Harland Yriarte

No summary at this time, please refer to the detailed index below.

0-6:04

Harland’s mother wrote her memories down and gave it to Harland. His paternal aunt, Dolores Method also wrote down some of the family history from Spain to Ellis Island then Carson City. His grandparents may have worked for the Laxalt family outside of Carson City before going to Crane, Oregon. According to his grandmother Josefa, Harland’s grandfather, Alfonso [Salvador] Yriarte, was sort of a gypsy and always wanted to move. When they moved to Crane, Alfonso left the family and went to California. At that time, they had five children, Mary, Dolores, Roman, Louie, and Elisa, and Josefa was running a boardinghouse in Crane. His grandparents divorced and his grandmother remarried with John Ebar who ran a sheep company with Frank Kueny around Little Indian Gorge. Harland’s father, Louie, was primarily raised by John, but thought of his mother’s brother, Raymond “Unc” Lausirica as his father. They would trail sheep from Crane to the Pueblo Mountains, into Diamond, Oregon and then into Kiger Gorge. Pete Ebar would deliver things to the Lausirica cabin to supply the sheepherders. They ate a lot of sage hen and mutton while herding. There were thousands of the sage grouse and they would follow the sheep because they provided a food source for the birds.

6:04-11:39

During his years leading the running camp, Harland has learned the area very well and has consequently found many aspen tree carvings. Zubizareta has a carving on an aspen tree close to the Lausirica cabin; Harland has many pictures of the arborglyphs. One of the carvings is of Mary Yriarte in scant clothing, carved by a sheepherder known as Patacon. Mary was Harland’s aunt, he had a good relationship with her, he sent her pictures of the carving, and she said that Patacon was in love with her but she never returned the feelings.

11:39-20:11

Both Harland’s father and mother were from Burns. Harland was born in 1948 and raised on the “Double O” Ranch that was passed down through his mother’s side of the family. His mother’s maiden name was Hughet. His mother and father worked for Louis Hughet, her father. The house Harland grew up in was an old house that was cold, and Harland has scars on his elbows from trying to open a frozen window. The family had gasoline generated electricity and a crank telephone. Judy and Judd Wise would work the phones in Burns. First through six grade, Harland attended the “Double O” school; his teacher was from Parma, Idaho. He went to school with kids whose parents also lived and worked on the ranch. He talks about the constant moving of families on and off the ranch. One of his old school friends flew fighter jets and would fly from the Mountain Home Air Force Base into the canyons around Burns.

20:11-25:09

Harland attended Burns High School. His mother worked for a tax accountant in Burns so the family rented a house there to be closer to the high school. His freshman year, Harland stayed at the hotel that Josefa, his grandmother, and John ran in town. John was missing an arm because he was trying to scare coyotes away from the sheep with dynamite and accidentally blew his arm off. Harland stayed at the hotel so that he could participate in football and track and field.  He would help his grandparents by making beds. The hotel was the Central Hotel in Burns; they had many Basque boarders, but it equally mixed with boarders who were not Basque. His grandmother cooked a lot and always offered her family food, but she did not cook for the boarders. Harland’s father grew up speaking Basque, and learned English from the Chinese population in Crane. Josefa spoke limited English and would write grocery notes with Basque phonetics.

25:09-30:54

John Ebar often spent time playing poker at the Central Pastime. Harland says he was a nice man. John was a French Basque, so he had a different accent when he spoke in broken English. Growing up, Harland was a shy and quiet kid. He loved sports, he broke two legs playing high school football, he also started throwing discus, he was very good at it and in his senior year, he won the state championship. He also set a school record for the 200 meter track event. Harland was the student body vice president his junior year. He won student body president in his senior year despite not even running due to his refusal to give a speech, but rather won due to write-in votes. Harland graduated from high school in 1966; afterwards he went to Allen Hancock Jr. College in California for his first year of college. He participated in track with kids from around the world. The following year he transferred to Southern Oregon College where he was a three-time All American winner in the discus and qualified for the Olympic trials in his senior year. He was married by then with two children and so had to work and was not able to go to the trials.

30:54-38:25

His first wife was Patricia Osa, the daughter of Marce Osa.  All of the Basques in Burns were happy because they were both Basque. Together they had three sons named Javen, Kael, and Jenner. Javen and Kael were born in Medford and Jenner was born in Gold Beach. Harland wanted to be a teacher and coach, so he became a teacher, but there were no teaching jobs so he worked at a particleboard manufacturing plant. When he first was married to Patricia, he was managing a cattle ranch for Cascade Ranches in Eagle Point, Oregon. A teaching job opened in Brookings, Oregon for the high school and he got it. There he was the PE and health teacher, the head boys track and field coach, and boys and girls cross-country coach. In 1975 he took one of his cross-country teams up to Steens Mountain in order to make them work as a team, and that was the first ever Steens Mountain Running Camp. Margarita Osa, Patricia’s mother, was the camp’s first cook, Patricia’s brother, Mateo Osa, was also at the camp that year. They went into Wild Horse Lake one day, a few girls stayed back with Kael and the bus driver. A thunderstorm came and a lightning strike killed the bus driver. One boy who was a Christian said bye to the driver, and Harland says that “planted the seeds” of Christianity in him.

