- National Oregon Day is March 9th this year and these are a bunch of fun facts about it.
Did you know Oregon is home to the tater tot? Enjoy the rest of these Oregon fun facts to celebrate National Oregon Day!
- The Decemberists, Everclear, The Dandy Warhols, Elliot Smith, Pink Martini, and Esperanza Spalding, all came from Oregon.
- About ¼ of the llamas in the United States live in Oregon. The llamas and the alpacas of the area all live in Clackamas County.
- The Oregon Trail is familiar to some many 80s and 90s kids thanks to the old
computer game of the same name, The Oregon Trail. Is it because of these Oregon fun facts or because of the Oregon Trail game that you know about the Oregon Trail? - The King of Roads, also known as the Historic Columbia Highway, in Oregon was the first scenic highway designated as a National Historic Landmark.
- Logging is one of the longest industries of Oregon. For years, lumberjacking and other tree-cutting related business was the primary source of income for most people in the state.
- If you’ve seen “Coraline,” “Kubo and the Two Strings” or “Missing Link,” you’ve seen the work of Laika Studios, which was created in Oregon.
- The animals of Oregon include owls, gray wolves, Roosevelt elk, wolverines, Anna’s hummingbirds, snowy plovers, sage grouse, osprey, western pond turtles, Oregon alligator lizards, and coastal tailed frogs. Did you know these Oregon fun facts
- Famous people like Lisa Rinna, Beverly Cleary, Edwin, Markham, Holly Madison, Tonya Harding, and Abigail Scott Duniway were all born in Oregon. Do you know all the stars on this Oregon fun facts list?
- Beverly Cleary, Gus Van Sant, Chuck Palahniuk, Stephan Malkmus, and Matt Groening are artists and authors from non other than Portland, Oregon.
- In the late 1700s, fur trappers, traders, and explorers began exploring the terrain we now know as Oregon. Famous explorers of Oregon include Captain James Cook, who also discovered Australia, among other lands, and Robert Gray, who discovered the Columbia River in 1792.
- Juggling in Hood River, Oregon is illegal unless you have the proper license for
it. - The state animal of Oregon is the American beaver, thanks to the fur trade that was once in Oregon.
- Portland is home to the world’s smallest park. Mill Ends Park is along the Willamette River near downtown and is only 452 square feet. It was designated in 1948. The park is only 452 square feet and was designated in 1948. Did you know about this teeny, tiny park in this list of Oregon fun facts?
- Portland, Oregon has 70 breweries alone and the state of Oregon boasts over 300 breweries. That’s 1 brewery for every 10,000 people.
- Wisconsin and California are known as the dairy states, but Oregon won world’s best cheese in 2019 and 2020. This cheese was the first American cheese to earn this title.
- It’s illegal in Portland, Oregon, to have a wedding at an ice skating rink.
- There are six other states in America with more breweries per capita than Oregon.
- Oregon has 17 National Historic Landmarks including wildlife refuges, a Chinese shop, a highway, fort, dam, lodges, and chateaux. Four National Historic Trails and 14 National Historic Districts also belong to Oregon.
- Oregon was the first state to legalize euthanasia or assisted suicide in 1994, though specific parameters are required for this practice to take place.
- The topsoil of Oregon isn’t actually from the state. The soil was washed into the Willamette Valley from eastern Washington during the Missoula Floods during the end of the last ice age.
- The most famous lighthouse in the state was built in 1892 and is called the Heceta Head of Lighthouse.
- The flag of Oregon has different designs on either side, one is the escutcheon from the state seal and on the other, a sitting gold figure of a beaver. Did you know this as one of the Oregon fun facts?
- The Bing cherry comes from horticulturalist Seth Lewelling. He was along the Oregon Trail in 1875 and settled in what’s now known as Milwaukie, Oregon. This is where he invented the hybrid and named the cherries after his Chinese foreman, Ah Bing.
- There are nine historic lighthouses and one ship along the Oregon coast.
- Olympian Dick Fosbury of Portland, Oregon, a high jumper who invented the
“Fosbury Flop.” This means he flipped the bar backwards. - The only state to have an official state nut is Oregon. The nut is the hazelnut or filbert.
- Over 1 million acres burned the summer of 2020, when some of the worst forest fires Oregon has ever seen took place.
- Oregon grows about 99% of the United States crop of hazelnuts every year.
Did you know filbert is another word for hazelnut? What was your favorite of all the Oregon fun facts?