The Open Gate: Barbara Walker

Sometimes people ask, why do Oregonians define “public good” as something that takes nature into account? I think it’s because we live amidst and with nature. It is incorporated into our blood. It is here, through our every waking moment.

—Barbara Walker

In 1903, landscape architects John Charles and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. had a vision for Portland: a “40-Mile Loop” necklace of nature to surround the city by connecting a series of parks. A century later, with the help of a woman who loved both history and nature, the Olmsteds’ farsighted idea has become reality, but with one major difference. The 40-Mile Loop has grown to 140 miles, becoming an outstanding network of paths crossing parks, rivers, lakes, buttes and forests, and encircling an entire metropolitan region.

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If fifty years ago Barbara Walker had not been a good typist, Portland, Oregon, would not resemble the place it is today. But Barbara could type— “in those days when there was no such thing as erasable paper, so you couldn’t have any mistakes,” she recalls, laughing. So when a neighbor asked for her help in transcribing the minutes for a young organization called The Forest Park Committee of Fifty, she kindly agreed to lend her a hand.

Typing those notes would expose her to things she had never thought about before, causing her to see natural areas in an entirely new light. Eventually, Barbara Walker became one of the most passionate advocates for parks, trails, and open spaces the City of Portland has ever known.

Born in 1935 and growing up in the west hills of Portland, Barbara found constant delight in the woods and natural beauty surrounding her. “This has always been home,” she says affectionately. “My parents, aunts, cousins and grandparents all lived here. When I was a little girl, I always walked to my grandparent’s house who lived a few blocks away.”

After attending local schools for her first seventeen years, she went to Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts, graduating in 1957 with a degree in government and foreign relations. “I just loved it!” Barbara says, her face lighting up. “Many of my friends who graduated with me would go on to work at The Atlantic, The New York Times, and the New Yorker.”

Barbara, her roots always in Oregon, returned home after college. For a time she worked in an attorney’s office, “where I learned to type” she says. Later, she took a job with the Oregonian and then the Oregon Journal, where she had her own column, Meanderings. “I loved writing the column,” Barbara relates. “I loved it because I loved Portland history and Oregon history.”

When Barbara married Wendell Walker in 1961, he was just starting a business of his own, and she switched her focus from writing for the papers to working for him. Before long, they had three children. Barbara thrived on the new adventure of raising three boys. When the children were still young, a neighbor, Dorothea Abbott, dropped by one sunny afternoon to ask for Barbara’s help. Dorothea was the acting secretary of the newly formed Forest Park Committee of Fifty.

“Dorothea utterly hated typing,” Barbara explains with a chuckle, “and she was at her wit’s end. She asked me if I would take her handwritten notes and transcribe them for her. I said I would. I had no idea, then, what that would set into motion. It was from typing them that I became aware of the history of Forest Park. Dorothea had been instrumental in preserving the park by virtue of being one of its staunch early supporters.”

As Barbara discovered, the Forest Park Committee of Fifty was a volunteer advocacy group representing different organizations— such as the Portland Garden Club, the Trails Club of Oregon, and the Western Federation of Outdoor Clubs— that had successfully worked together to create the park. After decades of striving for a goal that many said was impossible, Forest Park finally became a reality in 1948, preserving forty-two-hundred acres and the nation’s largest urban wilderness forest. Seventy years later, the Portland city sanctuary has grown to over fifty-two-hundred acres.

Barbara was captivated by the story. As her understanding of Forest Park’s value to the city grew, she became fascinated by the historic fight to save it. She learned that Forest Park had been originally envisioned at the turn of the twentieth century by prominent landscape architects, the Olmsted brothers, whose father, Frederick Law Olmsted, had been responsible for the creation of Central Park in New York City. In 1903, John Charles Olmsted and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. had been hired by the Portland Parks board to design a park planning study for Portland. At the time, the Olmsted brothers were well known and had completed numerous high-profile projects, including designs of numerous park systems, residential neighborhoods, universities, state capitols, and were doing pivotal work with the National Park Service.

Fueled by her love of history, Barbara was keen to learn more. With a good deal of sleuthing and perseverance, she at last ferreted out a copy of the original Olmsted report, published in 1903, long buried and forgotten. Looking it over, she recognized the document as remarkable and far-sighted. In their writings, Barbara discovered the Olmsted brothers had advocated for the creation of a Forest Park with a beautifully descriptive recommendation.

“A visit to these woods,” they wrote, “would afford more pleasure and satisfaction than a visit to any other sort of park. No use to which this tract of land could be put would begin to be as sensible or as profitable to the city as that of making it a public park. If these woods are preserved, they will surely come to be regarded as marvelously beautiful.”

