Sarah Helmick State Park

Sarah Helmick State Park is a state park located in Polk County, Oregon, close to Monmouth and Independence, Oregon, on the Luckiamute River. Various sources refer to it as either a "state park" or a "state recreation area", and I am not sure of the difference.

The park is small, about 30 acres, and is located along the banks of the Luckiamute River, a few miles from where it reaches the Willamette at Luckiamute Landing State Natural Area. It is located on a side road, a half mile from the main highway. It has the normal park amenities that you could expect: restrooms, picnic tables, a rough trail down to the river...and not much else. This is a 30 acre park outside of a small town that might be good for a family picnic or teenage shenanigans.

Sarah Helmick State Park is notable for two things---it was the first park in the Oregon State Park system. In 1922, Sarah Helmick, a settler, gave a donation of a six acre parcel of land, which was the original park, which was later joined by other donations. At the time, it was the first state park, in a time when automobile travel from Monmouth/Independence, a few miles away, would have been a big deal. Today, of course, Oregonians have a wide choice of spectacular parks, including National Parks like Crater Lake and State Parks, like Silver Creek Falls State Park, and the small Sarah Helmick State Park, much smaller than a city park (such as, for example) Minto-Brown Island Park in Salem lies out of the way, only visited by locals. I only came across it becase, as a bicyclist, the side road was a more pleasant route than the main highway. It also shows the haphazard growth of parks and natural areas in Oregon. As I mentioned previously, despite the natural beauty and environmental importance of the Willamette Valley, relatively little of it is protected as part of a park system. This 30 acre parcel along the Luckiamute is a rarity in the Willamette Valley, and it was only protected by the chance bequest in a settler's will. Oregon's preservations of natural areas were put together out of patchwork, not as part of a masterplan.

I also find it somewhat melancholy that this small park is probably not known by most of the thousands of people who drive between Monmouth and Independence, and Corvallis, every day. Just a thousand feet from the highway, there is probably no reason for most people to know it is there. But when I think about even a small park, I think of how it can be eternity in an hour, how many little memories of family picnics or first kisses or stoned teenage wonder might have happened there, in a little niche that people can just drive by, without noticing.