100 Oregon Books
A few weeks ago, the Oregon Cultural Heritage Commission issued a list of 100 books of Oregon. The books "speak to the quality of our literary community over time, our rich culture, and the influence of our amazing landscape," according to the commission's president, David Milholland.
It's the diversity of the list that's so astonishing - from the original journals of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club.
(Incidentally, a BlueOregon note. Our very own Kim Stafford made the list with Having Everything Right: Essays of Place)
So, here's the entire list of 100...
What books have meant something to you? What books would you suggest for the second 100 Oregon Books?
- Bobbie, A Great Collie by Charles Alexander (P, A)
- Skookum: An Oregon Pioneer Family’s History and Lore by Shannon Applegate (P, A)
- A Day with the Cow Column in 1843 and Recollections of my Boyhood by Jesse Applegate (P, A)
- The Clan of the Cave Bear by Jean M. Auel (P, A)
- The Grains, or Passages in the Life of Ruth Rover, with Occasional Pictures of Oregon, Natural and Moral by Margaret Jewett Bailey (P, A)
- The Bridge of the Gods: A Romance of Indian Oregon by Frederic Homer Balch (P, A)
- Assault on Mount Helicon: A Literary Memoir by Mary Barnard (P, A)
- Trying to be an Honest Woman by Judith Barrington (P, A)
- Delights and Prejudices by James Beard (P, A)
- Trask by Don Berry (P, A)
- You Rolling River by Archie Binns (P, A)
- Trout Fishing in America by Richard Brautigan (P, A)
- Mountain Man by Verne Bright (P, A)
- Will You Please Be Quiet, Please? by Raymond Carver (P, A)
- Eden Seekers: The Settlement of Oregon, 1818-1862 by Malcolm Clark, Jr. (P, A)
- Ramona the Pest by Beverly Cleary (P, A)
- Ricochet River by Robin Cody (P, A)
- The Two Islands, and What Became of Them by Thomas Condon (P, A)
- Willamette Landings: Ghost Towns of the River by Howard McKinley Corning (P, A)
- A Golden Journey: Memoirs of an Archaeologist by Luther S. Cressman (P, A)
- The Country Boy: The Story of His Own Early Life by Homer Davenport (P, A)
- The Skyline Trail: A Book of Western Verse by Mary Carolyn Davies (P, A)
- Honey in the Horn by H.L. Davis (P, A)
- The Book of Seeing with One’s Own Eyes by Sharon Doubiago (P, A)
- Journal Kept by David Douglas During His Travels in North America, 1823-1827 by David Douglas (P, A)
- Of Men and Mountains by William O. Douglas (P, A)
- Beyond the Pavement by Albert Drake (P, A)
- The River Why by David James Duncan (P, A)
- From the West to the West: Across the Plains to Oregon by Abigail Scott Duniway (P, A)
- Geek Love by Katherine Dunn (P, A)
- McLoughlin and Old Oregon: A Chronicle by Eva Emery Dye (P, A)
- By Scarlet Torch and Blade by Anthony Euwer (P, A)
- White Peaks and Green by Ethel Romig Fuller (P, A)
- Several Houses by Vi Gale (P, A)
- The Jump-Off Creek by Molly Gloss (P, A)
- Roll on Columbia: The Columbia River Collection by Woody Guthrie, Edited by Bill Murlin (P, A)
- Return to the River: A Story of the Chinook Run by Roderick L. Haig-Brown (P, A)
- Curtains by Hazel Hall (P, A)
- The Cabin at the Trail’s End: A Story of Oregon by Sheba Hargreaves (P, A)
- Dr. Mallory by Alan Hart (P, A)
- The Earthbreakers by Ernest Haycox (P, A)
- The Blood Remembers by Helen Hedrick (P, A)
- Far Corner: A Personal View of the Pacific Northwest by Stewart Holbrook (P, A)
- Life Among the Piutes: Their Wrongs and Claims by Sarah Winnemucca Hopkins, Edited by Mrs. Horace Mann (P, A)
- Before the War: Poems as They Happened by Lawson Fusao Inada (P, A)
- Astoria, or Anecdotes of an Enterprise Beyond the Rocky Mountains by Washington Irving (P, A)
- The Oregon Desert by E.R. Jackman and R.A. Long (P, A)
- Oregon Detour by Nard Jones (P, A)
- The Nez Perce Indians and the Opening of the Northwest by Alvin M. Josephy, Jr. (P, A)
- Broken Ground by John Keeble (P, A)
- Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey (P, A)
- A Sweetness to the Soul by Jane Kirkpatrick (P, A)
- Hole in the Sky: A Memoir by William Kittredge (P, A)
- At the End of the Car Line by Ben Hur Lampman (P, A)
- The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. LeGuin (P, A)
- Winterkill by Craig Lesley (P, A)
