unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
Oregon
Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...
Oregon Route 53
Oregon Route 53 is an Oregon state highway that runs through a pair of river valleys in the Oregon Coast range; those of the Necanicum River and the Nehalem River. OR 53 traverses the Necanicum Highway No. 46 of the Oregon state hi ...
, near the Nehalem River. Foss is the site of an important river flood gauge.
Foss was named for Herbert Foss, who owned timber in the area. Foss post office ran from 1928 to 1943, and Foss station on the
Southern Pacific Railroad
The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials) was an American Railroad classes#Class I, Class I Rail transport, railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was oper ...
(now the Port of Tillamook Bay Railroad) was established shortly after the post office. Camp Nehalem (also known as Camp Foss), a
Civilian Conservation Corps
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a voluntary government unemployment, work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men ages 18–25 and eventually expanded to ages 17–28. The CCC was ...
(CCC) camp northeast of Foss, had a Foss mailing address.
Geography
Foss is only 474 acres in area. It lies in the Northwestern region of Oregon at a low elevation near the ocean surrounded by the highest mountains of the Oregon Coastal Range.
Climate
Foss has a borderline cool-summer Mediterranean and oceanic climate with cool, extremely rainy winters, with only 2 inches of snowfall annually, while the summers are mild with light precipitation. Because it lies at a low elevation surrounded by higher mountains near the ocean, heavy amounts of moisture get trapped in the region resulting in plentiful and heavy rainfall.