The area around the ranger station, which had burned in the devastating 1902 Yacolt Fire, was one of the first timber sales on National Forest land. With the burned timber removed, a nursery was built, and the first seedlings were sown in 1910.  Wind River Nursery grew to be one of the largest federal tree nurseries in the United States. Hundreds of millions of tree seedlings grown here were planted in national forests across Oregon and Washington. Members of many local families worked at the nursery over the decades.

But in the late 1990s, the Forest Service closed the nursery and moved most of the ranger station staff to the nearby Mt. Adams Ranger District at Trout Lake. The previously bustling nursery fields, residences and work buildings suddenly went quiet. Part of the property was transferred to Skamania County to help compensate for the economic losses. But without a core business activity to help pay for maintenance of the aging buildings, many are now in disrepair. In 2020, a non-profit named Wind River Trust was formed to work with both Skamania County and the Forest Service on a restoration effort. If you’d like to get involved, we’d love to hear from you. Click on the link below to contact us about volunteer opporunities. If you would prefer to support the effort by donating, just click the Donate Now button at the top of the page!