While the Olmsteds’ plan was initially met with excitement citywide, not much was accomplished. Bond measures to carry out the Olmsted ideas repeatedly met with failure. Barbara was aghast at the revelations she uncovered. In 1912, changes were made to Portland’s city government. Under a new charter, the Portland Parks board was no longer an independent entity; rather, park governance was to fall under an elected mayor and commissioners. The acting mayor at the time, Joseph Simon, strongly believed that creating parks was superfluous and a waste of money. The sad result was that the Olmsted plan grew dormant through the years and headed toward oblivion.

The greatest feat, as Barbara saw, had been accomplished by a handful of dedicated citizens who never gave up and fought for forty-four years to realize the Olmsteds’ original vision for Forest Park—and won.

Barbara was astonished by the whole story. Grateful for the creation of such a magnificent park, she became curious about the other recommendations that the Olmsteds had offered. She continued her investigations. What jumped out at her was something that she had never heard about before. The Olmsted plan was far bigger than just Forest Park.

The great vision of John Charles and Frederick Law Olmsted Jr. was that the Parks of Portland should be connected.

Barbara remembers the first time she contemplated their rich ideas. “I realized the Olmsted plan proposed not only Forest Park but recommended many places for parks… places along Marine Drive and the Willamette River, east to Rocky Butte, then extending to Washington Park, which was then called City Park, to Forest Park, to Council Crest and then all the way down to Terwilliger Boulevard. They envisioned them all connected! … Their thoughts were just so forward for that time. What was different was that they valued the land for what it was, not just what it could be used for. That is why their plan has had such a lasting effect.”

As she studied the report, something else grabbed her attention. The beloved woods she had grown up with— Marquam Canyon in Southwest Portland— were also included in their plan, viewed as being worthy of preservation and becoming a park.

The timing of her discovery could not have been more fortuitous. Around the same period Barbara was to bring to light the Olmsted report, another plan for the area was already steamrolling forward. In 1968, three dentists were proposing an enormous housing development that would destroy the natural Marquam Canyon forever.

“It was one of those first planned unit developments, and it was huge. They were envisioning building a sprawling apartment complex, and that was only the beginning. It was long, extensive, and would wipe out the entire ravine.”

Contemplating the destruction of the beautiful Douglas firs, western hemlock, red cedar, and big-leaf maples that clothed the wondrous woods surrounding Marquam Hill, and the scores of wildflowers that covered its floor in spring, was devastating to Barbara.

“It just seemed to me that the massive development shouldn’t be there. Rather, it seemed so sensible to follow the Olmsted plan— to connect Council Crest and Terwilliger to Forest Park. The land was there; we just had to find a way to do it,” Barbara says, her resolve still shining brightly.

“After typing up all those minutes of Dorothea’s, I saw how a small citizen band never gave up the fight to preserve Forest Park. Now, it was our turn.”

Barbara sought out neighbors she knew who loved Marquam Canyon as fiercely as she did. Soon, six friends sat around her kitchen table discussing how they might begin a campaign to save the wooded gulch. Included was Dorothy Westrack, a fourth-grade teacher at Ainsworth School; Nadia Munk, who had fled from her homeland of Czechoslovakia when the Nazis came to power; Elizabeth Crookham, an active civic volunteer; and Bill and Sonia Connor, he a doctor and she a nutritionist.

Each knew it would be a Herculean task. They decided their initial step was to form a small foundation. Barbara didn’t know the first thing about foundations, but they gave it a name anyway— Friends of Marquam Nature Park. Next, the troupe began researching plat maps for tax lots numbers. Barbara dove into studying the geology of the ravine, which had exceedingly fragile soils, prone to slides. The group held meetings in each other’s homes, discussing strategies to enlist other supporters. All agreed that the only way to attack the problem was to preserve the canyon, and the only way to do that was to raise the money to buy it.

The question of course, Barbara relates, “was how in the heavens do we do that?” For inspiration, the band looked to the success of Tryon Creek State Park, which had recently been saved from an enormous development by voluminous park supporters, led by Lu Beck. “If they can do it, so can we, we told ourselves,” says Barbara. The Tryon supporters sold buttons and “feet of trail.” Barbara thought that sounded like a good place to start. “So, we made and sold little buttons that said, ‘I’m for Marquam Nature Park.’ We got lots of small donations.”

The fledgling group compiled informational packets about Marquam Canyon, citing it was an oasis in the city. The packets described the critical mission to save the precious resource, which held scenic forested views and offered retreat from busy urban life. Quickly they discovered, however, that distributing the packets was what took the most time and energy.

“Remember, this was before the day of the computer or emails. Everything had to be done by hand, by mail, by copying machine, and word of mouth.” And, in Barbara’s case, by foot.

