Home With Dewey

I was ready for spring break.  When Dewey asked me to come home with him to Washougal, Washington to meet his family, it didn’t take me long to accept the offer.  Neither of us had much money or a car, so we planed to hitch hike.  Our travel would be different than the route I had taken to the coast before; depending on the rides we were offered.  We left Cheney early in the morning as it could be a long day and hitch hiking doesn’t work well after dark.  We didn’t wait long before a truck pulled over and asked if we needed a ride.  We thanked him and got in.  He was a farmer going to Ritzville and as we talked he indicated he was actually turning south at Ritzville and would let us off there so we could keep traveling Highway 10.  We were quick to let him know we were headed for the Tri Cities, so would ride along as far as he was going in that direction.  His destination was Lind which was not too far past Ritzville, but on a smaller highway.  We decided we would chance being offered another ride at Lind, a small town in the middle of rolling wheat hills.

We were fortunate the sun was out.  There were no clouds and a cool breeze blew.  This part of the state often had small rain storms this time of year.  They would form quickly and soak you before you could find cover, and many times they were accompanied with hail.  A pickup stopped and motioned us to get in.  It was only the third or fourth vehicle to come by.  The road was busy for such a minor highway.  Our driver was going to Kennewick, one of the Tri Cities, the other two being Richland and Pasco.  These cities had sprung up as separate communities, clustered around the confluence of the Snake and Yakama Rivers with the Columbia River.  This area had been the meeting place for native people for centuries.  Native inhabitants have been traced in this area stretching back over ten thousand years.

During World War II, science research centers were developed around the country, such as the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the LIGO Hanford Observatory.  Hanford was just a few miles upstream from Tri Cities.  The hordes of scientists, professional workers and construction workers of every trade, hired on the project, sparked rapid growth of the Tri Cities.  That was why the road to the Tri Cities was so busy.

                                                Hanford

The Hanford project was established in 1943 as part of the Manhattan project in the little south-central town of Hanford.  The Tri Cities project was home to the B Reactor, the first full-scale plutonium producing reactor in the world.  Plutonium manufactured at the site was used in the first nuclear bomb, named “Fat Man” that was detonated over Nagasaki, Japan.  Subsequent additional reactors were built on the site.  They line the Columbia River bank as it flows for approximately 50 miles along the west side of the 586 square mile site. The land is currently uninhabited and closed to the general public.  It is a desert environment receiving less than 10 inches of annual precipitation.  We were in hopes of seeing some of the functioning part of the project as we drove by, but we were on the east side of the project and saw only desert.  Our driver had suggested we would have better luck catching rides on the Oregon side of the Columbia River as we traveled to Portland.  He let us off in Pasco at a gas and fast food stop.  We thanked him for the ride and information.  He headed toward the bridge leading to the other side of the Columbia and Kennewick.  We grabbed a bite to eat and watched cars stopping for gas and/or food, hoping to spot our next ride,  One fellow had arrived from north, filled up with gas and was just finishing his sandwich when we decided to approach him about a ride.  He said he would enjoy some company on the drive to Portland.  Dewey and I smiled at each other as we took a seat in his big black Buick.  He was a fast driver but a good driver, and had a car we felt safe in.


*Taken from "Which Road Should I Follow?, Volume 1, Growing up in the country", an autobiography by Edwin K. Hill.