economic prosperity created a demand for growth in park and recreation opportunities. Matsler has left for posterity a 288 page autobiography, typed on an old Underwood portable bought in 1937 at Montgomery Ward. It contains much information, some inspiration, copious opinions and a certain amount of headshake-inducing candor (mostly not reproduced here). The account gives a window into the times and into the perceptions of the department’s second director. Matsler felt he was initially seen as “a so-called Park man and not a Recreation man” like his predecessor. He set about making changes, some of which rankled. He learned from a secretary, identified only as Irene, that Recreation was unofficially subsidizing the Pee Wee Baseball League and a softball association by picking up their delinquent bills at Hendershott’s sporting goods store. Covering these unpaid bills exceeded the entire annual supplies budget allotted for Recreation. Staff defended the practice as a way to “see that the people have a chance to play,” but the secretary Irene “lit into them like a tiger to the point of almost physically pulling their hair and clawing their faces” when they denied she had warned them this was a problem, according to Matsler. The practice was stopped. A dispute with neighbors had developed at Washington Park where two lighted softball fields were aligned such that foul balls sometimes ricocheted off homes north of 19th Avenue and east of Lawrence Street. The problem came to a head when a traveling all-star baseball team was scheduled to play a local team as a softball fund-raiser. Matsler asked the coaches to “try to limit hits to the inside of the field and keep fouls to a minimum.” But, Matsler complains, “They did just the opposite,” and a barrage of baseballs rained down on the homes. The neighbors responded with the time-honored tactic of confiscating the balls, which enraged the fans. “You never heard such rude and uncomplimentary language … Several fights almost 42
broke out.” The matter was hashed out at the next City Council meeting, where the park neighbors “turned out in force … with blood in their eyes.” Matsler decided to hire a younger “park foreman” to replace Fred Lamb, who was staying in a house in Skinner Butte Park. Lamb, described as “a very fine hard-working older man nearing 70, I guess,” agreed with the change but asked that he and his wife be allowed continue living in the house. In exchange they would take care of the nearby cottage (the one later named for him) and the animals at Skinner Butte and Hendricks parks. Deal. In the mid ‘50s, when the Lambs were gone, Matsler tore down the house and remodeled the cottage. He restocked the kitchen from funds the Lambs had collected from rentals, and was able to further economize by installing two used urinals from the Sigma Tau fraternity house. Matsler’s choice for Parks superintendent was Paul Beistel. In 1951 Jim Coffell resigned and Al Dahlen was hired as Recreation superintendent. Matsler praised the work of both his selections. Matsler was successful in nurturing to full bloom both the riverfront Owen Rose Garden and the Rhododendron Garden in Hendricks Park, a pet project. He had less success with real pets, as a white fallow buck deer he brought to Hendricks Park from Klamath Falls got into fights with a resident bull elk and was killed, and a baby female fawn he tried to raise at home also met a fatal end. A rhesus monkey donated to the Skinner Butte zoo attacked him with “fangs about 1” long.” He flew in three Dinae monkeys from New York who all died of “chill.” The replacement cinnamon ringtail monkeys did better, but a baby born in captivity didn’t survive. Bad things happened to other monkeys, “Maybe a bear killed one,” Matsler writes. The bear itself came down with infected nipples, and Fred Lamb and the veterinarian “gave her a shot in the butt and they both headed for the cage gate getting out just in time.” For Oregon’s 100th 43