Death claims Paul Schurman at age 86
Paul Schurman, who established Paul Schurman Machine in Ridgefield in 1957 and was well known for his skill in designing and manufacturing a wide range of machinery, died Jan. 31, 2007, at home in Ridgefield.
Schurman is remembered for his ability to repair and manufacture virtually any mechanical item, from large tractors and threshers to pocket watches and weed eaters. He is especially remembered for his strong beliefs in hard work, honesty and morality.
Paul Eugene Schurman was born Nov. 29, 1920, in Portland, to Frank and Evangeline (Eckert) Schurman. He grew up with a brother and two sisters on a La Center farm where he helped with farm work. He graduated from La Center High School in 1938.
Schurman’s reputation for being able to fix mechanical things started when he was in school. When the city of La Center had trouble with a well and couldn’t fix the pump, they called on Schurman, a high school student, to do what a Portland expert could not--fix the pump. And so began his legend of being able to repair anything. His family and former employees remember his phrase: “Well, someone built it, you can figure out how to fix it.”
In 1940, Schurman went to work for Premier Gear in Portland, making parts for engines for Liberty Ships used in World War II. Officials decided he was needed in that job rather than serving in the military and was deferred.
He acquired a 1941 Packard that had been damaged in a fire and restored it to new condition. In later years, he bought collector cars, including a Crosley, a 1937 Studebaker and a 1922 Cadillac, but he was not a person to pursue fancy automobiles.
In 1940, he had a date with a woman who was not home when he arrived to pick her up, but her roommate was there. The roommate, Edith Hatfield, became his wife in 1941. The couple moved to Portland where Schurman continued to work for Premier Gear. The couple’s first two children, Alan and Frank, were born during this period.
In 1945, the family moved to a farm near Duluth in Ridgefield and Schurman went to work for his brother, Clyde, who had established a machine shop in Woodland. That company made machinery for loggers, including devices to drag, buck and yard logs. The “Log Boss” was in their line of products.
The company manufactured 300 edger machines for saw mills in four years, a production feat.
In 1957, Schurman left his brother’s business and established his own machine shop at his Ridgefield farm. He designed and built well drilling machinery, special equipment to dig flower bulbs, and machines for Pacific Wood Treating in Ridgefield. The company also made components for machines completed at Clyde Schurman’s shop in Woodland.
Paul Schurman was skilled in designing equipment for specific uses.
“That was my dad’s specialty,” said son Alan Schurman--”figuring out specialty stuff.”
Son Frank Schurman also remembers his father’s ability to understand engineering and machines. “He was a talented welder,” said Frank Schurman of his father. “He studied all the time. He was very sharp at machinery. He was second to none when it came to understanding machinery.”
Frank began working for his father at about age 12.
In Ridgefield, the Schurmans had three more children, son Dale, and daughters Nancy and Lisa. All five children grew up in Ridgefield and attended Ridgefield schools. In the 1940s and 1950s, Schurman served on the Pioneer School District board of directors.
Daughter Lisa remembers that the family went to Fred’s Hamburger Stand in Duluth on Friday nights for a hamburger and a chocolate shake. Other than at Fred’s, the family did not eat out much. Schurman worked six days a week and employed as many as 25 people at one time. Productivity was important to him.
Alan Schurman took over management of the business about 1977 and ran it for nearly 30 years. Paul Schurman Machine is now in the hands of Matt and Denise Houghton, Alan Schurman’s daughter and son-in-law.
But throughout the years, Paul Schurman not only lived next door to the business, but was involved in business operations, even after turning it over to Alan and then Matt Houghton.
Having grown up around steam equipment, Paul Schurman collected steam machinery and at one time had 35 steam tractors in his yard, along with threshing machines and other equipment. He took some equipment to the Clark County Fair. He also collected watches and clocks and enjoyed repairing them, a hobby he began early in life.
In later years, Schurman went to flea markets and brought home numerous tool boxes, weed eaters, lawn mowers, and “anything he could get for $1,” said Alan Schurman.
Edith Schurman died in 1987. That same year, Paul Schurman married Susan Wells Miller, and the couple enjoyed traveling by motor home around the country. They visited Florida four times. Many of their trips were planned to coincide with machinery shows in various cities, and visits to machinery museums.
Schurman never smoked or drank alcohol. He did not attend church even though his wife and children did. Schurman enjoyed radio programs, and later television, even though the family did not have a television set until the 1960s. He especially enjoyed Jeopardy and other shows that challenged thinking, along with history programs and documentaries. He was an avid reader.
