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Mrs. Robert R. Thompson
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Robert R. (R.R.) Thompson
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When R. R. Thompson built his stately home in 1936, Franklin Roosevelt was President and the country was beginning to pull out of the Great Depression. Gutzon Borglum was in the midst of his 14-year-long sculpting of Mount Rushmore, and Jesse Owens, the great African-American track and field star, stunned the Third Reich by winning four gold medals at the Summer Olympic Games in Berlin.
This is part of the history being made in America during the period the R. R. Thompson House was constructed. R. R. was the grandson of Robert R. Thompson, also known as R. R., an Oregon pioneer who made his fortune in river commerce, establishing the Oregon Steam Navigation Company. The enormous wealth of the senior R. R. called for someone to manage it, and he entrusted his grandson with that role. The News Register described the economic power of the senior Robert R. as follows: “Probably the single most prominent among the family patriarchs was a man who amassed a fortune building frontier infrastructure, then set his sights on the area’s rural riches: Robert R. Thompson, known as R. R.” (February 17, 2007).
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