Columbia River Quarantine Station

About this property

The Columbia River Quarantine Station, now known as the Knappton Cove Heritage Center, is a historic site in Knappton, Washington. The station provided fumigation and quarantine services to maritime vessels at the port on the Columbia River from 1899 to 1938, and is the sole remaining quarantine station on the West Coast of the United States as all others were burned for fear of contamination. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980. In the late nineteenth century, regulations on immigration to the United States were increasing. There were four west coast ports where immigrants could enter the United States: San Diego and San Francisco in California, Astoria, Oregon, and Port Townsend, Washington. Federal legislation in 1891 required medical inspections for arriving immigrants. Ships arriving at the port of Astoria on the Columbia River had to travel to the disinfecting station in Port Townsend, 275 miles (443 km) away, if disease was found on board. The communities of Astoria and Portland agitated for closer quarantine and disinfecting facilities, but did not want them too close and so proposed a site across the river. The location selected for the station was Knappton Cove, which had a defunct fish cannery with a wharf and buildings that could be converted. The government purchased the site for $8,000 (equivalent to US$245,856 in 2019), over the objections of the Washington residents. The station was established May 9, 1899. The building which had served as the cannery superintendent's house became the residence for the quarantine station caretaker. A new building for disinfecting ships was built in 1900, and a hospital (also known as a lazaretto or pesthouse) for ill crew and passengers was added in 1912. The first physician at Columbia River Quarantine Station was Assistant Surgeon Hill Hastings. He was succeeded several months later by Dr. Bayles H. Earle of the United States Marine Hospital Service. Earle was replaced by Passed Assistant Surgeon John Milton Hold in 1906, and in 1911, Assistant Surgeon Jay Tuttle took Hold's place. Ships anchoring at Astoria were inspected for infestation and communicable diseases. When either were found, the ships were sent to Knappton Cove where passengers went ashore for showers and delousing of their clothing and baggage while the ship was fumigated. Sick passengers would be isolated. To fumigate the ships, which took about 48 hours, pots of sulfur were burned throughout the ship. Initially, those crewmembers and passengers who were not ill slept in tents until they were able to board the ship again. From 1915 to 1929, the USS Concord was moored at Knappton to provide lodging.

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Property data from the National Register of Historic Places, National Park Service (public domain).

Description adapted from Wikipedia under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

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