In doing historical research, determining the camp locations of John C. Fremont’s exploring expedition of 1843-1844 through Oregon, I discovered an interesting observation relating to what is now called Ryan Ranch in his journal entry of Dec. 5, 1843.

The expedition of 104 horses and mules, 25 men, including Kit Carson, Thomas Fitzpatrick, cartographer Charles Pruess and then-19-year-old American Indian Billy Chinook had camped the night of Dec. 4 at what is now Shevlin Park.

The next day, they traveled south and arrived in the afternoon of Dec. 5 near Dillon Falls. They chose to camp in a break in the forest, which is assuredly the location of Ryan Ranch Meadow.

Fremont makes an observation in his journal entry for that location and date:

“In all our journeying, we had never traveled through a country where the rivers were so abounding in falls; and the name of this stream is singularly characteristic. At every place where we come in the neighborhood of the river, is heard the roaring of falls. The rock along the banks of the stream, and the ledge over which it falls, is a scoriated basalt, with a bright metallic fracture. The stream goes over in one clear pitch, succeeded by a foaming cataract of several hundred yards. In a little bottom above the falls, a small stream discharges into an entonnoir, and disappears below.”

Here he is describing Dillon Falls and the “entonnoir” that is located on Ryan Ranch, where they camped for the night.

It appears that Fremont may have misspelled the French word “enonnoir,” whose English translation is: doline, funnel, shellhole, swallow hole, sink, sinkhole, funnel-shaped.

This was a natural sink hole that drained water down into the lava and is still there. The position is 43 degrees, 57 minutes, 26 seconds north latitude and 121 degrees, 25 minutes, 8 seconds west longitude.

It appears that John E. Ryan dug a channel to it and accomplished drainage from his meadow after the berm was constructed some time in the early 1900s. Until then, as noted by Fremont in 1843, a small part of the river drained into it.

The question related to the removing of the berm and subsequent flooding of this lower end of the current Ryan Ranch Meadow is how much water will go down this ancient and historical “small stream” fed “enonnoir” with the possible reclaiming of a wetland by the U.S. Forest Service?

The late watermaster Bob Main mentioned this to me after I brought the issue to his attention: “It will be interesting to examine how much volume will disappear, and who has the water rights to that loss in the mainstem Deschutes, when the berm is removed.”

Certainly no government agency would be right in plugging it up, as it has been there in some form for hundreds of years.

In any event, feel free to visit this ancient “enonoir” and see for yourself. It is in the Deschutes National Forest and not far from the pullout parking near the boat ramp at Dillon Falls.

Fremont is speaking to us about Ryan Ranch Meadow. In my view, this piece of history is important to the decisions about to be made by the USFS.

— Loren Irving lives in Bend