By LAUREN L. DILLARD
Of the News-Register

NEWBERG - Poised at the corner of Highway 219 and Springbrook Road in Newberg early this morning, the old McKern house and barn rested on steel girders resting in turn on a set of massive hydraulic jacks.

The structures were awaiting trucks aiming to tow them a mile down the highway to a Chehalem Parks and Recreation District parcel next to the Fernwood Pioneer Cemetery. It's across from the historic Hoover-Minthorn House, where President Herbert Hoover spent part of his childhood.

Once they arrived, the trucks made quick work of the job. Crews from Northwest Structural Moving got started 6:30 a.m., after utility crews lowered phone and cable lines. The house and barn were both off of Highway 219 in under 15 minutes.

"It was surreal," said Lorraine Hall, curator at Hoover-Minthorn House and a driving force in Friends of Historic Newberg. "It was so hard to even grasp what you were seeing."

The three-story McKern house was built in 1879. It is the oldest structure left in Newberg and one of the oldest in Yamhill County, according to the National Register of Historic Places.

Originally painted a then-popular mustard yellow, it has since been painted green, red, white and gray by turns. It is mostly gray today, except for places along the back where later editions were removed to make the relocation feasible and restore historical authenticity.

The barn actually predates the house. It was erected in 1859, the year that Oregon became a state.

Luke McKern traveled the Oregon Trail from Indiana, settling in Yamhill County. He married along the way.

He and his new bride staked out a 640-acre donation land claim in what is now Newberg, according to Gordon Hall, who is also active in Friends of Historic Newberg.

Since then, what began as a full section of land has been whittled down to just three acres. Willcuts Company Realtors recent purchased it from Patricia Mays for a modern housing development, which is what precipitated the move.

"I think it's going to be a great asset for the community," said Marc Willcuts, president of the company's Coyote Homes development arm.

Member of a family whose roots in Newberg date back to the 1920s, he appreciates the historical significance of the farmstead.

Willcuts is planning to develop a 31-lot subdivision on the site under the McKern's Corner. But he was happy to wait until the historic house could be moved to a suitable new location.

Hall said the move itself cost $39,000. He said temporarily relocating power and phone lines to make it possible figures to run another $32,000.

"It's been a real issue trying to get everybody to coordinate," he said.

Friends of Historic Newberg has raised enough to cover the basic moving bill. The parks district, which is assuming ownership, maintenance and public display responsibility for the historic structures, fronted the money to cover the associated utility work.

The passage of time has not been kind to the house. It hasn't been owner-occupied for many, many years, and hasn't been occupied at all for the last five years.

"It was a derelict when we found it," Hall said. "I thought it was just some piece of junk."

That remains largely the case today.

The remnants of power lines dangle from the back porch, legacy of its electrification around the turn of the century. Shards of glass mark open window frames. PVC pipe runs top to bottom along one wall, drawing eyes to a toilet installed well after the house's original construction.

Inside, the original wallpapers have all been stripped, along with most of the original decorative flourishes. And the original staircase banister is long gone.

However, the house's original Italianate-style molding still graces its exterior door and window frames. The eaves still feature their original carved supporting braces.

Friends of Historic Newberg hopes over time to restore the house to something approaching the grandeur Luke McKern instilled originally.

"He obviously had some money and a great desire to impress someone," Hall said. "This fellow obviously went into Portland and looked around for nice ideas."

Don Clements, who heads the parks district, said the restoration effort has his full support.

"The group has a strong vision, a strong desire to save something and get it renovated," he said. "A lot of people gave a lot of time and effort and its important to them."

The district envisions developing a network of walking trails around the pioneer cemetery to connect Hoover-Minthorn House and what it's calling the McKern Farmstead.

Lorraine Hall encouraged local families to donate furnishings from the period from 1850 to 1880 to help jump-start the project, saying, "Almost all the pretty stuff got taken out." Mission one is finding a wood-burning kitchen range from the period, she said.

She's looking forward to the project, despite its daunting scope. "It will be fun to start gleaning the history and putting the story together," she said. "It was very much a vindication of the faith that everybody has had in those two structures."

For more information, call 1-503-538-7583.

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