Reporting the Oregon Story: How Activists and Visionaries Transformed a State by Floyd McKay

Abstract

292 OHQ vol. 118, no. 2 fornia people groups, Oregon basketry traditions — apart from those in the southwestern corner of the state and the Klamath and Modoc — are treated only in passing. Given the extended discussion of basket traditions that appeared elsewhere , the twining traditions of Wasco/Wishxam weavers, and the work of Native basket makers from the Willamette Valley and the central and northern Oregon Coast are all given short shrift. The Nez Perce and the residents of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation are scarcely mentioned, and the Paiutes make no appearance at all. Throughout the text, the author reveals his long-standing affection for his subject and his deep knowledge of it. He should be applauded for his expansive vision, but he could have incorporated only the southern Oregon material into the text and justifiably left and Oregon out of the title. Instead, some readers will be left with a heightened expectation for the contents of the tome. STEVEN L. GRAFE Maryhill Museum of Art REPORTING THE OREGON STORY: HOW ACTIVISTS AND VISIONARIES TRANSFORMED A STATE by Floyd McKay Oregon State University Press, Corvallis, 2016, Photographs, notes, bibliography, index. 288 pages. $21.95, paper. Floyd McKay bore witness to a remarkable quarter century of progressive leadership in Oregon. He roamed the State Capitol as a newspaper reporter for the Oregon Statesman in Salem, but it was his sixteen years as evening news commentator for KGW-TV in Portland that gave McKay a unique perspective, prominence, and access as Oregon history unfolded before him. In this memoir, McKay unspools his recollections of covering the state’s politics from 1964 through 1986. The first half of those years has been dubbed the “Oregon Story,” thanks to the state’s achievements and forward-looking view of environmental protections and open government . The second half saw a shredding of the tale as the Oregon timber economy toppled and, along with it, the hubris of a small state with great ambitions. The years McKay writes about brought the state’s protection of beaches and rivers, an anti-littering measure called the Bottle Bill, and the fraught effort to protect farmland through statewide land-use planning. McKay wisely keeps his book light on the policy details and instead focuses on the characters who dominated those years. We meet the state’s U.S. Senators (among them Republican Bob Packwood and Democrat Wayne Morse), governors (Bob Straub, a Democrat whom McKay befriends), and one who served as both — Republican Mark Hat- field. McKay also introduces us to people who risk being forgotten, such as L.B. Day, a state lawmaker at once charming and fearsome, and Nancy Russell, who led Friends of the Columbia Gorge and waged the successful fight to win federal protection for the Gorge. He also explains the transformation of Portland, beginning in the 1970s, from a dowdy town to its current Portlandia persona. Perhaps McKay’s best insights come in describing the epic 1968 U.S. Senate campaign between Morse, an unlikable populist champion and foe of the Vietnam War, and Packwood, a young and ambitious state representative building his own political machine. McKay shows how Morse was out of touch with voters, while Packwood wooed journalists (McKay included) and operated with bloodless efficiency in his upset victory. McKay remains most captivated by Tom McCall, the Republican governor from 1967 through 1975 who more than anyone else forged the Oregon story McKay seeks to render. In many ways, McCall typifies the telegenic politician whose flamboyance and turn of phrase drew all eyes in his direction. (McKay’s connection is personal: McCall held the same KGW news commentator’s chair that gave McKay his perch and prominence during those years.) McKay’s attention to McCall illustrates a time before bitter partisanship and intractable economic problems, the absence of which gave Oregon’s leaders room to innovate. 293 Reviews Reporting the Oregon Story, however, comes up short on stories. The book promises the inside account by a witness to history, but it too often hovers above the action, afloat on clouds of exposition, summary, and conventional wisdom. We rarely see McKay’s on-the-ground reporting about...