Harriet Langmas stands next to a pair of patchwork skirts she designed and made over the years of sewing in her Bend home on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2020.

By HARRIET LANGMAS • For The Bulletin

The 1950s in Bend was a lull between WWII and the 1960s social upheaval. Shevlin Hixon mill had closed, purchased by Brooks Scanlon, but most people still had their jobs. The attitude was “the last one out turn out the lights.”

There was finally a new high school so the kids didn’t have to double shift in the school downtown, but many thought the school was way out there, halfway to Burns, despite its location on Sixth Street.

Downtown there was a Wetles Department store, the Smart Shop, Brandis Drug, Masterson St. Clair hardware, Piggly Wiggly and Safeway. Erickson’s grocery had bravely moved to Eighth and Greenwood because the town was moving to the east. We all had charge accounts at these stores with the bill sent at the first of the month. You could have your groceries delivered, usually by Carl Erickson himself. And Erv Wagner built a grocery on the corner of Third and Greenwood across from Cale Hardware. Hambone Hanks’ meat department had sawdust floors.

There was a blinking red light at the corner of Wall and Franklin. Nearby was the only theatre, the Tower. Bob Chandler, Bill Niskanen and Mike Hollern of the Bulletin, Trailways and Brooks Scanlon brought the Portland Symphony to Bend once a year for some culture. Most families bought a membership to the community concerts, which were held at the Tower Theatre. There was one more blinking light in the area at China Hat Road, far south of town where the logging was taking place.

Residents knew the time of day by the mill whistles, which could be heard all over Bend. And your car would be covered with sawdust if you left it out on a windy day. Lumber was the economy. No ski resort yet, no vacation resorts, no high end industries. One guest list for social events. It was middle-class heaven.

For the outsiders, Bend was often referred to as “the middle of nowhere.” Not too much recognition. Only two restaurants — the Superior Café open 24/7 with its dangling light bulb in the center, and the Pine Tavern, where you went for your birthday or for $3 Saturday night Danish smorgasbord served by Marin Grivsov and Shirey Ray. Sometimes the Pilot Butte Inn was open, especially for the hundred-couple Winter Assembly Dance Club functions three or four times a year. The owners of several other Mom and Pop venues got into their campers after Hunting Season opened and headed for the desert where they stayed until it was time for fishing season to open.

Fishing was “bigtime” in Bend. Oh, the fun when the kids headed to Drake Park for the fishing contest. Prizes for the biggest fish, the ugliest and the smallest. About mid-June our attention turned to Fourth of July pet parade. Time to choose a theme and decorate our floats. Thanks to Chamber of Commerce secretary Marion Cady, the United States space program made Bend its headquarters in the 60s. Paulina and East Lake craters look a lot like the craters on the moon.) Those years with the Astronauts and Hollywood moviemakers could be another article. I loved being a part of all that.

There were about 9,000 people in Bend in the 50s, one radio station and no TV station. There were two men who built houses — Vern Johnson and Harold Rogers. The place to live was in the new part of Bend near Pilot Butte.

A two-lane East Third Street was lined with little two-bedroom houses, and you better “fill up” at the Standard Station on the corner of Greenwood and Wall if you didn’t want to run out before heading to Klamath Falls.

The Standard Station reportedly pumped more gas than any other station in Oregon. There was a miniature golf course next to it if you had some spare time.

The beginnings of what was to be the first Junior College in Oregon started in the 50s with extension classes in the evening at the old Bend High, which is now the administration building on Wall.

There were only six or seven doctors in Bend, and the only anesthesiologist was on duty 24/7. But in the 50s there was a new hospital where Bend’s first water tower and park were, Hospital Hill in the center of town. Next door to the hospital was the only fire hall. Every time there was a call, the whole town heard the alarm. Volunteers would go running. And volunteers got their water bills paid by the city.

The Presbyterian Church, the first organized church in the Deschutes Basin, was on Franklin near the underpass. It’s a bicycle shop now with those beautiful stained glass windows the McKay Family donated. There were about 100 members; now 1,000. George Palmer Putnam donated the money to buy the land.

There were no kindergartens or hot-lunch programs in the schools, but Mable Bowles had her garage made into a Jack and Jill studio where kids could learn to tap dance and tell time. School District No. 1 frowned on her teaching them the alphabet. But she did it anyway.

We came to Bend for one year to teach in the new high school, and almost 70 years later I’m still here. I’m as much in love with Bend as I was the first time I arrived.