My friends hang out in cool places. Earlier this week, I had
the pleasure of staying at McMenamins Kalama Harbor Lodge courtesy of two dear ones.
The four-story square structure is modeled after the Pioneer Inn on Maui, which
was completed in 1901, just barely on this side of the nineteenth century.
The town of Kalama itself dates from 1837, when John Kalama,
a Hawaiian native, came to act as intermediary between the Cowlitz Tribe and
the Hudson Bay Company. But I was shocked to learn the name of the first white settler
to the area.
Ezra Meeker.
Now, Mr. Meeker looms large in my local history, and I have
blogged about him before. But I hadn’t known he stopped first in Kalama before heading north to my neck
of the woods. Others built Kalama into a decent-sized town, one of the largest
north of Portland at that time.
Today, Kalama is a cozy town hugging the Columbia River, boasting
many wonderful antique stores, which we toured. I’ll share one of my finds in a
future post. The other thing Kalama is known for are a set of four totem poles
erected near the river. The largest was carved for the Seattle World’s Fair,
but never quite made it out of town. It is the largest single-tree totem pole
in the world at 140 feet long. Sadly, a recent assessment showed that the pole
is rotting from the inside out and could have fallen in a good wind. It had
been lowered onto the ground when we visited, and a group of local citizens is
working to determine how it can be restored.
The McMenamins group generally buys and restores historic
properties, turning them into hotels and eateries. The lodge at Kalama is one
of a few custom-built from the ground up. My friends and I had a blast wandering
the hallways reading the various accounts of local history posted between each
room. And we giggled like girls when we discovered each of the two secret rooms
hidden in the hotel.
If you are ever in the area, I recommend a look.
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