Barbara had learned that a major factor in Tyron Creek’s preservation had been the support of Glenn Jackson, the chairman of the Oregon State Highway Commission. Jackson had helped elevate the issue to a state level, which eventually aided it in becoming a state park. While not acquainted with Jackson personally, Barbara knew from others that he was a tireless behind-the-scenes worker who supported parks and whose office was in downtown Portland. He was purported to be a businessman who didn’t waste words and stayed long hours in his office.

Barbara’s goal was to give Glenn Jackson a packet. She wanted to garner his interest, which she hoped might spark his endorsement of a Marquam Nature Park. She knew her timing must be impeccable to incur a minute in his busy schedule.

Using this reasoning, Barbara chose a day when Portland was enveloped by a major winter ice and snowstorm to approach Mr. Jackson. Gambling that he would be in his office, she donned her winter boots, stuffed the packet in her backpack, and trudged downtown. She didn’t bother calling first, reckoning it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. Phone lines were down because of the storm.

Mr. Jackson was indeed in his office when she arrived. When she opened the door, he seemed surprised to see someone but welcomed her in.

“I knew that he wouldn’t be busy with someone else because no one could come to see him unless they had gotten there like I had— by hiking in the snow!” Barbara recounts.

Mr. Jackson listened. It was the first time he had ever heard of Marquam Canyon or of the idea of creating Marquam Nature Park. Barbara explained that the idea came from not just her or her small group, but from the original Olmsted plan to connect the parks. Even having a few buildings in the canyon, she entreated, would fragment it irreversibly. The Olmsted plan advocating for setting aside Marquam Canyon as a park seemed too phenomenal an idea to be lost.

Glenn Jackson liked the notion, but Barbara, not wanting to press her luck, asked him for only one thing at the conclusion of their brief conversation. Could he give her any names of people that he knew who might be interested in the proposal? Mr. Jackson, she says, graciously complied. With this list in hand, Barbara set out determinedly on her next mission: going door to door to meet them.

“When I would knock on their doors, I would ask for only five minutes of their time, no more. I didn’t want to appear presumptuous,” she explains with a sheepish grin. “You know, I was just a little housewife dropping by.”

That housewife started getting positive responses to the idea. The people she met gave her more names of people, even corporations, to contact. If they didn’t hop on the bandwagon right away, Barbara remained un- fazed. “I’ll bet they talked about this nutty woman who thinks she can do it— create a park! But then, eventually, many of them became great supporters and backers.”

Contributions began to trickle in, then to grow. Donations came from neighbors, foundations, corporations, and businesses, along with matching grants. The Friends of Marquam Nature Park attended meetings with city commissioners, the planning commission, the geological commission and endured endless hearings, always stating their unified opposition to the three dentists’ plan.

In time, a broad upwelling of community support began arising. More offerings came in. At last, the Friends of Marquam Nature Park secured the financial backing they needed to try to preserve the land for public use. Facing the overwhelming backing of creating a park instead of hundreds of apartments, the dentists at last relented, finally selling their interest in the canyon.

Marquam Nature Park, Barbara proudly beams, became a reality in 1978. In 1983, the park was officially dedicated. Six years later, in 1989, the Friends of Marquam Park transferred the two hundred acres to Portland Parks and Recreation. The Friends remain its devoted stewards, watching over the park to make sure it remains, as Barbara always envisioned, “an area of retreat from Portland’s urban environment and an opportunity to walk in a natural oasis within the city.”

Barbara’s success in helping save a place that meant so much to her emboldened her to continue with her even greater aim, resurrecting the vision of the Olmsted brothers. “We needed to work to preserve the rest of the areas they’d imagined,” she says. “Their plan just spoke to me. It seemed a natural to try to complete the dream! We needed to bring back their notion of the 40-Mile Loop.”

The Olmsteds were advocating for the creation of a circuit of parks, all joined, making one giant greenspace that encircled the borders of the city. It was similar in design to a beltline for traffic, such as in Washington, D.C., only this beltline was for people to connect with nature.

Barbara explains further. The Olmsted brothers’ idea of joining parks was like stringing together jewels on a necklace. They pointed out many gaps that existed between the beads. What needed filling were those spaces between the parks. Springwater Corridor, Rocky Butte and Johnson Creek to Troutdale, and routes down the Columbia River and the Columbia Slough all the way to Rivergate needed to be procured somehow, and connected. The Olmsted loop would follow the Willamette River along Forest Park, joining Washington Park, Marquam Park, and Terwilliger Boulevard. There needed to be a link from Peninsula Point to the Burlington Railroad and on to Swan Island.

The list went on. When Barbara added it up, she realized it wasn’t a 40-mile loop at all. In reality, as the city of Portland had expanded, it had grown to be a ring of parks and pathways, a natural ribbon, stretching a phenomenal 140 miles.

That didn’t matter to Barbara. The name would remain what the Olmsteds gave it: the 40-Mile Loop.

