By Patrick Lair
LEBANON - Even though it looks dilapidated and weather-beaten, the old Scroggins Feed and Seed Warehouse next to the Santiam Travel Depot in Lebanon is a landmark worthy of preservation, locals say.
The three-story structure with a jutting tower, now vacant save for pigeons, also houses two wooden refrigerator railroad cars believed to be nearly 100 years old.
A group led by residents Kate Dimon and Heather Clark is now applying for 501(c) 3 status and trying to figure out just what it will take to restore the building and cars.
The effort is complicated by the fact that Linn County owns the building while Union Pacific Railroad owns the land it sits on.
"We don't know what exactly the building can be used for, but we know it must be preserved. Someone who comes along after I'm gone will want to know what happened in the 1880s," said Dimon, an architect by training, who's previously helped preserve 37 buildings in the western U.S.
The building, which sits on concrete slab foundations, is constructed of 13-by-13 rough hewn fir beams and covered with tongue-and-groove siding. It contains a 1920s seed cleaner, connected by chutes to various seed bins.
Built in 1881, the structure was used as a seed warehouse for more than a century before Linn County took possession through tax foreclosure in 2001.
In 1937, the two wooden Pacific Fruit Express railroad cars were moved into an adjoining structure to refrigerate dressed turkeys, according to contemporary accounts.
The building's fate recently came into question when the metal roofing panels, peeling and falling off in many places, raised safety concerns among neighbors.
The railroad denied the county access to repair the building, instead demanding the county either enter a lease for $6,000 per year or tear the building down.
Dimon is hoping it doesn't come to that and has planned a trip to Omaha, Neb., to speak with UP officials in person.
Ideally, she said, the railroad would grant permission for the community to restore the old warehouse to its original character to remain as a landmark.
Renovations would likely include removing the exterior structure, added at a later time, which houses the cars. The structure's handsawed rafters could be used to reconstruct a porch similar to one present in early photos of the building.
Half the original Scroggins Warehouse sign is still painted on a portion of the wall, preserved beneath an add-on roof, and the colors could be duplicated to refinish it, she said.
New exterior siding would be needed in places and the tin sheets nailed onto rafters would need to be replaced by a more permanent roof.
Despite the laundry list of repairs, Dimon said that from her experience the building is in remarkably good shape.
"Some of the old buildings people try to restore are in appalling condition, but this one is just terrific," she said.
The railroad cars are a separate but parallel issue, Clark said.
Clark, a former Southern Pacific brakeman and conductor, is hoping to find somewhere to store the old cars while they can be refinished.
Made of finely hewn fir, with walls six inches thick, the two "reefers" sit inches from each other and the structural beams of the building around them. Their tight position presents a challenge to getting them out.
The cars were moved over from Albany on flatbed trailers 70 years ago, and Clark is searching for photos anyone may have of the operation, which must have required the trucks to back in across Sherman Street.
"A lot of grease was used to get them in, I'm sure," she said.
Built in 1910 and 1913 respectively, the two cars are probably some of the best preserved examples in the country of the wooden refrigerators which would later be made obsolete by their steel successors, she said.
The cars retain much of the original iron fittings and hardware.
Efforts to save the cars are intensified by news that the Southern California Chapter of the Railway and Locomotive Historical Society now wants them for a museum at the Los Angeles County Fairgrounds in Pomona. Chairperson Loren Martens recently contacted the newspaper and the county about their availability.
To help raise money, the Lebanon group will soon sell T-shirts featuring an original photo of the mill. The photo was purchased by former Lebanon Mayor Scott Simpson, who is active in the renovation effort.
The group also is soliciting the assistance of local industries and looking for public input or help of any kind.
"We'd like to see people just come and help," Dimon said.
The group meets at 7 p.m. every Thursday at 868 South Main St. in downtown Lebanon.
Patrick Lair can be reached at 258-6441 or patrick.lair@lee.net