Local chapter forms: LaX Museum to portray Ice Age Flood saga

The stone service station is one of six rock dwellings acquired by LaCrosse Community Pride. The group plans to transform the service station into an Ice Age Flood museum and visitors’ center.

It was 13,000 to 18,000 years ago when the most recent historic Ice Age floods swept through areas of Idaho, Washington and Oregon, shaping the landscape and depositing soil and rock in the areas the floods affected.

“The Ice Age Floods carved the huge, bare, basalt channels and dry falls, stranded massive boulders far from their bedrock source and deposited gravel bars whose fantastic scale dwarfs their modern counterparts,” according to information on the Ice Age Flood Institute website.

Members of LaCrosse Community Pride (LCP) are hoping to bring out this information for local communities and tourists through the formation of an Ice Age Flood Institute chapter in the area and the establishment of an Ice Age museum in LaCrosse.

At the LCP community discussion Sept. 30, members Lloyd Stoess of Washtucna and Peggy Bryan of LaCrosse reported on the work of LCP to form the Palouse Falls Chapter and the proposed museum.

Stoess has headed up the establishment of a local chapter with the Ice Age Flood Institute. A member of the Cheney-Spokane Chapter for several years, Stoess said he felt it was time for the Palouse region to have a chapter of its own to benefit the local population.

“There was really a need in this area to have our own chapter. Different people organize chapters so they can concentrate on their area,” he said. “Our purpose is to help local people learn more about this incredible area we live in.”

The Palouse Falls Chapter was officially approved Sept. 18, Stoess said.

Stoess said there is a rich history with the floods that have shaped the way of life in eastern Washington.

“We want to get the flood story out there; there are so many aspects to it,” he said. “The flood itself determined how we use our land today.”

He said if not for the rich soil brought in by the floods thousands of years ago, farming in this area might be completely different.

He said educational opportunities will take place through the local chapter meetings, which will be at least four times per year, and at least one field trip or bus tour per year. Stoess said he started a hike from Lyons Ferry to Palouse Falls several years ago. The Cheney-Spokane Chapter eventually adopted it as their yearly tour.

“Now that we have got our chapter that may be a joint tour between Cheney-Spokane and Palouse Falls,” said Stoess.

Stoess said through the Wheat Lands Communities’ Fair in Ritzville, the Adams County Fair in Othello and the Palouse Empire Fair, about 60 people signed their name to join the chapter.

“How many will follow through, I don’t know, but I expect we will have a pretty good body of people,” he commented.

Stoess said individuals or families can join the chapter by going to the Ice Age Flood Institute website at http://www.iafi.org and filling out an application to join a local chapter. He said the Palouse Falls Chapter is not yet listed on the website, but people filling out an application can write in the chapter name.

“The easiest way to sign up is to go to the website,” he said.

The cost to join a chapter is $40 per year for individuals and $55 per year for families. Stoess said half the dues paid will come back to the chapter for the purpose of putting on events and keeping the chapter running.

Plans are also moving forward to convert the LaCrosse rock houses acquired by LCP about a year and a half ago to an Ice Age Floods museum.

Bryan reported they are exploring options to put an Ice Age museum in the bigger station.

The rock houses acquired include the service station, two houses and three bunk houses.

Bryan said the idea for the Ice Age museum was hers. She said she saw the potential for at least one of the houses to be converted to the museum because they are made from basalt stones, the same type of stones the floods deposited in the region.

“It is tied together by the stones themselves,” she said.

She said she sees the museum benefiting multiple groups.

“It would be a great thing for our community, eastern Washington and the Ice Age Institute,” she said. “It benefits everybody.”

Bryan said they do not have a timeline. She is currently in the process of applying for a Washington State Historic Preservation grant, and work is being done to clean up the houses.

“We would like to (establish the museum) as soon as we have funding,” said Bryan. “We need to secure the building and make sure it is stable.”

Bryan said a temporary mobile museum will be formed to start showing the public what a larger museum would offer.

“We are working with WSU on plans for that,” she said. “Those should be done this semester.”

Bryan said the hope for the temporary museum on wheels is to have it ready by spring or early summer. She said that museum will be more visual rather than having artifacts because of the confined space.

She said she sees the museum in LaCrosse and the stone houses being more attractive to tourists once they are fixed up.

“The rock houses have always attracted a lot of photographers and continue to attract a lot of photographers and tourists,” she said. “Once it gets going, it is going to really be a boon to our tourism industry.”

The plan for the service station includes converting it to the museum and also incorporating a visitor’s center, and Bryan said plans for the additional houses are still in the works.

“Our first step is to do a museum,” she said. “We will start with that and build on as there is room and interest.”

Other ideas have included a photographers’ retreat, a bed and breakfast or a hunters’ quarters.

“We are taking it one step at a time,” said Bryan. “The houses are so unique that people would come just for the experience.”