Transformed Vision - Marie Sheahan Brown, Camp Sheman

[Sent to all State Senators:]

Some years ago, Becky Johnson ~ stateswoman of Oregon, beloved elder of the Metolius Basin ~ told me a story. Early this year, at 93, Becky passed on to a New Metolius. She cannot tell you the story now; I’ll try to do it justice. I call it a story of transformed vision.

Her father-in-law, S. O. Johnson’s, first view of the Metolius River headwaters took his breath away. In his mind’s eye, he saw a mill pond, a saw mill, and a cash crop of giant ponderosa timber all around. Mr. Johnson was seeing through lenses of the era. He bought 160 acres around the Metolius River headwaters for $16,000 in 1924.

Before that, in the late 1800s, T. Egenton Hogg had a green glint in his eye ~ the glint of cash. He envisioned railroad tracks and trains running from the Oregon coast into Central Oregon over the Santiam Pass. With transcontinental vision, he could see trainload after trainload hauling giant Oregon lumber to the East. Mr. Hogg’s railroad scheme crumbled, tainted with suspected misuse of investors’ funds. Perhaps, too, potential investors were rightly skeptical to sink money into a railroad built on the crumbly volcanic rock of Santiam Pass. Even today, great chunks of highway are prone to tumble down the hillside. The possibility of a railroad died out only after 1930, when the Portland and Southeastern Railroad filed for a right of way across “Hogg Pass,” which evidently was never granted.

Meanwhile, S. O. Johnson was experiencing transformed vision. Instead of an industry with raw materials all around, he began to see a sacred mystery of exquisite and delicate beauty, to be protected yet shared. He transmitted this vision to his son, Sam, to whom he sold the property for $1 in 1934. S. O. Johnson chose to serve as statesman for the common good instead of henchman to the Almighty Dollar.

Sam and Becky Johnson, and now their daughters, kept the tradition of statesmanship, generosity, and preservation of a Creation not their own. As just one example, thousands of people each year can view majestic Mt. Jefferson from the Headwaters of the Metolius, without much harm, thanks to the scenic easement the Johnsons donated to the Forest Service in 1971.

In recent years, Becky worried because she saw the springs at the headwaters diminishing. I am distressed to see similar dwindling of the spring I know best, a few miles downstream. I don’t know all the reasons why. I do know IT JUST CAN’T BE RIGHT to allow destination resorts in the Metolius Basin, with thousands of homes and possibly golf courses sucking up unprecedented and inconceivable quantities of this diminishing groundwater.

I don’t need to spell out the lesson in this story for Oregon Senators who choose to serve as stateswomen and statesmen protecting the common good.

I urge you to support SB 30 in its present restored form, with a vision to Save the Metolius and its irreplaceable values for all of the people.

Sincerely,
Marie Sheahan Brown
Camp Sherman, OR