machine leasing business that he sold in 1991.

His community involvement began early in FFA. Pratt became a state officer and a delegate to the national convention in Kansas City, Mo.

Pratt has been an American Legion member for 63 years. He served as the finance officer and as the adjutant for 25 years.

When he was commander in 1959, Chief Joseph Post 18 in Enterprise had 145 members. It merged with Wallowa Lake Post 157 in Joseph 51 years ago, he said.

For the past 52 years he has been a deacon and elder in the Enterprise Christian Church.

In 1946 Pratt was a charter member of the Chief Joseph Flyers flying club, which owns two airplanes at the Enterprise Airport. He was in the club until 1986.

He has been on the board of the Emanuel School of Religion in Johnson City, Tenn., for 32 years, and is donating money to fund the new conference center room there.

For 30 years he sat on the board of the Big Bend Ditch Co.

Pratt is a longtime Lions club member. He has been president twice and has held other offices. He also served as district governor.

Itha was president of the Lions Club auxiliary.

Pratt is an Al Kader Shriner, after being a 32nd degree Mason. He was in the Jaycees 20 years where he held all the offices, and was district president.

But Pratt is best known to many people as a local historian with remarkable recall of facts, dates and places — information Pratt hopes to put in a book someday.