Oral history interview with David Campiche

David Allen Campiche was born in Chicago, Illinois, in 1948, and grew up in Long Beach, Washington. In 1971, he earned a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Oregon. He became a potter and ceramic artist, and returned to Washington, where he operated an art gallery in Long Beach. During the 1990s, Campiche also served on the board of directors of the Willapa Bay Alliance, an affiliate of Ecotrust.

Campiche married Laurie J. Anderson in 1979, and they had three children. From 1977 to 2018, Campiche and Anderson owned The Shelburne Inn (now the Shelburne Hotel) in Seaview, Washington. They operated the China Beach Retreat (now Baker Bay Retreat) in Ilwaco, Washington, from 1998 to the early 2020s.

Sources: Vital records on Ancestry.com; information provided by Campiche in his interview; “The Hip New Historic Shelburne Hotel on the Washington Coast,” by Elizabeth Rose, Wander with Wonder website, April 26, 2018 (accessed May 23, 2025), https://www.wanderwithwonder.com/shelburne-hotel-long-beach-peninsula/; Hotel Adrift Hospitality website (accessed June 2026), https://adrifthospitality.com/shelburne-hotel/history/; “China Beach Retreat,” The New York Optimist (accessed June 2026), https://www.thenewyorkoptimist.net/china-beach-retreat.html

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, partially archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20250215175329/https://columbiariverhistory.org/; email correspondence with Donna Sinclair, 2025; email correspondence with Tania Hyatt, 2025; Oregon Historical Society Research Library internal documentation.