Mountain-Man Rendezvous Revisits Early-1800S Northwest

OAKRIDGE, Ore. - Frog Holler is only a 30-minute hike from the parking lot, or a 20-minute paddle by canoe. But it's a journey that takes you back a century and a half.

Don't bother looking for Frog Holler on a map. It's an event, not a place.

Teepees, tents and simple canvas lean-to shelters suddenly appear. Bearded men in buckskins and moccasins gather around a campfire, examining a beaver pelt. A woman sits in front of a teepee, items she wants to trade spread out before her on a blanket.

At the edge of the camp a dozen men, each carrying a long rifle and wearing a tomahawk on his belt, filter into the woods, single file.

Welcome to the 24th annual Frog Holler, a mountain-man rendezvous hosted by the Fort Umpqua Muzzleloaders Club of Springfield, Ore.

Welcome, that is, as long as you are willing to join club members and their guests in stepping back in time. Willing to shed your 20th-century trappings and don wool pants with a double-button-drop front, a hand-stitched cotton shirt and moccasins, with maybe a string of trade beads around your neck for good measure.

"We ask visitors to change down so they fit in and blend into the atmosphere of what we're doing," said a man called Silvertip, the "booshway" or head man at this "rondy."

Back in town, he's Dick Salsbury, a surgical nurse. Out here, he's Silvertip.

The period costume regimen is followed faithfully for the most part. Many of the men are wearing modern eyeglasses, but Silvertip

bought some 19th-century glasses and had prescription lenses put in them.

"Medical devices like glasses are all perfectly legal, but the general rule of thumb is if it can be seen from outside your shelter, it needs to fit within the general time period," Salsbury said. "What we're doing is trying to re-create an atmosphere that goes with the 1820s to 1840s."

That's when fur-trapping was at its peak in the Northwest.

It's also the era when flintlock rifles were giving way to percussion cap muzzleloaders. And much of the modern mountain-man phenomena can be traced to hunters and other shooting buffs who became fascinated with black-powder weapons.

The modern rendezvous is part shooting competition, part primitive camping, part costume party and part history lesson.

There are countless mountain-man rendezvous events held throughout the country. Frog Holler, one of about a dozen put on each year in Oregon, is among the best, the regulars say.

"The only way you can get in here is to walk or canoe in," Salsbury said. "That's one of the unique factors that attract people to Frog Holler. Most rendezvous you go to, you drive up and drop your gear off."

Also, most rendezvous run two or three days. Frog Holler officially is five, but many come early or stay late. As many as 400 people have attended Frog Holler in the past, although the number has been closer to 100 in recent years. A big crowd is expected next spring, for the 25th anniversary celebration.

There was more to a rondy, however, than trading beaver for beans, flour and beads.

"It was a forum for a party," Salsbury said. "These men had been out in the woods pretty much for a year by themselves, and rendezvous was a chance for them to come in and let off steam and socialize a bit. It was an eight-, 10-, 12-day wild party."

Frog Holler has seen its share of "hootin' and hollerin' and stayin' up all night," Salsbury said, but that's not where its name comes from. "We call it Frog Holler, quite frankly, because of all the chirping that goes on by the tree frogs and ground frogs . . . when the weather's warm, the noise can be just deafening."

Surprisingly, the noise from a shooting competition that is under way not far from the camp cannot be heard there.

Scattered along a half-mile section of trail are colored ribbons, each marking a shooting station. Metal "clanger" targets of various sizes and shapes are placed back in the woods at various distances.

Each man gets one shot at each target, and scores a point if it clangs. The final target is a "knife and hawk block," a chunk of wood, half of which has been painted red. The idea is to toss a knife in one section of the target and a tomahawk in the other.

A scorekeeper tallies the points and, at the end of the day, the shooter with the most points wins. There are separate competitions for men, women and youngsters. There is also a pistol range and an entire course of knife, tomahawk and spear targets.

People come to rendezvous for different reasons, Silvertip said. Some mostly for the shooting competitions, some for the primitive camping experience and some to socialize.

"I personally really enjoy the living history aspect of it," he said. "I enjoy sitting down with some of the people who have been doing this for 25 years and learning more . . . having them show me how to use my flint and steel better, or show me how to shoot a flintlock."