Rowena Oregon, Ghost Town
Rowena Oregon, Ghost Town
Rowena Oregon exists only as a suburb of The Dalles now. Located on the Mosier-The Dalles Highway, or the old Columbia River Highway, it was little more then a stop on the way between the two cities. A ferry crossed the Colubmia River to Lyle, Washington at one point, but it’s start and end dates are unknown. Oregon Post Offices 1847-1982 by Richard W. Helbock says that the Post Office which opened July 7th 1911 and closed November 15th, 1916 was named after Henry S. Rowe who was a former mayor of Portland and served on the board of the Oregon Rail and Navigation Company.
In his venerable tome, “Oregon Geographic Names,” Lewis A. McArthur tends to lean towards this origin of the name, but also mentions that he was told it was named after a local young girl.
Outside of town to the west is these two neat barns. One is obviously still used, the other looks long abandoned.
From the top of the nearby lookout, the mighty Columbia River. And then one of the area’s most distinct features – the “Rowena Loops.” This was such a popular attraction that vintage post cards were created to show it off. The area is still popular in the Spring months for the abundant amount of wild flowers that grow here. It is also a great hiking spot to the top of the bluff.
You can see it hasn’t changed much!
Of course any local school child knows that the Columbia River was formed via ice age floods. Few places along the Gorge show this off better then right here.
And last, but not least, “downtown” Rowena. A few houses hidden in the trees and it looks like it’s garbage day. Definitely not a bustling metropolis any longer.
A great blog. Today a fire is threatening that area….
What an arrogant scummy hack. You could at least have stopped and asked someone who knew something about the area. Or you looked it up in a library. Or honestly taken some photographs at Rowena. Hundreds of people live there. Hardly a “Ghost Town.” None of those photos are actually of Rowena. The first photo is part of the McClure ranch of Mosier. The second is part of the Moe ranch of Mosier. The third almost shows part of Rowena, In the distance, but it’s cut off by the foreground.
It’s really sad that Google serves this misinformation up at all, much less in the top search results.
The actual post office building is still there, As are a couple of the old general store buildings and motels. And an odd mix of mansions and single-wides and middle-class houses. There is a popular state park. And quite a lot of geology and history, but if you can’t read anyway, I’m not going to waste my time typing it out for you. Cattle drive terminus —> Railroad/Old highway/ferry crossing junction —> Interstate highway kills local businesses —> bedroom community/recreation destination.
If you don’t know anything, don’t just make up nonsense and post it on the internet. You should probably delete this entire page. It has negative value.
Thank you for your extremely kind words. I will update this article from 2012 when I get a chance and have some time to research more now the additional information is available.