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Fort Vancouver National Historic Site
Category: Landmarks & Historical Buildings [Edit]
612 E Reserve StVancouver, WA 98661
(360) 816-6230
4 reviews for Fort Vancouver National Historic Site
On a warm fall night I walked in to a dimly lit Georgian style house. Stark, but homey I heard someone get up and move towards the hall.
A guy around my age wearing fancy breeches a la 1835 walked over: "Hello Miss! Come in! Say, would you be able to help me for a moment?"
"Ah...sure..."
"You've heard about the American sailors shipwrecked up at the mouth of the Columbia I'm sure. The men are coming to stay with us and sent forward a letter of things to prepare."
"Oh, I see"
"That's just the trouble, miss, I don't. Look what they're asking for: Coffee? Tobacco? Ale? Do Americans really smoke and drink that much?"
I laughed.... "oh yeah, you'd better be careful."
"Lord help us yes! You've seen our jail, it's not that big!"
I freakin' love history. Living history I can take in small doses, and reenactors I make it a point to avoid. The exception (because I honestly always find myself having a great time) is the Candlelight Tour at Fort Vancouver.
Located on the National Historic Reserve, Fort Vancouver was a fur trading outpost and HQ for the British Hudson's Bay Company. Reconstructed after a large fire, the buildings are open for tours and events regularly.
Visitors hear about Dr. John McLoughlin (the Father of Oregon) and the daily life of the families and men who braved the northwest early on. I'm always amazed how formal and refined life was in an environment that was otherwise pretty wild and scary.
Of course there's some gruesome history too.... like, erm, 'resizing' people to fit inside whatever size caskets were available, and the eerie 'no thanks I'd rather just die' medical practices that usually got them there.
If you're coming to an event it's better to get here really early or really late, depending on your preference. There are less people (read: impressionable kids) around, and you get to talk with the characters and rangers, making the experience a little more memorable. Most are pretty good natured and funny (like the drunks in the jail) so it can actually be a good time.
And at $3.00 admission (or $5.00 per family) it's a cheap form of regional entertainment.
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Why got to NYC when you can pay 3$ to see the "New York of the Pacific Ocean?" This was the title bestowed upon Fort Vancouver by Narcissa Whitman, a missionary who stopped at the Fort on her way to her ill-fated mission in Walla Walla.
Her review continues:
"What a delightful place this is; what a contrast to the rough, barren sand plains through which we so recently passed. Here we find fruit of every description, apples, peaches, grapes, pears, plums and fig trees in abundance; also cucumbers, melons, beans, peas, beets, cabbage, tomatoes and every kind of vegetables too numerous to mention. Every part is very neat and tastefully arranged, with fine walks, lined on each side with strawberry vines."
Fort Vancouver remains a delightful place, from the garden and extensive green space outside of the stockade to the interior of the stockade itself. The stockade is the area surrounded by the tall log fence (wall?). It includes the reconstructions of the buildings from the period when the Fort was a Hudson's Bay outpost. That's the area which you have to pay to get into but for 3$ for an individual pass and 5$ for a family pass which is good for a week, it's definitely worth it.
My favorite exhibit, in the old fur counting house, has been constructed specifically for curious little fingers. All the rooms are open, and you can touch everything and pick almost everything up. Everything you can't pick up has been glued down quite securely. In fact, overall, the stockade has been designed well for a family trip. There's lots of space (i.e. kids can scamper to the next location) and everything kids aren't supposed to get into has been kid-proofed.
They give 10 minute talks there called "Fast Facts" designed to give you the basics without over-stretching small attention spans. The rangers, who are exceptionally knowledgeable, also are able to get across how important Fort Vancouver was to the eventual development of this area. Apparently, Mr. McLoughlin, a tall British man whose stature and crazy white hair no doubt scared many a small child in his day, went against company orders and helped the struggling settlers once they made it to the end of the Oregon trail. There are still paintings and pictures of Mr. McLoughlin in the stockade so he can scare your small child, too. History is alive!
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Our visit coincided with the arrival of huge herds of school children. I never consider this to be a good thing. However, it turns out that several of the exhibits are normally closed to the public and only manned when school groups come. By carefully timing our visit to each building, we were able to get the best of both worlds, few screaming wild juveniles abd the chance to see all the exhibits.
We enjoyed our visit here.
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hot dog, you can not miss a visit to this national treasure. this is the site of the fort that the hudson bay company built for their usual trading and trapping hijinks on the west coast. overall a very intriguing story i wont go into because you can check it out there. they have visitor center with a small museum area featuring items from the fort and a theater for showing the few videos they have on the subject. down on what is close to the best guess of the actual fort site is a recreation of the fort itself along with a number of buildings that have been constructed with some degree of historical accuracy. they have a functioning blacksmith shop and occasionally functional bakery. also featured is a fairly large garden that has random stuff they probably grew out there. one of the buildings features a restoration lab behind protective glass windows where you can treat archaeologists like the animals that they are. fort vancouver holds lots of fun events like outdoor movies and old timey baseball. im pretty sure the national park service is building lots of new stuff in the area so keep updated. national park service staff are awesome, friendly and definitely not the kind of govt employees that rough you up for money in an alley. nicely situated by the columbia river and oh look, mt hood is right in the background. take yourself, a friend, family, or some hitchhikers you just picked up. you wont be disappointed!
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