Tillamook City

Tillamook County, Oregon

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Tillamook City Hall is located at 210 Laurel Avenue, Tillamook, OR 97141.
Phone: 503‑842‑3445.

Neighborhoods

Beginnings [1]

In its early years, Tillamook, the first community to be settled in the county, bore the names Lincoln and Hoquarton, the latter believed to be a Native American Indian name meaning "the landing." From the "K'Elamuck" Tribe, also known as the "Elam" Tribe, the City's name was eventually changed to Tillamook, a derivative of the K'Elamuck Native American Indian word translating to "land of many waters."

View of Tillamook looking west in 1900's The first white settler in the vicinity was Joseph Champion, who came in 1851 and made his home in a hollow spruce tree he called his "castle." Within months other settlers came—all bachelors.

Tillamook became an incorporated city in 1891. The first County Courthouse and City Hall were erected in the early 1890s. Both the City Hall and County Courthouse have been relocated since that time. By 1920, the City of Tillamook had a growing population of 1,964 residents.

The City of Tillamook is located in the northwest part of Oregon near the Pacific Ocean. The City is approximately 70 miles west of Portland and an equal distance south of Astoria. Within the surrounding Tillamook City area are the floodplains and lower reaches of the Wilson, Trask, and Tillamook Rivers; the rich agricultural lowlands; and the forested foothills of the Coast Range with an opening to Tillamook Bay to the northwest.

The climate of the Tillamook area is typical of western Oregon with mild winters and moderate summers. As in other coastal areas, precipitation is heavy, over 90 inches per year, with about 70 percent occurring in November through March. Dairy fields, floodplains and forest lands surround the City's Urban Growth Boundary. The general climate characteristics also allow the area to participate in the growing attraction of the recreation and tourist industry to the beauties of the Oregon coast.

Today, Tillamook's City Hall is located at 210 Laurel and occupies the former Tillamook Post Office, which moved to a new facility on First Street in 1986. The building is listed on the National Register of Historical Places. It opened as a post office in 1925. In 1943, as part of a national public works program, the U.S. Treasury Department commissioned native Tillamook resident Lucia Wiley to paint a mural on one inside wall of the building. It is entitled "The Landing of Captain Robert Gray in 1788."

  1. City of Tillamook, OR, Comprehensive Plan, 2012, www.tillamookor.gov, accessed January, 2014.

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