Schurman wore hats during his life, beginning with a felt dress-type hat, then a plastic hat of the same shape, and finally baseball caps. He was generally a healthy person most of his life, and his death was unexpected.
Paul and Susan Schurman visited Seaside, OR the weekend before his death, and walked the beach on Monday. He did not wake up on Wednesday, dying in his sleep.
Schurman was preceded in death by daughter Nancy Anne in 2005, brother Clyde Schurman in December 2006, and sister Helen Barclay in 1997. Survivors include widow Susan Schurman, at home in Ridgefield, sons Alan Schurman and Dale Schurman, both of Ridgefield, and Frank Schurman of Oregon, daughter Lisa Mooers of Skamokawa, sister Florence Thompson of Oregon, step-son Keith Miller of Battle Ground, step-daughter Misty Smith of Battle Ground, 16 grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.
Services were held Feb. 4 at Memorial Gardens Funeral Chapel, Vancouver, with vault interment at Evergreen Memorial Gardens Cemetery.

Heart shape gets attention
It’s not just around Valentine’s Day when passers-by stop to inquire about the heart-shaped scab clearly visible in a walnut tree where a branch used to be.
Sharon and Dave Carter have lived on the Ridgefield property for nine years and, during that time, some 18-24 people have knocked on his door to ask permission to photograph the unusual but perfectly shaped symbol. The arrival of a photographer from The Reflector last week was just another in the line of curious people.
Pictures of the heart have appeared in a calendar and in a nature magazine, said the Carters.
The property at 299 S 65th Ave., Ridgefield, just south of the Ridgefield Junction with I-5 on the east side of the freeway, was once a farm with many walnut trees and has been in Sharon’s extended family since the late 1800s.
Brothers George Jr., Walter and Wilbur Tobey helped their mother Olive Tobey maintain and farm the land. Wilbur and Leta (Horn) Tobey’s daughter Goldie married Albert Koethe, and the couple lived on the farm for many years. Their son Gerald and his wife Grayce (Hill) purchased part of the farm south of the farm house and the legacy continued.
Sharon grew up on the property with her siblings, Vanessa, Gayle and David, all children of Gerald and Grayce. Sharon remembers picking walnuts in her youth and is glad to have the chance to continue. From what she remembers being told, the farm house was built in the 1920s. Gerald and Grayce finished building their home in 1962. A developer, who is also a relative, now owns all the farm the property.
An L-shaped row of ten walnuts trees remain, with the “heart tree” leading the way. The trees were believed to have been planted in the 1920s by the Tobey clan.
It may have been the Columbus Day Storm in 1962, suggested the Carters, or an ice storm, when the trees suffered damage. At some point, a large branch fell from the tree nearest to what is now 65th Ave. The damaged branch was apparently then cut off and, over the years, a collar grew around the wound. That collar forms a perfect heart shape.
Over the years the family sold walnuts to people driving by. The Carters continue to harvest and sell the walnuts in the fall. Colder winter weather generally produces more walnuts, they said.
The Carters described the trees as black walnut because of the color of the interior wood, but the trees produce a standard English walnut which itself has a somewhat heart-shaped appearance. Sharon Carter believes that the trees are a graft of English Walnut onto a black walnut base.

Ridgefield voters rally for schools
Bill Myers
staff reporter
Voters in the Ridgefield School District rallied for schools in a Feb. 6 special election with overwhelming support of a maintenance and operations levy.
About 47 percent of the 6,992 registered voters in the Ridgefield School District cast ballots in the election. More than 68 percent supported the replacement levy that will deliver more than $3 million in annual property tax collections to the District in 2008, 2009 and 2010.
Passage of the measure required approval by 60 percent of voters.
Solid support of maintenance and operations levies is not unusual in the Ridgefield School District where student scores on state tests usually rank at or near the top of Clark County schools. About the same percentage of District voters delivered a similar landslide in a 2004 special replacement levy election. The last levy failure occurred 12 years ago.
School officials were happy to see the support.
Acting District superintendent John Simpson said he is delighted with the result, and credits efforts of citizens and business owners who devoted time and energy to the election. He said levy funds will pay about 19 percent of maintenance and operation costs in the District. State and federal funds pay about 81 percent. Levy funds are also used for athletic, music and other extra-curricular programs.
The levy will cost property owners an estimated $1.50 per $1,000 of assessed valuation. Officials had predicted the levy would cost $1.86 per $1,000 of assessed value, but the rate is now estimated to be lower because of rising property valuations.
Increases in property valuations reduce the levy rate because the District sets a fixed amount for total dollars needed yearly for each year of the levy period. The District set new levy collections at $3.1 million in 2008, $3.4 million in 2009 and $3.6 million in 2010. As property values climb, the rate of collection per $1,000 needed from each property owner to meet the levy obligation declines.
