KINGS VALLEY — Longtime Kings Valley resident Kevin Collins recalls being in Mother’s Mattress Factory, a popular bar and music venue in Corvallis, roughly 45 years ago when he first heard about the property where he now lives.
Interested in living in a rural setting, he took a look at it with Ron Anderson.
“So we came up here and Ron and I, we purchased the property,” Collins said this past Sunday at Kings Valley Community Hall, site of a celebration marking the community’s 170th anniversary. “I grew up on the East Coast just outside of Washington, D.C., in Chevy Chase, Maryland, and there’s just nothing like this. I couldn’t live back there — that’s why I came out here.”
Anderson can’t imagine living anywhere else.
“We’ve been here for a long time and I’m not sure I know much about a different lifestyle,” Anderson said. “It is nice to have the openness and not have a neighbor right next to you. It’s kind of hard for me to conceive if you lived in town and you had houses right next to you — I’m not quite sure how that would feel.”
Kings Valley’s 170th anniversary is based on the establishment of a post office in 1855. There were settlers living in the region prior to that year, most notably Nahum King and his land claim in 1846.
The celebration featured a potluck, music by the Root Vegetables and recognition of Kings Valley’s six soldiers that were lost in World War II — a plaque in their memory hangs on the wall in the building’s main room (for more on those soldiers, see this weekend’s Three Things column).
Collins and Anderson built their houses on land once owned by Emery Moore, a longtime rancher whose name will be well-known to longtime residents. In fact, it was Moore who deeded the Kings Valley Church to the nonprofit organization that now oversees the building — now known as Kings Valley Community Hall.
“The only downside is you sort of have to plan ahead on your groceries and your shopping and so forth,” Anderson said.
Collins, who once served on the Philomath School Board, has always enjoyed being involved in the community.
“I help out at the school some, I help out here some, wherever I can,” he said. “The people here did a lot of hard work to get this thing together.”
Linda Samuels, who grew up in Corvallis, has also lived in Kings Valley for 40-some years. And she loves it.
“We live up on the hill in the trees and it’s just being out in the country with no one around except for critters,” Samuels said. “Coming to a place like this with neighbors that you can count on.”
The 170th anniversary celebration seemed to have a fairly impressive attendance with an estimated 75-100 people showing up at the historic building on the corner of Maxfield Creek Road and Kings Valley Highway.
“There’s a lot of people here I don’t know,” Samuels said. “And a lot that I know I haven’t seen for a while, so that’s exciting.”
Pat Malone, a tree farmer who serves as a Benton County commissioner, also made his way to the community celebration. He’s lived in the community since January 1978.
“My wife’s folks owned the property across the street here and encouraged us to come out,” he said. “There were some Christmas trees already planted but there was the better part of 10 acres that was vacant and that’s where we started.”
Malone reminisced about the historic Kings Valley Community Hall and back when he helped establish the Hoskins-Kings Valley Rural Fire Protection District. In fact, he served as the district’s first fire chief.
Samuels was happy to see the turnout for Sunday’s event. Such events used to draw good crowds back in the day but she said that kind of faded over the years.
“We’re trying to bring that back,” she said. “The last few events we’ve had here, we’ve had people turn up like this. It’s pretty exciting.”
