{"id":742,"date":"2011-09-21T20:42:24","date_gmt":"2011-09-22T03:42:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.peachylife.net\/blog\/?p=742"},"modified":"2011-09-21T20:42:24","modified_gmt":"2011-09-22T03:42:24","slug":"mitchell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/2011\/09\/21\/mitchell\/","title":{"rendered":"Mitchell"},"content":{"rendered":"

Date of visit<\/strong>: May 30, 2011
\nPopulation<\/strong>: 130 (2010 Census)<\/p>\n

Mitchell is a tiny town in central Oregon that looks like it’s straight out of the old west. It’s pretty amazing that has an old look to it, because the town has been hit by destructive floods numerous times in the past. There’s a pretty little creek running through town called Bridge Creek. During the dry season it looks pretty harmless. But this passage from Talking on Paper: An Anthology of Oregon Letters and Diaries<\/em> (which contains a letter from 10-year-old Julia Wilson describing how she survived the 1884 flood) describes how flash floods occur in this semi-arid region of the state: “hard, dry soils absorb very little water; rain, when it comes, collects in streams and rivers in an extremely brief period; the water drains downhill and overflows streams that have been dry or nearly dry for months; flood waters can rush miles downstream to places where the sun has been shining all day. Victims often have no reason to suspect that a flood is heading their way.”<\/p>\n

A flash flood raced through the Mitchell area in June 1884, killing four members of the Carroll family. In October 1904 a cloudburst sent another flash flood racing through town. When the water receded, it left behind 15 inches of mud. Many people lost their homes or businesses. The same thing happened again in July 1956. The water rose 50 feet high on the canyon walls, tearing out highway bridges both east and west of town and destroying 200 feet of highway. 20 buildings in town were destroyed. During my visit, 55 years later, I saw no evidence of that catastrophic flood, and Bridge Creek burbled pleasantly through town.<\/p>\n

\n

\"Welcome<\/a><\/p>\n

Welcome to Mitchell<\/p>\n

\n

\"Downtown<\/a><\/p>\n

Main Street<\/p>\n

\n

\"Whole<\/a><\/p>\n

Whole in the Wall, falling down<\/p>\n

\"Bridge<\/a><\/p>\n

Bridge Creek Cafe<\/p>\n

\n

\"Fixer-upper\"<\/a><\/p>\n

A fixer-upper on main street<\/p>\n

\n

\"Welcome\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The Oregon Hotel<\/p>\n

\"First<\/a><\/p>\n

First Baptist Church<\/p>\n

\n

\"Mitchell\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Mitchell from the hills above<\/p>\n

Map of Mitchell<\/a><\/p>\n

Oregon Towns Project<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Date of visit: May 30, 2011 Population: 130 (2010 Census) Mitchell is a tiny town in central Oregon that looks<\/p>\n

Continue readingMitchell<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[66],"tags":[138],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cherylhill.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}