As school officials celebrate the passage of the levy, they wonder how they will meet another challenge.
Simpson said student growth will increase the need for more and safer school space.
Since approving a measure in 2004 to fund a land purchase for a new high school, District voters have twice rejected bond measures to fund construction of a new high school and other improvements.
Simpson said it is possible that members of the levy committee, Citizens for Ridgefield Schools, will continue to operate at less intensity as a key link to the District board members. The committee, about 40 members strong, could be very helpful in a bond election, he said.
Simpson said the District might look at how a district foundation might play a role in fund raising and communications. “We also need to see how we can keep our District slogan, “Commit to Excellence” alive, he said.

BG levy gets nod
Brandy Slagle
Staff reporter
Battle Ground School District officials are celebrating the passage of an maintenance and operational levy, which was approved by voters in the Feb. 6 election.
The levy underwent extensive revisions after failing twice in previous elections. The levy’s second failure last May lost approval by a slim margin.
About 50 percent of the 31,000 voters in the Battle Ground School District voted in the election. Of those voters, 61.45 percent of voters supported the levy, which will raise $11.8 million in the first year, $12.8 million in 2009 and $13.7 million in 2010.
Passage of the levy requires a 60 percent approval rate.
The official final results will not be available until Feb. 21.
However, Battle Ground Superintendant Shonny Bria said she anticipates the number of positive votes will climb in the next few days.
“We are so very grateful and thankful that the community has chosen to care for our children,” she said. “They are our future.”
The levy funds about 13 percent of the overall school district budget. Projects pending on levy funding include the reinstatement of about 80 teaching positions and hiring assistant principals, plus some after-school tutoring and sports programs.
Bria said it is important for people to realize that the levy results won’t fully materialize for another full school year. Taxes will not be collected on the levy until 2008, which means the district will be funding another half-levy budget in the 2007/08 school year..
“We are still operating with no levy funds for this year (2007),” she said. “We are going to have to prioritize what the essential programs are and infuse half of the levy into the district first. The board will have to examine and vote on what those programs are.”
Battle Ground school board member Richard Kent said planning the next budget will be a struggle.
“Educating our children is our number one priority,” he said. “We want to prepare the students to be active, productive citizens. We want to provide services to all of our kids at all levels in the district.”
Bria also said that voters should be assured that the new Daybreak campus will open on schedule this fall, followed by the eastside K-8 schools in 2008.
Kent said staffing those schools will be exciting for the district.
“Maybe we can even bring some of our teachers back to the district that we have lost,” he said.
The levy will cost taxpayers an estimated $1.77 per $1,000 of assessed valuation during the three-year period.
Kelly O’Brien, public information officer for the district, said that millage rate could fluctuate, but the school board was conservative when estimating 8 percent of growth in the district.
“The board wanted to make sure when they set the $1.77 rate that it would not exceed that estimate,” she said.
O’Brien said the rate could come in at less than $1.77. In 2003, she said, a levy was approved with an estimated $2.02 millage rate. In the first year it actually totaled $1.96 per $1,000 assessed valuation. It continued to drop over the three year period until it came to $1.63 in 2006.
Carrie O’Donnell, co-chair of the Citizens for Better Schools, said her organization has been strongly campaigning for levy approval.
Citizens for Better Schools is an independent political action group that is not a part of the school district. Members strive to ensure children are getting the best education possible, she said.
“This has been a positive campaign from the beginning to the end,” she said. “Our slogan was ‘We believe in Battle Ground Schools.’ It’s not just for the betterment of my children or our children, but for all children.”
O’Donnell said members focused on making sure people who were voting for the levy were motivated to show up on election day.
“We knew on Tuesday night, without looking at the unofficial final vote, that it would pass with the number of yes votes that we already had,” she said. “Historically, that is what happens in this area.”
School officials said the levy was highly collaborative with the community both in planning and throughout the campaign. Citizens participated in focus groups and took surveys. Volunteers made hundreds of phone calls, said O’Brien.
Perhaps the most poignant example of community participation, said O’Brien, was the student-led march supporting levy passage.
“Students demonstrated in that march that they were committed to their own education, which gives the community a powerful message,” she said.
Bria said now that the levy has passed people can inspect and track its progress anytime.
“As far as I know we are the only school district in the area that separates our levy funds from our operational budget so people can see where their money is being spent to the penny,” she said.
O’Brien said that this levy passage was proof that “we have a school board and superintendant that listens and a community that cares about kids.”