38:25-43:18

Due to the lighting accident, the next year he took kids to Sisters, Oregon instead but he decided not to let fear rule his life, so the year after he went again to Steens Mountain. At the time of the interview, Harland is running the camp in its 42^nd year, filled with kids from fourteen states and two foreign countries. He has many kids from Boise. Harland says that the mountain is a great teacher, the second day of camp the kids go on a twenty-eight mile run and he works the kids hard in running and in their attitudes. Some of the past participants still come back to be counselors and one of the past kids designs shoes for Nike. That past camper designed the shoes Nike Wildhorse and Nike Kiger and now they are donated to the camp every year.

43:18-50:04

On Steens Mountain, most of the sheep are gone; the only ones remaining belong to private landowners on the mountain. Most of the sheepherders now are hired Peruvians. In 2016, the camp directors decided to take the kids on a night hike, but they knew they had to have a good reason to get the kids to go. The solution was to tell them there was a sheep tsunami; the kids went through the emergency procedure and then hiked to Fish Lake. While working at a high school, Harland was track coach of the year a few times. After working at Brookings High School, Harland took a job at Lane Community College in Eugene and moved his family there. There he got a full-time job and his master’s degree at the University of Oregon. He worked at the college until 2005 as the athletic director. Harland hated giving speeches, but it was required for him in high school and college so he started doing topics that could work around his nervousness. He says he finally faced his fears and at the running camp, he gives speeches all of the time and often prays before he does.

50:04-59:52

Harland and Patricia Osa eventually divorced, but they are on good terms and still spend holidays together with their children. About eight years later, he married Jan Burrell. She had six kids when they married, so there were eleven people living in his house. They were married for thirteen years. Jan was diagnosed with non-smoking lung cancer which was very hard for Harland to watch her get sick. He still keeps in contact with all of her kids who he helped raise. He says they are all smart kids and one manages the bus company that goes to the Steens Mountain Camp. After Jan died, Harland took a leave of absence from Lane Community College and went to everyplace that he and Jan had gone to together by himself; he redid all of their travels together. After six months, he decided to face his grief and go to run the camp. Before her death, she was at Sacred Heart Hospital and the doctor gave her days to live. He says when she finally died it was beautifully painful and painfully beautiful. He says the only reason he can do things now is that he realized he needed to move on, but he still loves her. After her death, when his children had all moved out and he was still working at the community college he prayed and asked God what he was supposed to do, whether it was to meet someone or anything. The next day he went to his office and the baseball coach walked in and told Harland he knew a woman that he should meet. He is now married to that woman, Kay Wilson Yriarte.

59:52-1:04:00

Harland has twenty-one grandchildren counting all of the children of his step kids. Of his three boys, who are at the running camp, Kael’s daughters are Ayden and Ava Rose Yriarte. Jenner’s children are Asher, Ella, and Sylvia (whom he refers to as Sugar Plum Twinkle Lights). He learned a lot about values and work from his parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles, all of whom he loved and treated him like a son. He says that even though his father now spends most of his time in bed, he is the happiest man he has ever seen. He says his father learned to value people due to his time working as a sheepherder, which is a solitary job. Harland’s grandmother Josefa would call Harland and his other family members “putzli” as a term of endearment.

 

                                                NAMES, PLACES, AND THEMES                                                              

 

NAMES:

Ceniga, Julian “Patacon”

Ebar, John (Josefa’s second husband)

Ebar, Josefa “Josephine” Lausirica Juaristi Yriarte (Paternal Grandmother)

Ebar, Pete (John Ebar’s Brother)

Hughet, Doris, (Mother)

Hughet, Louis (Maternal Grandfather)

Keuny, Frank

Lausirica, Raymond “Unc” (Paternal Great Uncle, Josefa’s Brother)

Laxalt Family

Method, Dolores Yriarte (Paternal Aunt)

Osa, Marcelino “Marce”, Jr.

Osa, Margarita Aramaio

Osa, Mateo

Osa, Patricia “Patty” (First Wife)

Wise, Judd

Wise, Judy

Yriarte, Asher (Grandson)

Yriarte, Ava Rose (Granddaughter)

Yriarte, Ayden (Granddaughter)

Yriarte, Charlie (Brother)

Yriarte, Elisa (Paternal Aunt)

Yriarte, Ella (Granddaughter)

Yriarte, Janet Burrell (Second Wife)

Yriarte, Javen (Son)

Yriarte, Jenner (Son)

Yriarte, Kael (Son)

Yriarte, Kay Wilson (Third Wife)

Yriarte, Louis (Father)

Yriarte, Mary (Paternal Aunt)

Yriarte, Roman (Paternal Uncle)

Yriarte, Salvador Alfonso (Paternal Grandfather)

Yriarte, Sylvia (Granddaughter)

Zubizareta, Fermin

 

PLACES:

Allen Hancock Jr. College, Santa Maria, California

Boise, Idaho

Brookings High School, Oregon

Burns High School, Oregon

Burns, Oregon

Carson City, Nevada

Central Hotel, Burns, Oregon

Crane, Oregon

Double O Ranch, Steens Mountain, Oregon

Double O School, Oregon

Eagle Point, Oregon

Fish Lake, Steens Mountian, Oregon

Gold Beach, Oregon

Harney Lake, Oregon

Kiger Gorge, Oregon

Little Indian Gorge, Oregon

Medford, Oregon

Mountain Home Air Force Base, Idaho

Parma, Idaho

Pueblo Mountains

Sacred Heart Hospital, Eugene, Oregon

Sisters, Oregon

Southern Oregon College, Ashland, Oregon

Steens Mountain Running Camp, Harney County, Oregon

University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon

 

THEMES:

Boarding Houses

Children

Education

Family Relations

Illness

Language

Ranching

Sheep

Sheepherders

Sports

Work