Oral history interview with Mark L. Ufkes, 2000 January 26

Mark L. Ufkes was born in 1955 and grew up in the Tri-Cities, in Washington state, where his father, Leon Ufkes, worked at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Mark Ufke earned three degrees from Washington State University in Pullman: a bachelor's degree in business administration in 1977, a bachelor's degree in agricultural economics in 1985, and a master's degree in adult education in 1987. He later also earned a master's degree in public administration from Harvard University in 1994. In 1991, he and Lois A. Schipper were married. In the late 1990s, he started Hanford Reach Columbia River Tours, a business operating jet boat tours on the Columbia River in the Tri-Cities area. In 2005, he began working with Indian River Development Services, an organization providing consulting services to tribal governments. In the mid-2010s, he served as executive director for the Quileute Tribe in La Push, Washington.

Sources: Vital records in Ancestry.com; information provided by Ufkes in his interview; "Jet Boat Skippers Starting to Offer Reach Tours," by John Stang, Tri-City Herald, June 13, 1996, Page C1; "Tri-City Riverboat Competition Heating Up," by Mike Lee, Tri-City Herald, May 24, 1998, Page A8; "Candy Mountain seller grateful for new park," by Wendy Culverwell, May 3, 2016, Tri-City Herald; "Remembering Leon B. Ufkes, 1926-2023," West Seattle Blog, December 15, 2023 (accessed February 2026), https://westseattleblog.com/2023/12/remembering-leon-b-ufkes-1926-2023/; "Classmate Notes," ReConnect, 2015, Page 23 (accessed February 2026), https://wpcdn.web.wsu.edu/cahnrs/uploads/sites/4/ReConnect15-low.pdf; Ufkes's profile on LinkedIn.com.

In 1990, the Washington State Historical Society, Portland State University, and Washington State University Vancouver formed the Center for Columbia River History (CCRH) to promote research, education, and public programs about the Columbia River Basin. The center operated for more than 20 years. Among its work was the Columbia River Basin Project (CRBP), an umbrella project supported by a 1997 grant from the U.S. Department of Education. The CRBP included online exhibits, oral histories, and high school curricula about the history of the region's land, wildlife, and people.

As part of the project, CCRH partnered with the Oregon Historical Society Research Library’s oral history program, headed by Jim Strassmaier, to gather interviews. Oral Historian Michael O’Rourke spearheaded the Northwest Power Planning Council Oral History Series, while Oral Historian Clark Hansen oversaw the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series, with aid from two Portland State University research assistants, Dannette Rowe and Tania Hyatt. In addition, CCRH conducted oral history interviews for a third project, Columbia Communities, and later donated the interview recordings and transcripts to the OHS Research Library, where they are designated SRC 1.

The Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series culminated in 59 interviews (approximately 184 recorded hours) conducted between 1998 and 2001. Interviewees included Native people, activists, farmers, conservationists, fishers, and others who contributed to the shaping of policies that have had, and continue to have, significant impacts on the Columbia River Basin in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and British Columbia. The interviewees opposed policies by agencies such as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Bonneville Power Administration, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and advocated for alternative visions of management and use of the Columbia River.

Sources: “Voices of the Columbia,” by Bryan White, PSU Magazine, Fall 1998, Page 17; Center for Columbia River History brochure, undated (circa 2000); Center for Columbia River History website (accessed July 10, 2025, partially archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250215175329/https://columbiariverhistory.org/; email correspondence with Donna Sinclair, 2025; email correspondence with Tania Hyatt, 2025; Oregon Historical Society Research Library internal documentation.