~February 2015~
West Linn Historical Society Newsletter

Left: young Marjorie with her Mother outside their house in Willamette on 4th Avenue.
Right: Marge was a volunteer tutor at Willamette Elementary.
 

At the age of 88, Marge is one of Willamette’s oldest residents. She is a fiercely independent and private woman who continues to do as much for herself as she possibly can.  She is forward thinking and believes, “there is no use in looking back because that’s not the direction you are going in.” Delightfully frank and intelligent, with impressive clarity, Marge recalls for us a little bit of her life growing up in West Linn.
 
 She was born in Oregon City in 1927 but tells us her mother was raised in West Linn and wanted to move back to be near her family.  When Marge was five, they moved back to a family home in the Willamette area.
 
Marge attended Willamette Elementary beginning at the age of six. She loved school and was a good student. We asked Marge about the fire destroying the Willamette Elementary School. She corrected us, “there were two.  One started in the attic when I was in the 6th or 7th grade but it didn’t interrupt school. As I remember, it happened in summer. Sometime later, the school had a second fire and was rebuilt. 
 
Marge is a third generation West Linn Resident. Her grandfather, Charles Andrus, delivered the mail with a horse and buggy from his house on 9th street around the turn of the century (he is actually a character in one of the scenes in the Willamette Living History Tour).  The Willamette Falls Trolley was still running when Marge was a child.  Her uncle was a conductor and she often took rides on the trolley. The trolley ran from the Methodist church down to the station at the Arch Bridge. Much of the trolley tracks were eventually covered by the street but there are still original stairs that once led down to the tracks in between 7th and 9th at Willamette Falls Drive.
 
As kids, Marge explained, “We pretty much made our own fun. We would go down to Willamette Park and spend the day.  There would be counselors there in the summer to organize games and crafts.  We could swim in the Tualatin at Devil’s Elbow [now Swift Shore]. In winter when it snowed, and it snowed a lot, we had 12th street for a good steep run with a sled.  Mind you, we’d make a quick turn at the bottom to avoid shooting into the river.” 
 
She graduated from high school and began her college education at Marylhurst in 1947. She entered college as a music major studying violin, piano and voice. Music was always an important part of Marge’s life; she taught and played piano for many years but she considered early on that it wouldn’t likely pay the bills. Being the practical woman that she is, she eventually switched her major to pre-medicine and transferred to Portland State.  She studied medical technology in school then went on to work in a laboratory in Portland. 
 
Marge had moved out of West Linn during those years but eventually moved back to another small house in the Willamette area where she still lives today. Ever the music lover, her shelves are filled with sheets of music and her tiny living room is taken up by a grand piano.

~