What do a $100 bill, a walnut, and the East Linn Museum have in common? For one thing, they are not part of a shell game. The walnut has never been cracked and there is no pea.
Actually, they are gifts. The $100 bill relates to a story about Peter Rapp as told by museum Volunteer Emeritus Lucille Rapp. Her husband Lloyd was one of the twins who came to Oregon with Peter and his second wife, Hattie, Floyd being the other twin. Peter and Hattie can be seen among the photographs in the main room. She, coincidentally, wears a hat.
So this is the story of Peter Rapp and the $100 bill.
Before coming to Oregon Peter Rapp had been successful enough in Nebraska to be able to leave an early legacy to his five children by his first wife. As a hard worker, he again prospered in Oregon, doing well enough to keep accounts at the bank in Brownsville.
But the Great Depression, which haunted the 1930s, loomed. The Brownsville Bank failed, swallowing up Peter Rapp’s assets. By this time he was reaching his 80s and he had little chance to begin again the way he had done when he left Nebraska for Oregon. He grew depressed. His losses preyed upon his mind.
In the meantime, the sons, Lloyd and Floyd, were working at various jobs, jobs and money both being scarce at the time. But they scraped and saved. Finally they had enough to buy a $100 bill. They gave it to their father.
And Peter Rapp felt some ease of mind. He’d carry the bill around with him, sometimes peeking at it or patting it just to know it was there. Then one day he looked for it and it was gone. Stolen? The Depression forced many to desperate actions, and Peter, who died in 1932, would be gone before economic relief came with the war industries of World War II.
This is a bittersweet story. The $100 bill was certainly gone, but Peter Rapp had some consolation in recognizing the respect and affection shown by his sons.
The story of the walnut as a gift is a simple “Happy Birthday” one. The walnut can also be found in the main room, having lasted for decades without attracting a museum mouse, which would have been poorer than a church mouse not having access to occasional potlucks.
In reality, the walnut is only part of what was given, for it sits associated with a strikingly pretty cup and saucer, the sort ladies collect to place on special view. This cup and saucer are gold- and white-gilded. Raised poppies form the base of the cup and gold decorates both it and the saucer.
The label with the walnut and the cup and saucer set explains that they were given to Sam Cairnes on his first birthday. If you lacked money for a gift at that time, custom called for giving the birthday celebrant something cherished. Perhaps the walnut wouldn’t qualify as cherished, but it would interest a baby boy, though it seems doubtful that the cup and saucer were among his play things.
Sam Cairnes served as a long-time educator and Boy Scout leader in this area, one who was noted for dedicating himself to helping others. He is well-represented in the museum and was a generous supporter, having left one third of his estate to it, so it is intriguing to run across souvenirs from his babyhood. Certainly, these presents, the walnut and cup and saucer were treasured by Sam’s family in keeping with their meaning of generosity.
Regarding the museum itself, it ranks as the biggest gift of all, likely one of the largest received by the city of Sweet Home. It, too, is a kind of birthday gift because part of the stimulus for its inception came from the looming Bicentennial celebration of the United States, which marked its birthday as July 4, 1776 when the Declaration of Independence was signed.
Those who manage the museum are volunteers and everything displayed has been donated by people from this area. Great thanks remain owed to the memories of those who gathered to voluntarily create the East Linn Museum, individuals like Lois Rice, Don Menear, Bud and Martha Steinbacher and many others. They performed a tremendous task in getting the building together, in collecting objects, in numbering them and filing and cross-filing records and then setting up orderly displays. They laid the pattern for the ways in which the Museum has continued to grow.
A tidy mind might complain about the East Linn Museum as being too eclectic, meaning too many different articles are included, sometimes in a piecemeal, hugger-muggerly fashion. A mind looking for chronology would be disappointed. Some items are worn and even nearly worn out. Others seem to be curiosities and there can be considerable doubt about the dates and ages of many of them.
On the other hand, for a viewer with an open mind, the museum becomes a wonderland, which might involve wondering what objects are, such as the “glut” in the logging section. It is a huge chisel with a hollow shaft into which a tree branch could be fitted for a handle and was used in making skid roads
In the museum, too, can be found incidents of tragedy and comedy.
Tragedy: The box of personal items sent home after the death of Pvt. Rosell who died in England from an infection in his foot during World War I (previously written about).
Comedy: Not so visible, but the discovery of a violin among the musical instruments labeled “Stradivarius” by a volunteer. Strads are very valuable, but wait a minute – there is a Quanarius violin in the same case, also worth money! Hold on, wasn’t there something pertaining to this in an old Sears-Roebuck Catalog? There certainly was, a whole assortment of “European” violins bearing names of famous makers.
“That those to come may know” is the motto chosen by the museum’s founders, and it is true, you can always be surprised at what you didn’t know you’d find at the East Linn Museum. Once a visitor went around saying to his young companion, “I’d give two dollars for this” and “two dollars for that.” Not a likely price for an early Zenith radio looking like something listened to for one of Franklin D. Roose-velt’s Fireside Chats.
Nearby, this visitor could hear, also, a recording of the whistle from the steamboat Terrascone. Having plied Midwestern rivers, thanks to Joe Fallon, the whistle ended up at the Santiam Lumber Mill which became the mill for Willamette Industries. Two bucks wouldn’t pay for the priceless history of that whistle.
And that is what the East Linn Museum really is, a priceless gift to the city and to all who take advantage of wandering and wondering through the stimulating vistas it offers. A middle-aged lady can look at a sewing box with a Chinese coin decorating it and remember her grandmother or a ten year old boy might be awed by an enormous paper wasp nest behind a blacksmith forge. The possibilities are innumerable.
As the stories of the $100 bill and the walnut, along with the cup and saucer, show, gifts come in different forms, and a really big gift comes in the form of the East Linn Museum. But hold this memory for the moment because the museum closes through January and February, reopening on the first Thursday in March.
On Thursday evenings, however, from 5 to 7 p.m., students and visitors will be browsing and researching with volunteers Lana Holden, the museum’s director, and Sarah Lynn. Volunteers will also be working on special projects and can be available on request to host special tours during this two-month closure.