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Doug Decker

Doug Decker has had a life-long interest in connecting past and the present in the natural landscapes of Oregon, and in historic homes and buildings. He retired as Oregon State Forester in 2016 after a 30-years of public service including 11 years in the Tillamook State Forest, where he led development and opening of the Tillamook Forest Center, an interpretive museum that tells the story of past and present in the former Tillamook Burn. He currently serves as Vice President of the Oregon Geographic Names Board, and runs the executive leadership program at the Hatfield School of Government at Portland State University. Doug also writes about old buildings and neighborhood history from his website: alamedahistory.org.

Author's Entries

  • Alameda neighborhood

    Alameda is a neighborhood in northeast Portland, platted in 1909 by developers and marketed as an exclusive district. The early restrictions banned all but Caucasian residents, set minimum home construction costs, and permitted solely residential uses. The original plat, known as Alameda Park, is bounded by Northeast Fremont and …

    Oregon Encyclopedia

  • J. Edward Schroeder (1914–2010)

    John Edward Schroeder was Oregon’s eighth State Forester, serving from 1965 to 1979. One of his lasting accomplishments was the replanting of the Tillamook Burn, a 500-square-mile area in the Oregon Coast Range that had been devastated by four wildfires between 1933 and 1951. Schroeder came to the work from …

    Oregon Encyclopedia

  • Tillamook Burn

    The Tillamook Burn was a catastrophic series of large forest fires in the northern Oregon Coast Range mountains 50 miles west of Portland. It began in 1933 and struck at six-year intervals through 1951, burning a combined total of 355,000 acres (554 square miles). For a generation of Oregonians …

    Oregon Encyclopedia

  • Tillamook Forest Center

    The Tillamook Forest Center, located twenty-two miles east of Tillamook on Oregon Highway 6 (known as the Wilson River Highway), is a visitor information and education center that tells the story of the Tillamook Burn and the Tillamook State Forest. Owned and operated by the Oregon Department of Forestry, the …

    Oregon Encyclopedia