Bob Boring, great-grandson of the Civil War veteran who lent his name to the community, says, "Boring is a name, not a condition." The recent pairing of Dull, Scotland, and Boring, Oregon, has created worldwide multimedia reports, including articles in Time magazine and the Wall Street Journal that published the same week. Never incorporated as an official entity, Boring has been a thriving farm, logging, and sawmill community since Joseph and Sarah Boring traveled the Oregon Trail in an ox-drawn covered wagon and settled here in 1853. The "downtown" area of Boring is only four blocks long,...

Traveling the Barlow Road, 50,000 pioneers rolled their wagon wheels over the site of today's Sandy Historical Museum without stopping. Not until the arrival of Francis Revenue in 1853 did anyone consider the area suitable for homesteading. Building a store and a bridge across the Sandy River, Revenue established the first bit of civilization the pioneers encountered in Oregon. Among the heroes and legends to appear on the slopes of Mount Hood were Elijah "Lige" Coalman, who climbed the mountain 586 times; brawny loggers, lumbermen, and farmers who tamed the forest and settled the land;...