Oral history interview with Michele DeHart

Collection

Identifier: SR 2706

Staff Only

Transcript and digitized audio recording of interview

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Scope and Contents

Audio recording and transcript of an oral history interview with Michele DeHart that was conducted by Clark Hansen on December 11, 1998, at the Fish Passage Center in Portland, Oregon, as part of the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series.

In this interview, DeHart discusses her early interest in biology, and her reasons for studying fishery biology at the University of Washington in Seattle. She talks about her early jobs in fish management, including with the Washington Department of Fisheries and the National Marine Fisheries Service. She discusses the life cycles of different species of fish and how those life cycles influence the impact that the Columbia River dams have on the fish. She describes the history of efforts to conserve and restore fish runs in the Pacific Northwest, and talks about the lack of leadership willing to call out ineffective policies. She shares her thoughts on the relationship between humans and the natural world. She talks about the feasibility of energy sources other than hydropower, and about the likelihood of fish run restoration. She describes the formation of the Fish Passage Center, talks about the effects of the 1980 Northwest Power Act, and shares her opinion on the effectiveness of the Northwest Power Planning Council (now the Northwest Power and Conservation Council). She speaks about her accomplishments as manager of the Fish Passage Center, about opposition to dam removal proposals, and about the U.S.-Canada salmon treaty. She closes the interview by sharing her opinion on fish hatcheries as a conservation measure.

Dates

Creation: 1998 December 11

Creator

DeHart, Michele (Michele Claudette), 1950- (Interviewee, Person)
Hansen, Clark (Interviewer, Person)

Conditions Governing Access

Collection is open for research.

Conditions Governing Use

Copyright for this interview is held by the Oregon Historical Society. Use is allowed according to the following statement: Creative Commons - BY-NC-SA, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/

Biographical note

Michele Claudette DeHart, nee Navant, was born in Marseilles, France, in 1950. Around 1955, she moved with her mother to the United States. In 1972, she earned a bachelor’s degree in fish biology from the University of Washington in Seattle. She worked as a stream surveyor for the Washington Department of Fisheries, and as a biologist for the National Marine Fisheries Service, now known as NOAA Fisheries. In 1987, she became manager for the Fish Passage Center in Portland, Oregon.

She married twice, first to David R. Anderson in 1972. They divorced in 1975, and she remarried, to Douglas A. DeHart, in 1981.

Sources: Vital records in Ancestry.com; Information provided by DeHart in her interview; Declaration of Michele DeHart, in DeHart, Berggren, Filardo, Benner and Franzoni v. Bonneville Power Administration, Civil No. 06-369-HA, September 4, 2007 (accessed December 2025), https://peer.org/wp-content/uploads/attachments/06_16_3_dehart.pdf

Historical note

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), https://columbiariverhistory.org/; email correspondence with Donna Sinclair, 2025; email correspondence with Tania Hyatt, 2025; Oregon Historical Society Research Library internal documentation.

Extent

0.1 Cubic Feet (3 audiocassettes (3 hr., 1 min., 28 sec.) + transcript (77 pages))

Language of Materials

English

Additional Description

Abstract

Oral history interview with Michele DeHart, conducted by Clark Hansen on December 11, 1998, as part of the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series. DeHart discusses her work as a fish biologist and as manager of the Fish Passage Center in Portland, Oregon, and talks about fish conservation measures in the Columbia River Basin.

Existence and Location of Copies

Audio and transcript available online in OHS Digital Collections.

General

Forms part of the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series.

Processing Information

This interview was previously cataloged as part of SR 2700.1, the Center for Columbia River History Oral Histories. SR 2700.1 included oral histories gathered for two separate projects: those conducted by the Oregon Historical Society Research Library for the Columbia River Dissenters Oral History Series, and those collected by the Center for Columbia River History for its Columbia Communities Project. In 2024-2025, as part of digitization of the Dissenters interviews, the collection was reprocessed to separate the two sets of interviews for improved access. Each of the 59 Columbia River Dissenters interviews was cataloged individually under the name of the interviewee. The interviews for the Communities project were kept together as a single collection that was redesignated as SRC 1, Columbia Communities Project oral histories.