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North Powder is located in the extreme southeast corner of Union County on the north bank of the North Powder River. A historic marker near the community marks the spot where, in the winter of 1811-12, Marie Dorian gave birth to the first child with white blood born west of the Rockies. Dorian, an Iowa Indian and wife of a French trapper, was accompanying the Wilson-Price Hunt Expedition. A stage station was established at the site in 1862 as a result of the migration to the Powder River mines. The post office was established in 1866.
The community of North Powder was incorporated in 1902. By that time there were twelve businesses, three churches, a local school and a newspaper called the Powder Valley Echo. For more than forty years, there was an ice plant in North Powder that harvested from 8,000 to 15,000 tons of ice from an artificial lake each winter. Until it burned in 1937, the ice plant served the needs of the Pacific Fruit and Express Company, providing ice for the rail cars that shipped their products to market.
Major industries in North Powder are timber and agriculture. The community is at the heart of a recreational area that includes Pilcher Creek Reservoir, Wolf Creek Reservoir, and Thief Valley Reservoir, where Rainbow Trout measure up to eighteen inches. Camping, skiing and snowmobiling abound, and the Anthony Lakes Ski Resort is only nineteen miles into the Elkhorn Ridge of the Blue Mountains.
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Winter sports in nearby Anthony Lakes Mountain Resort
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