- The Journals of the Expedition under the Command of Captains Lewis and Clark to the Sources of the Missouri, thence Across the Rocky Mountains and Down the River Columbia to the Pacific Ocean, Performed During the Years 1804-5-6 by Order of the Government of the United States by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark (P, A)
- Of Wolves and Men by Barry Holstun Lopez (P, A)
- Ranald MacDonald: The Narrative of his Early Life on the Columbia under the Hudson’s Bay Company’s Regime; of his Experiences in the Pacific Whale Fishery; and of his Great Adventure to Japan; with a Sketch of his Later Life on the Western Frontier, 1824-1894 by Ranald MacDonald, Edited by William S. Lewis and Naojiro Murakami (P, A)
- A New Life by Bernard Malamud (P, A)
- The Man with the Hoe and Other Poems by Edwin Markham (P, A)
- A Peculiar Paradise: A History of Blacks in Oregon, 1788-1940 by Elizabeth McLagan (P, A)
- Life Amongst the Modocs: Unwritten History by Joaquin Miller (P, A)
- Tule Lake by Edward Miyakawa (P, A)
- Mansions in the Cascades by Anne Shannon Monroe and Elizabeth Lambert Wood (P, A)
- Gentle Ben by Walt Morey (P, A)
- An Arrow in the Earth: General Joel Palmer and the Indians of Oregon by Terence O’Donnell (P, A)
- Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk (P, A)
- Nehalem Tillamook Tales by Told by Clara Pearson, Recorded by Elizabeth Derr Jacobs, Edited by Melville Jacobs (P, A)
- A Long Way to Fisco: A Folk Adventure Novel of California and Oregon in 1852 by Alfred Powers (P, A)
- A Saga of a Paper Mill by Laurence Pratt (P, A)
- Looters of the Public Domain, Embracing a Complete Exposure of the Fraudulent System of Acquiring Titles to the Public Lands of the United States by Stephen Douglas A. Puter, in collaboration with Horace Stevens (P, A)
- Coyote Was Going There: Indian Literature of the Oregon Country by Compiled and edited by Jarold Ramsey (P, A)
- The Road to Zena by Joel Redon (P, A)
- Insurgent Mexico by John Reed (P, A)
- Nordi’s Gift by Clyde Rice (P, A)
- Ruined Cities by Vern Rutsala (P, A)
- Beyond Deserving by Sandra Scofield (P, A)
- Heckletooth 3 by David Shetzline (P, A)
- The Gold-Gated West: Songs and Poems by Samuel L. Simpson (P, A)
- Riprap and Cold Mountain Poems by Gary Snyder (P, A)
- Having Everything Right: Essays of Place by Kim Stafford (P, A)
- Traveling Through the Dark by William Stafford (P, A)
- Letters from an Oregon Ranch by “Katharine” (Louise Stephens) (P, A)
- Big Jim Turner by James Stevens (P, A)
- Departure by Janet Stevenson (P, A)
- Cathlamet on the Columbia: Recollections of the Indian People and Short Stories of Early Pioneer Days in the Valley of the Lower Columbia by Thomas Nelson Strong (P, A)
- Listening for Coyote: A Walk Across Oregon’s Wilderness by William L. Sullivan (P, A)
- The Northwest Coast, or, Three Years’ Residence in Washington Territory by James G. Swan (P, A)
- The Loop: A Tale of the Oregon County by Thirteen Oregon Authors: Charles Alexander, Robert Ormond Case, Kathleen MacNeal Clarke, Dean Collins, Sabra Conner, Anthony Euwer, Major John D. Guthrie, Sheba May Hargreaves, Theodore Acland Harper, Stewart H. Holbrook, Alexander Hull, Harold Bradley Say, Lillian Porter Say (P, A)
- Stepping Westward: The Long Search for Home in the Pacific Northwest by Sallie Tisdale (P, A)
- Marking the Magic Circle: An Intimate Geography by George Venn (P, A)
- The River of the West: Life and Adventure in the Rocky Mountains and Oregon; Embracing Events in the Life-Time of a Mountain-Man and Pioneer by Frances Fuller Victor (P, A)
- Fiddlers’ Green, or the Strange Adventure of Tommy Lawn; A Tale of the Great Divide of the Sailormen by Albert Wetjen (P, A)
- The Story of Opal: The Journal of an Understanding Heart by Opal Whiteley (P, A)
- Beyond the Garden Gate by Sophus Keith Winther (P, A)
- The Canoe and the Saddle: Adventures Among the Northwestern Rivers and Forests and Isthmania by Theodore Winthrop (P, A)
- Collected Poems by Charles Erskine Scott Wood, Edited by Sara Bard Field (P, A)
- Seven Hands, Seven Hearts by Elizabeth Woody (P, A)
- Bat 6 by Virginia Euwer Wolff (P, A)
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Feb. 18, 2005
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Feb 19, '05
A good list, though I would have liked to see something about Abigail Scott Duniway and women's suffrage, the KKK, as well as some about figures in the past half century: Wayne Morse, Tom McCall, Mark Hatfield, Jim Weaver, just to name a few.
