Floyd William Harvey was born in Lewiston, Idaho, in 1925. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Army Air Force. He earned a bachelor's degree in business administration and foreign trade from Washington State College (now Washington State University) in Pullman in 1950, and started a river tourism business near the Hells Canyon area in 1968. In the 1960s, Harvey was among those who lobbied against private utilities and public power agencies over the proposed construction of the High Mountain Sheep Dam in Hells Canyon near the confluence of the Snake and the Salmon rivers. After the Federal Power Commission issued a license for the dam in February 1964 despite opposition, the U.S. Department of the Interior sued. In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a majority opinion written by Chief Justice William O. Douglas, ruled against the commission, ordering it to reconsider, and the dam was ultimately never built. Harvey, as a result of his lobbying efforts, appeared on the television program “To Tell the Truth.” He died in 2010.

Sources: Vital records on Ancestry.com; information provided by Harvey in his interview; Harvey’s obituary in The Lewiston Tribune, August 10, 2010; “Floyd Harvey, Hells Canyon Advocate Dead at 84,” by Eric Barker, Lewiston Tribune, August 13, 2010; "Hells Canyon," Northwest Power and Conservation Council website (undated, accessed January 2026), https://www.nwcouncil.org/reports/columbia-river-history/hellscanyon/

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.