Safety, traffic level discussed at Wal-Mart hearing
Alice Perry Linker
staff reporter
There was standing room only and the crowd of more than 65 spilled out into the hall when a hearings officer opened the appeal to consider the future of Wal-Mart in Woodland.
Many in the crowd were there on Feb. 9 to testify in opposition to two proposed round-abouts planned to control traffic leaving I-5 to go to the superstore. Woodlanders Against the Wal appealed the city’s decision to accept the State Environmental Policy Act’s statement of non-significance and the Wal-Mart site plan.
None who testified in opposition to the round-abouts spoke in opposition to the existence of the store itself, but they asked that a different type of traffic controller be used at the entrance to the city’s industrial area. One or two people suggested that a different site be found, and others pointed out that a high school will sit in the middle of the mix of industrial and commercial operations.
Hearings officer Irv Berteig announced that the public record will remain open until Feb. 28, and he will make a decision by March 12.
The Woodland group was represented by Vancouver attorney John Karpinski. Wal-Mart attorneys were Jack McCollough and Courtney Flores.
As expected, David Ripp, executive director of the Port of Woodland, spoke in opposition to the round-about planned immediately east of the I-5 exit onto Dike Access Road.
“I’d like to see it (approval) wait for the transportation study,” he said. “A mix of industrial traffic, with commercial and residential traffic is a concern that there could be a loss of future development in the port area.”
“I have learned that Woodland would have the only industrial area in the nation where the only entrance would have a round-about,” said Darlene Johnson of Woodland Trucking.
A test drive through a mock round-about last summer showed that semis could negotiate the circle, but representatives from the industrial community said the test did not take into account other traffic, including cars and buses, that would be using a circle.
Johnson suggested that an overpass across Scott Avenue and the widening of roads leading to the Wal-Mart location be considered as alternatives to the traffic circles.
David Kenney, who said he is a charter bus driver and school bus driver, said that school buses “have problems with round-abouts. Circles slow buses.”
A proposed transportation study of the Woodland area, including traffic levels on I-5 and SR 503 is expected to begin within the next year. State Rep. Richard Curtis and Ed Orcutt and State Sen. Joe Zarelli wrote separate letters asking that any decision to build round-abouts next to the industrial area wait until the transportation study is complete.
They suggested that if the city goes ahead with building the round-abouts, the state could refuse to fund the study.
Transportation Department officials disagreed with the elected officials’ opinion.
Brian Walsh, an engineer with the Washington Department of Transportation, said that traffic circles have proven to be safe and more are being installed across the U.S. He said a “single lane circle would be sufficient” at the Woodland I-5 exit.
“A round-about lessens the points of conflict,” Walsh said. “A study shows there are fewer accidents in round-about.”
He said that traffic studies have shown “schools and round-abouts are a good combination. Drivers travel at a very low speed through round-abouts and it’s a safety issue.”
Bruce Shaffer, a traffic and civil engineer who testified for Woodlanders Against the Wal, said the test did not show the operational and safety problems for heavy trucks.
“Heavy haulers must have a lot of space,” he said. “(There was) no account for overhang from heavy trucks.”
In contrast to Walsh’s opinion, Shaffer said the traffic circles would create a safety issue, and he said heavy trucks would have a problem finding a big enough “gap” in traffic to enter a circle. He said with heavy trucks competing with buses and cars to enter the round-about, traffic could back up onto I-5.
The impact of commercial and industrial traffic on young drivers was also discussed. In his letter, Rep. Orcutt expressed concerns for “young drivers,” as well as for possible emergency evacuation of the area. He suggested that the increased traffic could not only negatively affect industrial development, it could impact transportation funding.
No analysis of the impact of the high school on the area’s traffic has been done, although a study of the issue is under way, according to a Wal-Mart representative.
Orcutt also was concerned about a loss of industrial development.
“Will retail development limit the proposed development of the industrial area?” he asked. “I believe the proposal could have an impact and create an immediate cost to the transportation budget and affect our ability to get new transportation projects in Southwest Washington.”
Walsh, however, said the construction of the round-abouts will not affect the proposed transportation study.
A question was raised about two undeveloped lots that are part of the commercial area. Wal-Mart will build a 157,000 square-foot super store and a parking lot for 187 vehicles. Transportation engineer Michael Swenson of the Transpo Group, who testified for Wal-Mart, said the lots could be used for a fast-food restaurant and a gas station.
Other issues of concern have been a loss of wetlands, although Wal-Mart must mitigate for any wetlands loss, and a potential increase in crime.
The acreage where Wal-Mart proposes a store was at one time zoned for industrial development, but the city re-zoned the area for commercial development in 2003.