Wheeling and Dealing, Property Development on the Clatsop Plains

Yesterday November 3, 2022, Richie Schroeder passed away after a short illness. I met Richie back in the late 1997 when my wife Annie and I moved into Surf Pines. However, it was not until fall of 2018 that we happened to be both sitting at the bar at McMenamins that I finally got to know him better. We shared our love of local history, and I explained that I was working on a video piece about the 50^thanniversary of Surf Pines becoming an association and the 70^th anniversary of it being developed by Barney Lucas in 1949 for our annual association meeting in August 2019. He then told me he literally was the oldest living continuous owner of a home in Surf Pines. He was only 6 years old when his father Dick Schroeder convinced Barney to sell him the first home built in Surf Pines after a well lubricated Christmas Party in 1951. 

As a result of that discussion, Richie spent several hours with me recording his memories of the Clatsop Plains in several video interviews. He also shared all the records that Barney’s son Jimmy Lucas passed onto Richie after his dad passed away. These recordings and documents have been digitized and will be added to the Internet Archive collections supported by the Clatsop County Historical Society to preserve many of Richie’s memories for future generations. 

The story below talks about how wild development of the Clatsop Plaines was in the middle to end of the 20^th century. It also is a great way to pay homage to one of Clatsop County’s leading developers who truly loved the area. I wanted to share some of his memories as a tribute to a good friend and mentor. T