. . . War Events (3) . . .

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Though by now the US Air Force and the air wings of the Army, Navy, and Marines had assumed the main burden of the war, some remaining ground troops invaded Cambodia as troops of the South invaded the adjacent small country of Laos. 

 

These and other events in Vietnam (and also here in the US) generated another surge of anti-war feelings and protests.  By now, a number of polls had begun to suggest that a growing majority of Americans were against continuing the war.

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. . . Home Events (1) . . .

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One day in Tigard, high school students watch a film called "The Soiled Frontier."  It was about pollution in Oregon.  In the same year, a documentary film told about a Detroit boy who lost his tree fort when the forest where he played was logged out.

 

Environmental fears mounted in our state.  Oregon passed "The Bottle Bill," the first such bill in the nation, which discouraged littering the landscape with used containers.  And although that boy in Detroit had lost his tree fort, 70 camp sites were added to its state park.

 

. . . Home Events (2) . . .

 

Women's Rights was another great issue of the time.  A Salem girl sued (successively) the school district for the right to wear slacks to class.  And in McMinnville, the first woman student representative took her place on the Linfield College Board of Trustees.  In Portland, our state's first chapter of the National Organization For Women was formed.

 

. . . Home Events (4) . . .

 

Then there were the anti-war protests, mainly centered at our colleges.  Planned protests at the American Legion's national convention in Portland were avoided as 30,000 youths went to Vortex, a massive music festival held on the banks of the Clackamas River.  This separated those who wanted to protest from those who didn't.

 

And one chronic issue was finally settled.  The legislature, aware of how many Oregonians in their late teens and early twenties were serving in Vietnam, gave the Vote to 18-year-olds.

 

. . . Home Events (5) . . .

 

Then there were events which, though less sensational, were important in their own time and place.  Grants Pass senior citizens gave a ball, Scio held its annual sheepdog trials and, as always, chose queens for the Linn County Lamb and Wool Fair, and Oregon City counted 35,000 coho salmon passing through the fishway.

 

Here are two of many examples of Oregonians being good neighbors: students at Gladstone High contributed $1,000 to help build a school in a Third-World country while inmates at the Oregon State Penitentiary contributed $98 to a family in Turner whose house burned down.  These were reassuring gestures amid all the bad news of those years.