Through a pandemic, an inferno and an ice storm, the Trio Tavern in Mill City, Oregon keeps on cookin’.
The year 2020 started off with what would eventually become a raging pandemic.
In March of that year, all of us had to make drastic changes to our daily lives, isolating, quarantining, masking and social distancing. The COVID-19 virus spread rapidly, taking out millions of people around the world. Many are still reeling from its effects.
Especially hard hit were those in the food service industry, and the Trio Tavern in Mill City, Oregon (pop. about 2000) was no exception.
This little restaurant and bar (proudly called a "dive bar" by owners and employees) had always catered to locals from the region, serving up some of the best food and cocktails in the two counties that the small town straddles.
When the pandemic struck, the Trio had to close its doors.
Waiting daily on changing instructions from Oregon’s governor regarding what COVID restrictions would be put in place, its owners reluctantly halted their friendly operation. And bit their nails. As their main source of income, closing the tavern impacted not only their livelihoods, but those of their long-time employees.
Father-and-daughter team Chris and Sara Kelley didn’t give up. Instead, they improvised.
Serving to-go food during the weeks that stretched into months when no entry into their establishment was allowed, the Trio’s kitchen stoves kept burning. Their few workers – albeit working fewer hours – were still employed.
As patrons were allowed to start trickling back into Oregon restaurants, the Kelleys learned to physically distance regulars, serving several feet apart at the bar whenever necessary. Of course, social distancing rules impacted their seating capacity. Less customers meant less income.
To combat the problem with space, the Trio opened up an adjacent patio as an outdoor seating area to accommodate more tables. They installed heaters and a tent, and decorated the area. Locals nicknamed it the “beer garden.” Now they could serve more people, and keep regulars happy.
They were staying afloat, though the sea of the hospitality industry was awash with permanent closures.
Turns out the pandemic was just the beginning of their worries.
One morning in mid-August 2020, thunderstorms moved across Oregon, with lightning igniting several wildfires in the vicinity. A power line was downed, and another fire started. Smoke from the wildfires spread throughout the West and along the Pacific coast. Mill City was no exception. The sky around the town was dreadfully dark.
The smoke was only a warning of what was to come.
According to one Mill City resident, wildfires were spreading so quickly around the state that the governor told local agencies to stand down, in order to battle bigger blazes. The town was now in grave danger.
The fire started in the foothills of the Cascades near Detroit Lake, about 30 miles away. Winds up to 50, 60 and 70 miles per hour came from the east. The fire burned 12 acres, then 28 acres, then 128 acres, up to 2000.
Three wildfires burning became one, and due to the steep terrain, there was little that could be done. With other active fires in the region, local forestry officials were virtually helpless.
The fire district didn’t have the resources to fight it. "The governor said to just let it burn,” said Kelley. In his southern lilt, he quipped, “Then it was Katie bar the door.”
In other words, Big Trouble was on its way. Local communities were left to fend for themselves.
A Trio customer from the neighboring town of Gates watched as the local schoolhouse near his home caught fir. Though he called 9-1-1, water tankers, fire trucks, and firemen there couldn’t help.
“We’ve got stand-down orders,” the fire chief was said to report. “We can’t do a thing.”
When the fire reached Mill City, its fire department took a different stance. Mill City residents were evacuated, and the Kelleys, along with many other families, found refuge in Salem or other neighboring cities. Meanwhile, the Mill City Fire Department disobeyed orders and stood up against the flames, saving the town’s nucleus.
While evacuated, the Trio's owners got phone calls from a loyal customer and friend that refused to leave town. He kept them updated regarding their historic home and their neighborhood watering hole. Miraculously, neither were harmed, but many homes in Mill City were destroyed.
It was “...a surreal scene. The sky was black, like midnight on a moonless night, with dense smoke and ash in the air. But much of the town remained.”
(from “Rare fire good news: Mill City mayor says town ‘relatively unscathed’”, written by Amelia Templeton of the OPB, Sept. 10, 2020)
“It’s weird how some houses made it through, and some lost everything. That is the random nature of what burned and what didn’t,” commented Kelley.
Many residents are convinced that their town suffered unnecessarily, due to the governor’s orders.
In the aftermath of the fire, the Trio reopened, providing firefighters and houseless locals with comfort inside their walls and meals to go, offering the best form of community service they could administer.
Amazingly, the Santiam Fire – not completely extinguished until December – wasn’t the end of the plagues affecting Mill City. In early 2021, as homes were being rebuilt and residents were recovering, a freak ice storm reached the town.
"It’s surprising the damage it did," said Kelley. "First we had COVID, then fire, then more COVID. On the heels of that we had an ice storm. It was a freak thing that nobody expected. It started raining, then got so cold. Frozen telephone poles and trees were falling down on Highway 22. Frozen trees were falling on top of burnt trees.”
No matter what has struck the small town of Mill City – pandemic, wildfire, or ice storm – it has survived. And the Trio Tavern is doing better than ever.
When many residents of Mill City had no homes and no food, or were isolated or quarantined due to COVID, some that hadn’t been to the tavern in over 40 years stopped in for a bite to eat. These “old-timers” told the Kelleys how the Trio never looked the way it does now.
“We did much to stay open and feed a lot of people,” said Kelley. “We sold food out the door as long as we could. We got a lot of people that never came before; we got a lot of new customers.”
During the tough times the town has recently encountered, the Kelleys feel that the Trio created a safe haven for many in Mill City, and the surrounding area. They fed firemen and others who volunteered to help. Many locals wanted to come in for a beer simply to talk about all that had happened, to vent, and to share stories. Others needed something good to eat.
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