1:55 a.m.
Feb 19, '05
Not to go off-topic, but didn't Kari just recently state that the new policy was no one posts anonymously?
2:46 a.m.
Feb 19, '05
Um, Kevin? Abigail Scott Duniway made the list. And she might be pretty darn thrilled that her brother, Harvey Scott, the longtime Oregonian editor and anti-suffragist who wrote a history of Oregon, didn't make the cut. So go taunt his statue in Mt. Tabor Park on Abby's behalf. :)
If you're looking for good books on some of the other topics mentioned, try David Horowitz's Inside the Klavern: The Secret History of a Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s; Brent Walth's Fire At Eden's Gate: Tom McCall and the Oregon Story; and Mason Drukman's Wayne Morse: A Political Biography.
As to b!X's point, I think "open discussion" postings come directly from our fearless editors, and are therefore not anonymous.
10:07 a.m.
Feb 19, '05
I think their selections of some of the "bigs"--Kesey, LeGuin, Carver--are weird (Notion over Cuckoo, Lathe over Left Hand, Please over Cathedral?) and I'd argue that limiting either to a single selection reflects dubious process at best. If this were California, would Steinbeck rate a single title?
But of course, these things are always only about creating discussion, and I can't think of anything better to discuss than books.
Feb 19, '05
For what it''s worth, my sugesstions for other books centered in Oregon by Oregon writers.:
Craig Lesley's "River Song" and "Sky Fisherman". Ken Kesey's "Last Go Round".
If you like anyting by by Lesley or David James Duncan, read everything else they write. I think "Sky Fisherman" is Lesley's best story. Duncan's "The Brothers K" centers around Camas, Washington, just across the Columbia River from Oregon and involves a Portland Pacific Coast League AAA baseball team.
For Pacific Northwest political history junkies, I suggest "They Never Go Back to Pocatello: Selected Essays of Richard Neuberger". Neuberger was a US senator from Oregon.
BTW, by entering Powell's website through www.powellsunion.com, 10 percent of your sale goes to the workers profit-sharing plan.
2:47 p.m.
Feb 19, '05
Bix... "Not to go off-topic, but didn't Kari just recently state that the new policy was no one posts anonymously?"
Yes, you're right. That's true - but your BlueOregon co-editors (Jeff, Jesse, and me) will continue to post stuff under open discussion, breaking news, and blueoregon admin. We've got our own rules for that stuff; basically that it's neutrally written stuff: "This happened. Discuss."
We've actually flipped a few items from 'open discussion' to a commentary by the author when it appeared to head down the road of opinion commentary.
Thanks for asking.
2:54 p.m.
Feb 19, '05
Rachel, you're right - I just noticed that Fire at Eden's Gate didn't make the list. That's a real omission - it's the best biography of our most dominant 20th Century political leader.
Feb 20, '05
I didn't know Richard Brautigan was from Oregon. Kewl!
Feb 20, '05
Today's Sunday Oregonian ArtsWeek section has the list and an essay about it by Robin Cody, whose "Richochet River" made the cut. A Big O copy editor probably wrote the headlne, "Variations on a man-in-nature theme", but Cody uses a phrase in the second paragraph that would have served better, 'The Oregonness of it". Or perhaps simply, "Oregonness".
Feb 20, '05
"For Pacific Northwest political history junkies, I suggest "They Never Go Back to Pocatello: Selected Essays of Richard Neuberger". Neuberger was a US senator from Oregon......"
For that matter, anything by Steve Neal (who I think had a role in Never Go Back). Neal is the late great writer of a McNary biography and a graduate of McNary High School.