Oregon150

by Tom Bull
Crooked River Ranch
Oregon

Our family lived in Condon, Oregon, the county seat of Gilliam County when I was born, July 25, 1938. My parents went to Spokane, WA, where my mother was raised, to have me but came back to Condon a week later.

My Dad, Hollis Bull, was Manager of Condon Grain Growers Co-op from 1936 to 1952, during the time when the large grain elevators on the east side of town were built. Hollis served on the city council and belonged to other civic organizations when he and Esther lived in Condon. He resigned his position and we moved to Portland when I was 14 years old. My brother Jack was two years and nine months younger than me when we moved. Hollis worked for Continental Grain Co. in Portland until he retired in 1971. Hollis and Esther moved to King City OR after Dad retired. He passed away in 1976, Esther passed away in 1986. They are buried at Finleys in Portland.

Hollis Bull was raised in Moro, Oregon and was the only child of Mack Bull and Lila Elliott Bull. He was born June 19, 1906, and graduated from Oregon State College in 1928, with a degree in Agriculture. He married Esther Blomquist on his 24th birthday in 1930. They had met in Walla Walla, WA and lived in Walla Walla, Pendleton, Lexington, Wallowa, and Condon before moving on to Portland. Esther was an elementary school teacher and Hollis worked for Kerr, Gifford Grain Co. at the time. When they drove up the highway across Shutler Flat from Arlington they encountered a gigantic dust storm, making them wonder what they had gotten themselves into.

Mack Bull was the youngest child of M. P. Bull, the founder in 1875 of the East Oregonian newspaper in Pendleton. He was born in Pendleton on July 12, 1870 and died in Portland at age 90 after having lived in Moro all of his adult life, where he was City Marshal, confectionary owner, and manager of the Wasco Warehouse and Milling Co. He was known as a person that was somewhat of a natural veterinarian who was very good with horses. Mack had been orphaned at age 11, and lived in White Salmon, WA as well as some time spent in the Southwest as a “buckaroo”, ending up with some families in the Sherman County area in his late teens.

M.P. Bull was admitted to the Oregon State Bar in 1866, and served as a notary in Baker about that time. He moved back to Portland and was the editor of a paper known as the Portland Daily Commercial which lasted around a year, going the way of some other small papers of the time. After moving back to Pendleton he moved on to La Grande where he helped found the La Grande Observer. He went back to Portland and served as a Justice of the Peace for the Washington District of Oregon. He died in about 1882. We have no history on how our great grandparents on the Bull side came to Oregon, but we keep searching, and hope to find more out as time goes on. It is said that our grandfather Mack did duty as a “printer’s devil” inking presses when he was around 9 or 10 years old. Other sons in our grandfather’s family were also in the newspaper business, Munson (Muncie) purchased the East Oregonian from his father when the elder Bull moved to Portland. The East Oregonian was eventually purchased by C. S. (Sam) Jackson who started the Oregon Journal in Portland. Carlton was the editor of a paper in New Mexico, and his daughter marred W.J. Hooten, the editor of the El Paso Times in the forties and fifties of the last century.

Our grandmother, Ruby Delilah (Lila) Elliott was born in Philomath, OR, March 5, 1884. There were a number of brothers and sisters in her family that eventually moved to Moro in Sherman County where Lila married Mack Bull on November 24, 1904. Her mother’s family name was Thompson, of which there are quite a number by that name in Sherman County.

Josh Elliott, our maternal great grandfather homesteaded in the Lonerock area East of Moro on the breaks of the John Day River. The Bull Family still owns the ranch now known as the H.M. Bull Ranch Partnership LLC. Mack Bull purchased the land from the Elliott heirs in the 1930’s and with some other land created our present ranch. It was farmed by Rich Bruckert from that time until the mid 1960’s when Kenneth Hattrup took over. Our present farmer, Marvin Thompson (no relation) raises wheat on the half that is tillable land. We are anticipating electricity generating windmills in the next few years as part of the Golden Hills Power Project that has been in the news lately. Both our grandparents and great grandparents are buried in the family plot at the Moro cemetery.

After the move to Portland by the present generation of our family, Tom started high school at Washington High School in Portland, where he met his wife Linda (Eefsen) Bull. They were married on July 13, 1957. They had graduated from Washington in 1956. Tom was in the US Navy at the time and was stationed on the USS Bremerton, a heavy cruiser from 1957-1960 where he was an Electronic Technician. Tom and Linda have two sons, Jim born in 1959 who lives in Redmond where he runs his own business, Central Oregon Sound and Security, LLC, which is an offshoot of his parents’ business, Lake Electronic Contractors, Inc. Tom and Linda’s younger son owns Lake Electronic Contractors, Inc. with his father. Scott and his wife Cindy live in Sherwood. Lake Electronics started in Lake Grove in 1966. Tom and Linda have no grandchildren. Linda’s uncle, Walter Eefsen was a pilot for United Airlines from the beginning and landed the first airplane at the present Portland Airport when it opened for business. Tom and Linda moved to Redmond from Lake Grove in 1996, and now live on five acres at Crooked River Ranch. They celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2007.

Jack Bull, Hollis and Esther’s younger son was in the first graduating class (1959) at James Madison High School in Portland. Jack was born in The Dalles, OR April 30, 1941. He graduated as a registered pharmacist from Oregon State University in 1965 and works as the relief Pharmacist for Bi Mart traveling around Oregon and Washington to the various stores. He was married to Joan Virginia (Gibson) Bull on August 17, 1963. Joan graduated from OSU a year prior to Jack with a degree in Home Economics. They have two children, Jerry Bull and Julie Gebhardt. Jack and Joan have 5 grandchildren. They all live in Salem.

Tom and Jack both spent their summers during high school back in Condon at the Sid Seale ranch working in the wheat harvest. Matthew, Mack, and Hollis were members of the Masonic Fraternity, Mack and Hollis were Masters of their lodges. Tom and Jack are Masons as well, Tom was Master of his Lodge in 1986. Tom will be President of the Redmond Rotary Club in 2009-2010.

It is an extreme pleasure to be known as a “Native Oregonian” and to have the privilege to tell the story of our family from the late 1800s to present. One of the thrills of Tom’s life was to be at the 1959 Rose Festival on his Navy ship.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO OUR WONDERFUL STATE!