Natural Resources on Marys Peak

Resources Encourage Settlement

In the early 1900s, settlers supplemented meager farming by gathering chittum bark, used in medicinal remedies. When the price of chittum bark reached record highs, more homesteaders filed land claims on the Peak, only to leave when the chittum was depleted.

At the turn of the 20th century, Marys Peak was a checkerboard of Oregon and California (O&C) railroad lands sprinkled with private holdings.

The Chamberlain-Ferris Act of 1916 gave the O&C lands to the Department of the Interior, whose policy was to sell off profitable land.

Logging companies purchased many of the abandoned homesteads to consolidate their timber holdings

Logging photo taken about 1910.
© BCHM 1985-032.0026

1929 Metsker map of Marys Peak showing the route of logging railroads. BCHM 2005-60.

A Watershed Protected

In 1905, the City of Corvallis voted to construct a gravity flow water system to tap the Marys Peak watershed fed by Rock and Griffith creeks.

Within a year, water flowed through redwood pipes. The City of Philomath also tapped into the pipeline for water.

Log "crib" dam, probably on Rocky Creek, Marys Peak. One of the four intakes of the Corvallis Water Department. ©BCHM 1980-088.0029.

Cooperative Protection Established

Corvallis city leaders, concerned that logging interests would impact the watershed, appealed to the U.S. Forest Service for assistance to incorporate both public and private lands into the Siuslaw National Forest.

The lengthy process required an act of Congress and additional purchases of private lands.

Logging Railroads Short-Lived

The first logging railroad on Marys Peak originated at Noon Junction.

When William C. Noon sold his company to Charles K. Spaulding of the Marys River Logging Company, Spaulding expanded the railroad.

By 1929, logging operations had ceased on Marys Peak.

1917 photo of logging on Marys Peak in the Woods Creek drainage.
© BCHM 2003-085.

Wrecked steam locomotive on Woods Creek logging railroad, about 1912.
© BCHM 1994-038.0379.

Images of W.C. Noon Lumber Company and Spaulding Lumber Company logging railroads on Marys Peak

Above: Photo collection of images of W.C. Noon Lumber Company and Spaulding Lumber Company logging railroads on Marys Peak. ©BCHM 2003-085.

Lloyd M. Palmer recalls in his book, The Woods Creek Logging Railroad Then and Now, "...the inherent nature of logging railroads is that they were short lived. They were built into a fresh stand of timber, the trees logged out and rails removed, only to be spiked down up a different creek or over the next bridge" (1996).

Water System Today

The Baldy Reservoir was constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), which replaced original wooden pipes with cast iron.

Today, the water system is called Rock Creek Municipal Watershed and includes approximately 10,000 acres, jointly owned by the City of Corvallis and the U.S. Forest Service.

Map from a 1962 pamphlet published by the U.S. Forest Service, titled, "Corvallis Watershed."
BCHM 1982-054.0004.

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