St Helens Gateway Towers

These two lighted towers, with pierced metal images celebrating the history & environment of St. Helens, dramatically announce the gateway to the City of St Helens. Six panels, separated by flowing bands of pattern representing water, feature images of native flora, fauna & contemporary & ancient history. Lighted & lined with cobalt blue resin, they glow at night while the silver finish shimmers in the daylight.

Images include an elk, eagle, mastodon, saber tooth salmon fossil, the eruption of Mount St Helens, the basalt rock that the City is built upon & a spring or fall salmon run on the Columbia River. Also, this mighty river was once a major transportation route for huge sailing ships, sternwheelers, earlier Kalapuya Indians in their dugout canoes & the Lewis and Clark Corp of Discovery. The waterway still also supports barges, cruise ships, fishing & pleasure boats, herons, wetland habitat & Sandhill cranes, but millions of years earlier, the now extinct 10’ long, sabertooth salmon swam upstream to spawn.

Partly inspired by a description of Native American “power poles” by David Lewis, Manager of the Cultural Resources Department for the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde, these elegant monoliths complement the metropolitan & natural environment & convey the spirit of the community with stories easily understood by all ages & backgrounds.