Name of Division

Should Balch Creek keep a murderer's name?

Retired public school art teacher Nancy Helmsworth was drawn to the beauty of Balch Creek, making it the subject of multiple paintings.

“Little did I know how this theme would lead me in learning the rich and complex history of this area,” she wrote in explaining her campaign to rename the creek to honor Native American peoples.

That history spoke to her of colonization, exploitation and finally murder by Danford Balch, the creek’s namesake.

Helmsworth, who lives nearby, has embarked on a two-year “social action” campaign to erase the name of the first white man legally hanged in Oregon. She contacted three tribal nations and took their suggestion to rename the creek kulla kulla, which means “bird” in an intertribal language used in the region.

Despite broad efforts to engage the community, she is chagrined at the apparent lack of interest.

“I have reached out to multiple newspapers and elected officials ... with no response,” she said.

Letters to 18 homeowners whose property abuts Balch Creek garnered four responses: two for, two against.

Letters of support were submitted by the Chinook Indian Nation, Bird Alliance of Oregon, Forest Park Conservancy and the Northwest District Association. Her art exhibits at Gallery 114 and Mt. Hood Community College drew support for renaming from 40 of 51 attendees surveyed.

Still, nothing resembling a community discussion has occurred. The neighborhood association board discussion elicited one negative statement, after which the board voted 6-1 to approve the letter without further deliberation.

Helmsworth understands why the tribes have not been more outspoken. She said one tribal representative told her, “We will never do this ourselves because it’s so politically controversial, and there’s so much blowback on it.”

Helmsworth found an ally in NWDA Parks Committee Chair Tanya March, who submitted a 275-word statement later adopted by the association’s board.

March called the renaming “a meaningful opportunity to honor the indigenous heritage of this land.

“We believe this name change will bring a positive and much-needed recognition of the indigenous roots of the area, while removing the honor from a figure whose legacy does not align with the values we uphold today,” she wrote.

Her letter also praised thorough community outreach “ensuring that this proposal reflects the will and spirit of our neighborhood.”

Helmsworth intends to submit her proposal in time for the semiannual meeting of the Oregon Geographic Names Board in January.

Good proponent

“She’s a good proponent,” said Doug Decker, vice president of OGNB, which rules on name change applications. “She’s really been doing the homework.”

That homework could soon be put to the test. The state board follows procedures and policies adopted by the U.S. Board on Geographic Names, which has final say on decisions by state name boards. Those federal policies include:

• It must not be defamatory or derogatory and should be acceptable to a majority of the residents in the local area.

• The proponent should contact local landowners involved to determine if there is any opposition to the proposed name.

• OGNB will conduct a review process and request comments from all Oregon American Indian tribal organizations, appropriate county commissioners and local historical societies. If the proposal generates a high level of public interest, an article will be placed in the local newspaper to inform the local population.

Decker said the board will consider various reflections of public sentiment, including newspaper stories.

That means Richard Gronostajski’s views, which barely left a ripple at the NWDA board meeting, may get a second hearing.

“Erasing history is very disturbing,” Gronostajski told the board. “The worst virtue signaling I’ve heard of for a while.”

He explained his critique further in an interview with the Examiner.

“It’s doing something in order to appear that we are more virtuous than we actually are,” he said.

Such gestures are meaningless if no lands are returned or tangible benefits bestowed, he said.

Kathy Sharp, a member of the Parks Committee and a periodic NWDA board member since the 1980s, submitted a 400-word polemic to the Examiner.

“Balch Creek was never named in honor of Danford Balch. The name identifies the territory where his family settled,” Sharp wrote.

“I have heard him called a colonizer; aren’t we all?” she continued, referring to U.S. military bases around the world and exploitation of natural resources by U.S.-based corporations.

Land acknowledgements and name changes “are hollow words from a nation that builds pipelines across waterways and native reservations,” she said.

As for Balch himself, “many a father would be upset to find his 16-year-old daughter running off with the neighbor. Don’t be distracted by platitudes and shame about past behaviors of individuals. We cannot know what they thought and suffered.

“It seems we want to hold yesterday’s people to today’s vision of what is right and politically correct,” Sharp concluded.

Leave it alone

Chet Orloff, a longtime Northwest Portland resident and former director of the Oregon Historical Society, has served on the Oregon Geographic Names Board for more than 30 years.

Orloff has extensive experience in naming places and landmarks. He chaired the committee that named the Tillicum Bridge and was appointed by former Mayor Sam Adams to create standards for naming and renaming sites within Portland.

“My opinion is to leave it alone and focus on giving names to unnamed sites within Forest Park,” Orloff told the Examiner.

He is not even certain Balch was guilty of murder, given cloudy accounts of the shooting, which he believes may have been accidental.

“I’ve met Nancy and have mentioned to her and (repeatedly) to Doug Decker that I thought that Balch was a perfectly appropriate name for the creek,” Orloff said, “but I don’t have the energy to do all that she's doing in order to keep the name.”

While the process of recognizing historic figures through place names is spelled out in federal policy, the corollary—removal of a designated honoree—is uncharted water.

Three blocks of Southwest Jackson Street that include the home of the Native American Student and Community Center at Portland State University are being renamed to disassociate from President Andrew Jackson, a notorious Indians fighter.

Mount Howard in Eastern Oregon, named for Civil War Gen. Oliver Howard, retains its name despite Howard having commanded U.S. troops against the Nez Perce tribe, which was led by Chief Joseph. But Howard, who led the Freedmen’s Bureau, was also the namesake of Howard University, a historically black school.

Orloff raised these examples to illustrate how the renaming game gets complicated.

Helmsworth is not interested in attaching kulla kulla to an unnamed Forest Park feature. Balch Creek is where she draws inspiration, and its namesake raises only negative associations.

“Dan Balch was a colonist who received his land for free in 1850 via the Donation Land Claim he and his family settled. But before long, in 1858, Dan murdered his son-in-law in a drunken rage, not approving of his daughter's elopement.

“Continuing to refer to a creek with a murderer’s moniker is an insult to the original people whose land was stolen and to all people striving to live in a civilized society, past and future. It's not funny, nor quirky ... it is unjust and was an act of violence that ended an innocent persons' life.”