Remembering Pondosa - New book shares company town's colorful history

ABOVE: This 1944 photo shows the seventh-grade class at Pondosa school. Photo courtesy “50th Anniversary, Pondosa Oregon Pictorial History’’

So when its mill closed in 1959, Pondosa began a slow, sliding descent into oblivion.

Today, echoes of the past still emanate from the town, almost totally abandoned 35 miles southeast of La Grande, and reverberate across the Grande Ronde Valley.

The book, compiled by Fred Ringer Jr., who grew up in Pondosa in the 1950s and now lives in McMinnville, tells the community’s story. The book features at least 500 photographs and six first-person accounts of former residents. The first-person accounts tell of 13-cent Wednesday night movies, balloon tire bicycles, Jitterbug dances and more.

Former residents tell of living conditions that were austere by today’s standards. Families resided in company-owned homes that for years had no electricity or indoor plumbing. Still, some write of their lives in Pondosa with Shangri-La-like wonder.

“The thing I remember, always, about Pondosa is how happy and carefree our lives were. We all played together, had the same chores, were watched by everyone in the town and knew everyone. What an idyllic childhood,’’ writes Merledene Rennecker, who grew up and lived in Pondosa in the 1930s and ’40s.

Noel Robinson, a youth in Pondosa in the 1920s and 30s, writes of how young men with the Civilian Conservation Corps worked in the Pondosa area in 1937. The CCC boys cleared underbrush, fought forest fires and built access roads. They also connected Pondosa to a social phenomenon.

“They brought the Jitterbug to Pondosa,’’ Robinson wrote, referring to the swing dance wildly popular throughout the United States in the late 1930s and early 1940s.

CCC members introduced the Jitterbug to Pondosa while attending its dances.

Dance fever hit Pondosa long before the phrase became popular.

“And we danced. Everybody danced. Every Saturday night there was a dance at the school house. So I learned to dance,’’ wrote one former resident.

Joann Knighten King writes of dancing to 78-rpm records in the school basement during recess when the weather was cold. King also tells of enjoying Wednesday night movies in the basement of Pondosa’s school for 13 cents.

Balloon tire bicycles were also hot for a time in Pondosa. They were introduced in 1933, according to Robinson.

“All wanted a new item like this,’’ Robinson wrote.

Most families could not afford them, but Robinson said he vividly recalls how in 1934 on his 12th birthday “I got a new-tired bike.’’

The lives of Pondosa residents were filled with color but their community’s hues were limited. Vivian Clark Smith noted every house was painted the same color — paper-sack tan.

“That caused some problems when late night celebrating residents tried to find their own house and bed in the wee hours of the morning,’’ she said.

The lives of Pondosa residents came crashing down in May 1959 when it was announced the mill was closing and being put up for auction. The site had 280 acres, 53

2- and 3-bedroom homes, 11 factory buildings, 30 portable homes, a general store and a hotel. Many of these buildings were lost in a fire that struck the site in June 1959.

Pondosa’s legacy has continued to live though annual picnics of former residents and their families. Ringer came up with the idea for his book while attending the 2000 picnic. He said there was a need for the book because local museums have few remnants of Pondosa.

Ringer asked people to begin submitting photos and they soon began pouring in. Photos of everything from Pondosa’s buildings, to telephone switchboard at nearby Medical Springs to student class pictures. So too did the names of some 200 former Pondosa residents, all of whom are listed in the final chapter of Ringer’s 233-page book, which is available at Sunflower Books, Earth ‘N Book and The Archives.

Ringer, who can be reached at 503-472-7564, is still welcoming submissions for an updated version of his book he hopes to put out later.

Meanwhile Ringer will continue attending Pondosa’s annual picnics, the 50th of which was conducted last summer.