"As we floated down the river we could see natives, sunning themselves - naked, on an island."

- unknown

Dear Naked Folks

Gravel mining goes back to the building of Highway 99. In the 1950s, local high school kids started using the area as a nude beach. They called it “Hot Rocks”. The coast fork of the Willamette River had gone through that particular spot for so long that the basalt is worn smooth.

Unfortunately, there is now a road built over the length of the
“Hot Rocks”.

The last pond in the park was excavated for gravel in the early 1970s. It was around this time that the Army Corps of Engineers diverted the river to protect the railroad. The Oregon Department of Transportation held responsibility for the land during the
1980s but did little to prevent the buildup of homeless camps in the area. The Oregon Park and Recreation Department acquired the property in the late 1990s and cleared the homeless population.

The first SOLV cleanup was on May 19, 2001. That group of nine people moved three tons of garbage out of the homeless camps. Glassbar Island Volunteers have maintained and enhanced the area since then. They continue to foster the removal of many invasive species and have worked to add many native species back to the area.

DAVID R.
President,
Glassbar Island Volunteers