Dave Knows Portland

Wild Arts Festival 2011

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Wild Arts FestivalThe 31st annual Wild Arts Festival, presented by and benefiting the Audubon Society of Portland, takes place this Saturday and Sunday, November 19 and 20, 2011 at Montgomery Park (2701 NW Vaughn).

The Wild Arts Festival celebrates nature in the work of regionally and nationally-known artists and writers . . . [T]he Festival has become the northwest’s premier show and sale of nature related art and books. The participating artists and craftspeople represent a wide variety of media, and the authors present are a mix of novelists, photographers, poets and writers of non-fiction.

Attendees will have the opportunity to meet over 70 artists and 30 authors, view and purchase art and books, and bid on items in the silent auction.

Hours Saturday are 10am until 6pm, and 11am until 5pm on Sunday. The fest also featured a cafe and information about Portland Audubon Society’s programs and work. Admission is $6 (kids 16 and under get in free).

Sex at Dawn (2-November-2011)

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Christopher Ryan, author of Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships, will be appearing at the Bagdad Theater (3702 SE Hawthorne) on Wednesday, November 2, 2011.

Join us for an evening sure to titillate the most cerebral among you, featuring a humorous and fact-filled lecture and Q&A that will blow away centuries of misconceptions about why we mate, why we stray and what it means for modern relationship.

Hosted by Eleanor O’Brien of Inviting Desire fame and Gabriella Cordova of ErosFestNW (two women oozing with biology).

Find out lots of things you should have learned in high school but didn’t. Science class was never this much fun!

Christopher Ryan, PhD, co-author of Sex at Dawn, has lived and worked all over the world. His research draws upon his multi-cultural experience . . . and focuses on trying to distinguish the human from the cultural. Dan Savage has called Sex at Dawn the single most important book about human sexuality since Alfred Kinsey unleashed Sexual Behavior in the Human Male on the American public in 1948.

This event is Sex, Love, & Spirit.

Doors open at 6pm and the event start at 7pm. This show is 21 and over (minor w/ adult allowed). Visit the McMenamins’ website for ticket information.

October 30, 2000: Steens Mountain Wilderness Established

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Steens MountainOn Monday, October 30, 2000 President William J. Clinton signed the Steens Mountain Cooperative Management and Protection Act, establishing the Steens Mountain Wilderness and adding nearly 175,000 acres to Oregon’s inventory of protected wilderness lands (The Oregonian, 31 October 2000).

It took the threat of a national monument designation and hundreds of hours of sometimes contentious meetings, but Republicans and Democrats along with environmentalists and ranchers were able to craft legislation designating the acreage in southeast Oregon as the Steens Mountain Cooperative Management and Protection Area.

Ranchers and local residents received assurances they would have a say in how much of the public land around them is managed. Environmentalists secured nearly 100,000 acres of “no-grazing wilderness” on the 30-mile long ridge.

“I believe this sets a precedent that will be replicated time and time again to protect other extraordinary places, not only in my home state of Oregon but throughout the Western United States,” Democratic Rep. Peter DeFazio said Monday.

Steens Mountain is located in the Alvord Desert in Harney County. The mountain is a large fault-block mountain that stretches 50 miles and rises from 4,200 feet to peak at 9,733 feet.

Credit: Steens Mountain photo by Sam Beebe / Ecotrust on Flickr. Used here under Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0) licence.

October 26, 1970: Tryon Creek Park is Formed

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The Oregonian article on Tryon Creek Park's creation (29 October 1970)Southwest Portland’s Tryon Creek Park, a 670 acre natural area maintained by Oregon State Parks and Friends of Tryon Creek, was created on October 26, 1970.

The Oregonian reported on October 29, 1970:

All hurdles have been cleared to develop . . . the Tryon Creek area as the Tryon Creek State Park, Gov. McCall’s office announced . . .

The announcement climaxes work that was begun in the early 1960s by citizens who wanted to preserve wilderness areas in the proximity of urban communities. The Tryon Creek area was such a wilderness.

Tryon Creek State Natural Area is the official name of the park. The only Oregon state park within a major metropolitan area, it encompasses Tryon Creek canyon, a second growth forest made up of red alder, Douglas fir, big leaf maple, and western red cedar. Tryon Creek is one of the last unobstructed tributaries of the Willamette River in the Portland area. The park has a Nature Center, trails, and a shelter.

October 19, 1805: Lewis and Clark Spot Hat Rock

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Hat RockOn October 19, 1805 Lewis and Clark recorded in their journals that from their camp near the Walla Walla River they traveled southwest down the Columbia 14 miles to a rock in a Lard. resembling that a hat. They has spotted Hat Rock, nine miles east of what is now Umatilla, Oregon.

Hat Rock is one of the few landmarks in this area remarked upon by Lewis and Clark that is not now under the waters of Lake Wallula, which formed behind McNary Dam when it was completed in the early 1950s.

The columnar basalt outcropping dating from a lava flow 12 million years ago is now part of Hat Rock State Park.

Photo credit: Hat Rock by John Calnan (JohnCalnan on flickr), used here under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic license.