Introduction
How
the story begins... a word from Clifford Nelson
In the state of
Oregon the Vista House, an iconic reminder of the glory days of the
scenic Columbia River Highway, perches high above the Columbia River
near Portland, Oregon, attracting over one million visitors each year.
Just to the south of the Vista House parking area a narrow road winds up
the slope and disappears in the trees. This road, now closed to public
access, leads to a moss covered rock wall and a few scattered remnants
of the Crown Point Chalet, a roadhouse that once flourished during the
heyday of the scenic Columbia River Highway. My great grandmother, Mrs.
Margaret E. Henderson, lovingly known as "Bidy" to my mother,
opened the doors to
her new enterprise on May 15, 1915. Under her gifted management, the
Crown Point Chalet was soon to become one of the most popular dining
destinations in the Pacific Northwest, luring the rich and famous from
all parts of the world.
Margaret's
venture had the obvious ingredients for success, undoubtedly the major
one being her choice of location, which offered not only a world class
view of the Columbia River Gorge, but was situated adjacent to the newly
opened Columbia River Highway. This superbly engineered roadway,
revolutionary in its attention to aesthetic value, was luring motorists
to the area in droves. Shortly after Margaret opened her Chalet, the
Vista House reached completion, and as motorists stopped at this scenic
point to enjoy the view, they were likely to see her roadhouse beckoning
from the hill. Judging from the favorable comments expressed in her
guestbooks, many who responded to the call were ecstatic over what they
found: an inspiring view, the relaxing ambiance of a mountain chalet,
great country-fried chicken - and Mrs. Margaret E. Henderson - a most
gracious hostess, filled with the enthusiasm of a teacher in love with
her subject.
Margaret
relentlessly championed her creation as she continued to enlarge and
invest in improvements. One article that appeared in the May, 1925 issue
of Sunset Magazine estimated the worth of the Chalet at $78,000,
obviously a noteworthy sum at the time. From the moment it opened, the
Crown Point Chalet was celebrated by its patrons, and Margaret must have
experienced a headiness akin to striking oil. Then the prosperity of the
war years faded to depression and belts began to tighten. The number of
guests visiting the Chalet dwindled, and Margaret's health began to
fail, the onset of a chronic kidney infection. In 1927, Margaret sold
her Chalet and opened a modest third floor dining room on Alder Street
in downtown Portland. The move proved of little salvation and she was
soon forced into bankruptcy. Her health continued to decline, and on
April 28, 1930, at the age of 58, she died in a Portland sanitarium.
The obituaries that
followed her death were universally filled with praise, noting the
success of the Crown Point Chalet and her role as a "gadfly"
in encouraging the construction of the Columbia River Highway. Sadly at
least one account was uninhibited from noting that she "died
penniless".
Objective
This
website is the result of five years of investigation into the entries
found in guestbooks that have survived Crown Point Chalet. The
introduction of this website results from a motivation to share the
details of my research and elicit feedback. You are free to explore the
pages and print whatever information might interest you. You will find
that Adobe
Acrobat Reader is
required for viewing, and if you are not equipped with this useful
application, you may download it by clicking here.
Please note that the study is copyrighted, and commercial distribution
is a violation. Any use of photographs or text for academic use or
distribution is quite welcome and credit to the author is requested.
Since the complexity of the book requires some time for orientation, you
might want to move directly to specific categories such as famous
guests, other
notables, or liberty
ships. Keep in
mind that this guest list is not a comprehensive list of all of the
notable guests recorded in the study, but only those considered to be of
special interest.
While invoking the image
of the explorer, I might also mention that the pursuit of information,
the very essence of this study, has profited mightily from the power of
the computer and associated Internet search engines. It seems quite
accurate to say that the onerous task of examining over 70,000
signatures in guestbooks, with the objective of identifying the hand
holding the pen, would have been totally impractical before the
Internet. What a rewarding experience it has been to see positive
responses to my queries pop up on the monitor screen like a winning
combination on a slot machine! To the techno-head, my excitement may
seem childish, but to someone over sixty who went to school when DNA was
still a theory, the Herculean power of the Internet to find answers to
questions is as magical to me as a mirror might be to a chimpanzee.
