Beaver Falls on Beaver Creek


Here’s that postcard view of Lower Beaver Falls, taken about 1920. Just above it is a primitive plank road crossing, and a splash dam, built to impound the creek. Why? To collect logs, then to pull the dam and send the logs roaring down the creek to a mill somewhere below—probably where Beaver Creek enters the Columbia at the townlet of Inglis.
Here’s Lower Beaver Falls today, reached by a muddy but easy trail from the road—which road, once upon a time, was the main Columbia River Highway to Astoria. Things looked different today.