2019 Portland Rose Festival Medallion Hunt

Introductory clue. No hints here except the last word.

The 2018 hunt contained many references to past winners, dates, and locations where the medallion has been hidden. This year did not. The last word of the clue also comes into play.

The line that is described is the section of county line separating Multnomah and Clackamas (two peoples) counties that is between the Willamette River and the I-5 freeway. It also is the line between Township 1 South and Township 2 South. If you extend that line in both directions you have the southern boundary of your search area. Again, the last word is also a clue.

This clue is designed to help later in the hunt, because once the search area is narrowed considerably, this clue can confirm that you’re in the right place. The first street to the north of where the medallion was hidden is called Blueridge Drive. “Roads” in the first line of the clue points to John Denver’s “Country Roads.” In that song, he refers to the Blue Ridge Mountains of West Virginia. It was adopted as one of the two state songs of West Virginia. Additionally, a “bar” is another term for a measure, or section of a song, and the hunt’s big star is the medallion.

And like the first three clues, the last word is part of another clue.

Archimedes, the Greek mathematician, is quoted as saying, “Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.” The shortest route between CTC (Clackamas Town Center) and the Roseway neighborhood is a straight line up 82nd Avenue. Archimedes is also the one who stated the mathematical rule that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. The medallion was hidden in Waterhouse Powerline Park. A sign on Walker Road also refers to it as a “linear” park. And yes, the last word of the clue is important.

The I-205 freeway is also known as East Portland Highway No. 64, which now becomes the eastern boundary of the search area. This is also the final clue in which the last word is part of an upcoming clue.

The words “a mixup” are a hint that some of the following letters are an anagram. The last line tells you that it is the eight letters that immediately follow. An anagram of “at latifa” is atfalati. Queen Latifah is a native of Newark, New Jersey, but the Atfalati were a Native American people whose home included the Forest Grove, Tualatin and Beaverton areas.

Waterhouse Powerline Park is in Beaverton.

In the movie "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial", Elliott leaves a trail of Reese's Pieces to entice E.T. The film's producers first contacted the Mars Company, makers of M&Ms, for permission to use their product. They declined the offer, which they later regretted. The Hershey Company was contacted next, and they agreed to have their candy featured in the scene. Sales of Reese's Pieces subsequently skyrocketed.

MM is also an abbreviation for millimeters, and the number at the bottom of the clue is expressed in scientific notation. 50,763,800,000,000 square millimeters are equal to 19.6 square miles, the area of the city of Beaverton according to its own website.

The words in the second line “at the end” are a hint to look at the end of each clue. This gives you “tee won north are one west”, or T 1 North, R 1 West, coordinates of the Willamette Meridian. When put together with previous clues, this greatly narrows the remaining search area.

“Claim” in the fourth line is an indication that this clue refers to DLC's, which stands for Donation Land Claims. The Donation Land Act, passed by Congress on Sept. 27, 1850, granted free land to any settler, provided they lived upon and cultivated their claim for four consecutive years.

“Captain Jack” is Captain John Clary, whose claim includes Montavilla Park. “Quinn” refers to Terrence Quinn, originally from Ireland. His claim is in the Laurelhurst neighborhood, including Laurelhurst Park. “King” is Amos Nahum King, born in Ohio in 1822. He traveled the Oregon Trail in 1845 with his father, three brothers, and five sisters. His claim includes the northern part of Washington Park.

If you draw a line from John Clary’s claim through Terrence Quinn’s to Amos King’s, (more or less following Glisan Street) and then go that same distance again along that same line, you arrive close to Waterhouse Powerline Park.

“Artie Junior” backwards is Junior Artie, or JRRT, which is the initials of John Ronald Reuel Tolkien. “Three” refers to his Lord of the Rings trilogy, of which the “middle” one is titled "The Two Towers.” Through the length of Waterhouse Powerline Park there are many sets of two towers, but the tower closest to where the medallion was hidden has a large metal plate with the number two printed on it. “Middle” is a double hint, because Middle Earth is the setting of much of Tolkien’s writings.

This clue is giving you the name of the park, but it’s all about the Academy Awards. The first line refers to Oscar, the statuette. “Account” in the third line is pointing to the accounting firm of Pricewaterhouse Coopers, which tabulates the results of the voting and produces the famous sealed envelopes. “Gary and Brad” are Gary Cooper and Bradley Cooper, both of whom were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, with Gary winning twice. (“Sergeant York,” “High Noon”) So if you take Pricewaterhouse Coopers and subtract the price on its head and lose the Coopers, you’re left with Waterhouse, the name of the park.

Under the U.S. Public Land Survey System, now administered by the BLM, there are 37 rectangular survey principal meridians in the United States. The Willamette Meridian System covers all of Oregon and Washington in a grid pattern of townships and ranges. The baseline runs west to the Pacific and east to the Snake River, while the meridian runs north to Puget Sound and south to the California border. The survey’s initial point, where the meridian and baseline intersect, was established in the West Hills on June 4, 1851. The site is now enclosed in Willamette Stone State Park near Northwest Skyline Boulevard.

“D” is the Roman numeral for 500, and the medallion was hidden less than 500 feet north of the baseline.

Before the Newberg-Dundee bypass was completed, traffic congestion was a chronic problem in the area, especially on Sunday afternoons. It was known as the Dundee bottleneck. About 500 feet north of Walker Road, the footpath through Waterhouse Powerline Park goes through a bottleneck as it crosses a stream. The medallion was hidden in the rocks beside the path. (This was not intended to imply that anyone is an ignoramus. It just conveniently rhymed.)

These are all hints to help solve 11 of the previous clues. They are in order, except two of them refer to multiple clues. (Mathematicians rule! - clues #5 and #8, and a band of native groups - clues #3 and #7.)

The rocks beside the path over the creek were wrapped in cyclone fencing material to keep them in place. There was just enough room in one spot to get your hand between the fencing and the stone to feel a large open space underneath. Additionally, if you knelt on the path and looked over the edge, the metal box was partially visible.