Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/405



The author of this description of the historical and scenic setting of the Columbia River Highway was the consulting engineer in its location and construction. He measured up to the opportunities that this connection with this achievement gave him. He soon became enamored with the views such a highway along the Columbia where it breaks through the Cascade Range could command. Also as he was engaged in the arduous work of running the lines for the determination of the location of the road his thought was naturally turned back to the experiences of the explorers, the missionaries and the pioneers who were compelled to use this route to reach the Coast country. This vanguard of exploration and settlement elicited his sympathy and gave the essential background of human interest to the wealth of scenic beauty arrayed along the wonder stretch of the Columbia gorge.

Nature in her disposition of the natural features of the earth's surface has not been given to running her mightiest rivers at right angles to and athwart her loftiest mountain ranges. Great drainage channels and watersheds regularly lie more or less parallel with each other. But in equatorial Africa and with the Columbia we have the exceptions. The combination of the Columbia and the Cascade Range with its snow-capped sentinels set across each others pathway was tried in our quarter of the globe and a most unique wealth of scenic grandeur was the necessary result. A road along this part of the Columbia to serve its highest purpose could be located and built only by an engineer whose vision caught, as did Mr. Lancaster's, the best that was here displayed and who would run his highway lines accordingly. Furthermore,