and funnel the profits to the SWFRA. Pamplin greenlighted the plan. In August 2023, Shaniko Hotel and Shaniko Firehouse RV Park opened for business. On a volunteer basis, Marrs manages the hotel and RV park. He is also the town’s volunteer water master and fire chief. The hotel and RV Park’s (paid) assistant manager is Long, who is also the Shaniko City Council president and volunteer assistant fire chief. Recapturing the Magic That workload is par for the course in small communities trying to grow. “Most rural development is accomplished by people going out and doing stuff, which can mean individuals wearing 17 different hats,” Hause says. “Everybody here makes other people look lazy,” says Kephart, owner of Raven’s Nest antique store in Shaniko. “Along with everything else they do, Scott and Diana Marrs always help me out with Second Saturday.” On the second Saturday of each month, Shaniko hosts a music jam and potluck. The nearly decade-long tradition almost petered out in 2019 before Kephart decided to take over. “I just love music, but I did it to bring the community together. Everyone is welcome, whatever your politics, race or where you live,” she says. Musicians take to the little stage behind the Raven’s Nest around 6 p.m., and 20 to 50 people come out to listen and eat each other’s food. Sometimes the dramas of Shaniko could make reality TV producers blush, but that all is put aside for these couple of hours where everyone comes together. Like Second Saturday, Shaniko Days, the town’s hallmark music festival, was languishing. Sandy Cereghino, who has been organizing Shaniko Days since 1988, laments the sag in tourism after the hotel closed in 2008. “The success of Shaniko Days is hitched to the success of the hotel. We have limped along all this time with no place for people to eat or stay.” The hotel reopening last year made a huge difference for Shaniko Days. Plus they booked Countryfied, a very popular headliner, and that added to the momentum. This year the 50th anniversary of the festival, Countryfied is returning and the crowd is expected to be much bigger than previous years. “Could be 300 or 3,000;— we don’t know,” conjectures Cereghino. Shaniko leans on tourism to fuel its comeback. “Small towns like this have to figure out how to sustain themselves with drive-by traffic and tourism,” says Jessica Metta, the executive director of Mid-Columbia Economic Development District. “Their local population just isn’t large enough to support businesses.” However, there are common challenges for small towns looking to develop themselves as tourist destinations, such as failure of local stakeholders to collaborate and loss of authenticity. “Communities should embrace their history,” says Kristin Dahl, who created the Destination Development Department at Travel Oregon and founded Crosscurrent Collective, a destination-development consultancy. “It’s important for locals to come together collaboratively, understand the roots they’re building on, and determine the stories to celebrate and stories to honor in silence.” Cereghino, who got married in Shaniko in 1988 and has been a part of Shaniko ever since, is one of a handful of locals trying their best. “Shaniko was magic at one point. It can be again.” Selina Kephart owns the Raven’s Nest antique shop in Shaniko and also lines up performers for the monthly Second Saturday Potluck and Music Jam, which is held behind her store. PHOTOS BY JASON E. KAPLAN 50
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