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His ambitious plan for the town called for a modern and bustling trade and manufacturing center complete with underground utilities, including water and sewer systems, and electricity generated at Willamette Falls. Soon after its founding, the town boasted a number of fine homes, a busy downtown, a shoe factory and an electric trolley line. The town was incorporated in 1908.
While Willamette Falls never grew into the boomtown Walden envisioned, the community offers an example of the many towns that developed along the banks of the Willamette River in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Willamette Falls is recognized as the largest and most developed of these communities and one of very few towns in the nation during the late 1900s that incorporated modern utilities into the original city design. The neighborhood also boasts one of the best collections of historical houses in West Linn.
Beth Kieres, president of the Willamette Neighborhood Association, said plans are in the works for a big celebration, likely at a venue on the neighborhood’s main drag of Willamette Falls Drive.
“We’re positively thrilled that our neighborhood is part of the national registry,” Kieres said. “We think the old homes in Willamette are charming, modest, and very unique in that this, as a community, was one of the first planned communities in the nation, really.”
She noted residents Ruth Offer and Charles Awalt were instrumental in securing the historic designation.
The National Register is maintained by the National Park Service under the authority of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966.
More information about the National Register and recent Oregon listings are online at www.oregonheritage.org.
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