Hinkle is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...

along the

Umatilla River The Umatilla River is an tributary of the Columbia River in northern Umatilla County, Oregon, United States. Draining a basin of , it enters the Columbia near the city of Umatilla in the northeastern part of the state. In downstream order, begi ...

in northwestern

Umatilla County Umatilla County () is one of the 36 counties in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2020 census, the population was 80,075. Hermiston is the largest city in Umatilla County, but Pendleton remains the county seat. Umatilla County is part of ...

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

, United States. It is south of Hermiston, near Interstate 84/

U.S. Route 30 U.S. Route 30 or U.S. Highway 30 (US 30) is an east–west main route in the system of the United States Numbered Highways, with the highway traveling across the northern tier of the country. With a length of , it is the third longest ...

and

Oregon Route 207 Oregon Route 207 is an Oregon state highway running from U.S. Route 26 in Mitchell to U.S. Route 730 near Cold Springs Junction. OR 207 is long and runs north–south. Part of OR 207 is included in the Blue Mountain Scenic Byway. Ro ...

, within the Pendleton–Hermiston Micropolitan Statistical Area. It is the site of the

Union Pacific Railroad The Union Pacific Railroad , legally Union Pacific Railroad Company and often called simply Union Pacific, is a freight-hauling railroad that operates 8,300 locomotives over routes in 23 U.S. states west of Chicago and New Orleans. Union Paci ...

's (UP) Hinkle Locomotive Service and Repair Facility, part of the Hinkle Freight Classification Yard.

History

Hinkle was a railway junction where a cutoff to Boardman rejoined the main line of the Oregon Railway & Navigation Company that ran from Umatilla to Huntington. When the cutoff was built in 1915, a station was needed at the junction with the main line, and Joseph T. Hinkle, a prominent local attorney, newspaper editor and politician, sold the railroad a small amount of land for that purpose. The station was named in his honor. According to the compilers of ''

Oregon Geographic Names ''Oregon Geographic Names'' is a compilation of the origin and meaning of place names in the U.S. state of Oregon, published by the Oregon Historical Society. The book was originally published in 1928. It was compiled and edited by Lewis A. McArth ...

'', the community of Hinkle "languished in obscurity for a third of a century", until 1951, when the completion of the McNary Dam flooded the former route of the UP's line. When the tracks were relocated, UP built a major

yard The yard (symbol: yd) is an English unit of length in both the British imperial and US customary systems of measurement equalling 3 feet or 36 inches. Since 1959 it has been by international agreement standardized as exactly 0.914 ...

at the junction, expanding it beginning in 1976. From 1977 until 1997, Hinkle was a passenger stop on

Amtrak The National Railroad Passenger Corporation, Trade name, doing business as Amtrak () , is the national Passenger train, passenger railroad company of the United States. It operates inter-city rail service in 46 of the 48 contiguous United Stat ...

's ''

Pioneer Pioneer commonly refers to a settler who migrates to previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited land. In the United States pioneer commonly refers to an American pioneer, a person in American history who migrated west to join in settling and de ...

'' route; the station code was HIK. Hinkle was previously a stop on the UP's '' City of Portland'' route, with connections to

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

. The station code used by train telegraphers and trainmen was UK.

References

External links

Images of Hinkle
from Flickr Unincorporated communities in Umatilla County, Oregon Unincorporated communities in Oregon {{UmatillaCountyOR-geo-stub

History

See also

References

External links