Aubuchon Drive, St.Helens, Oregon

St. Helens, Oregon

Fred Aubuchon - 1939

Aubuchon Drive, St. Helens, OR

Prior to becoming a house-builder and sub-divider, my dad Fred P. Aubuchon, worked as a logger (me too, I worked as a limber and choker-setter), wood-chip truck driver (Corvalis, OR run), and strawberry farmer (Asberry, Lutrell, Triplett, etc.) for Bird's Eye. We lived out on Brooks Road, near Bunker Hill and Yankton.

Before that, dad worked at Lockheed Aircraft in Burbank, when he lived in Eagle Rock, CA, in the late forties. Dad now lives in Ontario, OR, and is still restoring old houses at age 89, currently replacing all the plumbing in a slab floor. But then, he has jack-hammer experience from the 40's, as I recall. May be time to slow down. One thing I certainly learned from my dad was the "Christian Work Ethic".

St. Helens, Oregon 97051
30 miles north of Portland, OR on the Columbia River
Aubuchon Drive, St. Helens, Oregon
Noncommercial Fair Use graciously provided by Google Maps

1959-1962 History

All the homes on Aubuchon Drive, except one, were built by my father between 1959 and 1963. Sykes Road runs from mid-left to lower-right at the bottom of the photograph. McBride School is on the right of the image. I used to shoot pheasants there with my grandfather's 410 guage shotgun.

When my dad Fred Aubuchon first had me start clearing this land in 1958, it was mostly small fir tress, blackberry vines and wild rose bushes. My tools were the scythe and the ax. Dad brought in the Caterpillar tractor, made a road, and the houses started going up. The first house took a year. The second about 6 months, as I recall.

Then he started hauling in the prefabs, and the speed picked up. Put the foundation in place, bring in the truck, and the house was framed in no time - about 20 houses in 4 years.

After Dad filled up all the lots here, he built another subdivision off of Pittsburg Road, on MacArthur St. and Allendale Dr.

Subsequently, he built another subdivision nearby, as I understand, for a total of over 150 houses.

1959-1962 History
Oregon 1959 History After 7th and 8th grade at Yankton Grade School on Pittsburg Road, it was on to St. Helens Junior High in town. The original driveway for house #1 and 2 is shown by the yellow line, when only Sykes Road existed. It came out right at the intersection of Sykes Rd. and Columbia Blvd. The numbers refer to the order of the houses that I lived in. As I recall, we first lived in the trailer marked "1" on the map above (not in photo), while dad was fixing up old house #2. There was a deep well behind the trailer that my dad eventually filled in. I lived in house #2 next, the older fixed-up two story, and then #3, the first brand new house my dad ever built totally from the ground up. I lived in number 4 briefly.	California 1960 Then I was off off to Hamilton High in Los Angeles for 10th grade in 1960, with mom and step-father. Dan Aron was my best friend. 1961 Then I was off to 11th grade at Hillsdale High School in San Mateo, California, between San Francisco and San Jose. I stayed with the Ron Fisher family when RCA again transferred my step-father, this time to Palm Beach, FL. That was the end of living with my brother. After the end of the semester, I moved back up to St. Helens. Subsequently, my step-father was transferred back to RCA Van Nuys, CA, to manage personnel for the Avionics plant, where he remained until retirement. Dad built the 10 yellow houses above during this 2-year period.	Oregon 1962 Then it was back to12th grade at St. Helens Senior High School on Gable Road. First, I lived in house #5, and then in house #6. My dad's mother and father lived in house #7. We were estranged for 25 years. I chose not to remain in the Oregon environment, but instead I sought my fortune on the San Francisco Peninsula of California. Where I struggled for years to appease the semiconductor industrial Gods, all, pretty much, to no avail. In my next incarnation, I would like to do real estate sales. Far less effort, far more reward.

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This Aubuchon Drive, St. Helens, Oregon webpage was last updated on 2009-10-02.