Ecological succession: I mourn the loss of my favorite uncle, Ted Brown, who died Friday evening in eastern Oregon, Realizing an Oregon dream and vision

I mourn the loss of my favorite uncle, Ted Brown, who died Friday evening in eastern Oregon. It's particularly the wood craft as well as his and his family's realizing of the amazingly beautiful Wisdom Creek Ranch sustainable tree farm since 1959, as an Oregon dream and vision, that I appreciate and love him for.

I first visited them in the mid 1970s (1974?) in eastern Oregon at their ranch, and I remember going backpacking with him (and my brother and mother I think), along Catherine Creek, probably for a mile or two.

From 1979-1987, when I was a student at Reed College, and living in Portland, Oregon, after this, I visited them possibly 15-25 times, hitchhiking many times across the state along Interstate Highway 84. It was Mary's home making and warm hospitality, her gardening, canning, and knowledge of the natural world of the ranch that also touched me. They had both met and married at the Quaker Earlham College in the 1950s (where my mother went for a year), that informed their vision of sustainable homesteading in many ways, an old American vision. They realized this amazingly and beautifully raising 3 children, some of whom have grandchildren now.

Ted and Mary worked so hard to realize this dream - physical 12 hour day labor. At the same time, my uncle first taught high school, then college and university, at Eastern Oregon College, which became Eastern Oregon University in later years.

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Hi M,

Thanks so much for your excellent writing about Ted! I learned of many aspects and stories about Ted's life I had never known before. I was thinking about writing about some of my remembrances and feelings of loss for Ted (as well as a kind of eulogy) today in my blog. (I have already written about Ted, Mary, the Browns and Wisdom Creek Ranch in my blog before, and I may well gather some of this together today as well). Thank you for your touching remembrances about your brother so much. 

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Thanks so much for sharing your remembrances about Ted for Annie, Cathy and Sandy with me, Ma. I'd love to read more. I too went for a long walk yesterday, cried a little and continue to have him in mind much today. I miss him, but am glad he is free of his compromised and pained health situation in its completely incapacitating way of these last years. Thinking about Ted (and you), and thank you for writing about him like this. I miss him much as well. 

Much love, 

S

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Here are some blog posts about them, which I've written over the years:

American frontier: ongoing vision of realizing the Oregon trail, Reed College

http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2016/06/american-frontier-ongoing-vision-of.html

Pinus ponderosa: Realized visions ... The realized dream of Oregon trail at Wisdom Creek Ranch, Harbin Hot Springs' New Planned Landscape as a vision, * How might both Wisdom Creek Ranch as tree farm and Harbin Hot Springs as hippie hot springs' retreat center emerge as part of a virtual earth such as in Google Street View with time slider?, All of this would be part of a virtual classroom in a virtual earth with time slider and planned in all languages at WUaS, and also for STEM ethno-wiki-virtual-world-graphy, and sustainable tree farm planning, for example, in the case of Wisdom Creek Ranch, Virtual Worlds wiki subject at WUaS for for idea sharing about this ...

http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2016/06/pinus-ponderosa-realized-visions.html

Water resources: Brown family genealogy conversation, A few questions about my Aunt Mary Chadbourne Brown for me? 1. Do you know if her son is still living? 2. Do you know if he might have any photos he would be willing to share of her as a young woman?

http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2016/08/water-resources-brown-family-genealogy.html

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Catherine Creek, OR: Forests and grasslands, Glistening June day, Walking in Oregon dream

Catherine Creek, OR: Forests and grasslands, Glistening June day, Walking in Oregon dream

Forests and grasslands,
glistening June day,
I walk in this Oregon dream.

Ted and Mary shaped this wonder,
opening the way here,
Thanks to sustainable timbering.

Up past Catherine Creek,
on home land a gem,
a human made heaven.

http://scott-macleod.blogspot.com/2014/06/catherine-creek-or-forests-and.html

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_succession

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Ecological_succession

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