“John Olmsted loved the views from Terwilliger. He thought we should save those wonderful lakes north of Portland, many of which are now gone, that adjoined the Columbia River.” Barbara explains that the lakes have disappeared due to industrial development, dredging, piping, and levees to prevent flooding that changed the area’s hydrology. “He thought we would be crazy not to do something with it. We should preserve it!”

Barbara reads from a copy of the old report that lyrically conveys their philosophy:

It was not a dream for the faint of heart, nor for someone who did not have the stamina to take on a big picture, piece by piece, without losing sight of a much larger goal. It would take a giant dose of optimism and goodwill. Barbara was blessed with those virtues. She knew that securing each section of the loop would take time and work, bringing, at turns, successes and failures. In her favor she had a solid working knowledge now of the effort necessary to get things preserved.

The race was on. Big box buildings were erupting across the borders of Portland as the city expanded. Barbara’s concerns concentrated on the lands around Marine Drive from Kelley Point and the Columbia Slough to Burlington Railroad and Swan Island. All those wonderful lakes dotted throughout were disappearing one by one. At risk, too, was natural habitat from Johnson Creek to Troutdale and on to Beavercreek.

Barbara’s grand plan was to try to save them and then to connect them. Expanding on the Olmsted brothers’ theme, her vision was to make it possible for people from all neighborhoods to go out their front doors and connect to trails. These trails would, in turn, join up with other trails, eventually even linking with pedestrian routes that could take walkers all the way to Mt. Hood, and from there, up and down the Pacific Crest Trail.

For thirty-five years, Barbara worked tirelessly to achieve that dream. At seventy-eight years old, she continues her advocacy still.

“People need places for refreshment and solitude and serenity. Our parks are not for carnivals; they’re for people to enjoy what is natural in Oregon. We don’t need to be entertained. Having something like Forest Park reminds us what a treasure we have. And then, we want to keep it! It makes people recognize nature, and seeing it, understand why it is so important.” She smiles and adds something that underlies her truest beliefs. “As Oregonians, we get our fulfillment from the place, not from what somebody has built on top of it.”

Today, through Barbara’s indefatigable efforts, along with countless others who have been deeply inspired by her lively dedication, many of the pearls on that green necklace of nature in Portland have been acquired and preserved. A century after being proposed by the Olmsted brothers, the 40-Mile Loop now stretches 140 miles, joining together more than thirty parks, two counties, and six cities. It has been designated an Oregon Recreation Trail, an honor awarded to a single trail or a combination of trails that stand out for their outstanding quality and exceptional beauty and that define the essence of what is “Oregon.”

Barbara, continually grateful, nevertheless expresses a note of caution. Breaches in the loop remain, she points out. An advocacy group, the 40- Mile Loop Land Trust, continues to pursue filling in the spaces. Incorporated in 1981, the nonprofit land acquisition organization, managed by a volunteer citizen board of directors, works with thirteen local jurisdictions to coordinate land purchases or donations, to accept conservation easements, and to act as a “land bank” of properties for future transfer to public agencies. They continue to meet with success in promoting the system of connected recreational rails and strive to complete the Olmsted-inspired trail around Portland.

Barbara appreciates all the citizen efforts, frankly acknowledging that working to make these things happen isn’t all fun. It can be tiring and full of disappointments. For her, though, she will never give up trying to close the gaps… and to open the gates.

“I can’t think of how much time I have had to spend at hearings,” says Barbara, shaking her head. “There are, and will always be, endless planning commission meetings. When you propose putting in a trail, people sometimes become apprehensive that it will bring the riffraff. They put up a fence along the trail. It doesn’t take long, though, for people see how positive it is. Then, where there has been a fence someone has built, landowners put up a gate that can be opened to get to the trail.”

Her eyes are bright. “Nothing is going to be more valuable than having a connection with nature in our cities, and an attachment to the earth. If we can keep nature in our cities, we can create the most wonderful communities ever.”

Barbara Walker’s amicable yet determined commitment has helped preserve hundreds of acres of natural beauty in the city she loves, making it accessible to all. Inspired by an old, overlooked report written by two men she never knew, she has helped make Portland one of the most livable cities in the world.

“There is motivation to extend what you love, and what you appreciate,” she says thoughtfully. “Sometimes people ask, why do Oregonians define ‘public good’ as something that takes nature into account? I think it’s because we live amidst and with nature. It is incorporated into our blood. It is here, through our every waking moment.”

Barbara’s warmth radiates throughout the room. “Yes, I think my favorite idea of success is when someone cuts out a hole in the fence and puts in the gate. To me, that is the spirit of Oregon.”

“The Open Gate: Barbara Walker” is from A Generous Nature: Lives Transformed by Oregon by Marcy Cottrell Houle, copyright © 2019. Reprinted with permission of Oregon State University Press.