Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Services in Metolius, OR

Metolius is a city in Jefferson County, Oregon, incorporated in 1913 and named for the Metolius River, a nearby tributary of the Deschutes River.

The name comes from the Warm Springs or Sahaptin word mitula, meaning white salmon and referring to a light-colored Chinook salmon, not a whitefish.

As of the 2020 census, Metolius had a population of 978 and 338 households, with a median age of 34.8 years.

The city covers 0.48 square miles, all land, at an elevation of 2,530 feet.

Metolius was founded in the early 1900s, and in February 1911 the Oregon Trunk Railroad built a depot, turntable, and roundhouse in the town, choosing it as a servicing spot where railroad engines could take on water.

By 1917 the town had grown to over 1,700 people with two banks, two newspapers, a flour mill, hotels, and general stores, but as railroad technology improved and maintenance stations were needed less often, the Metolius shop was eliminated and the town went into decline.

A major fire in the 1920s destroyed most of the downtown buildings, drought from 1924 to 1926 bankrupted many farmers, and by 1945 the population was down to about 45 people.

An irrigation project diverting water from the Deschutes River revived farming, and by 1960 over 3,000 railroad cars of fresh potatoes were loaded from the area each year, until a potato blight of nematodes ended large-scale potato production in 1968.

A fire in the city's post office around 1970 led to the loss of the community's ZIP code, after which it shared nearby Madras's code, until city leaders enlisted U.S. Representative Greg Walden's help to reclaim its own code in late 2003.

Metolius Elementary grew out of the 1913 high school building, and over half of its students speak Spanish at home, reflecting Spanish-speaking families who began settling in the 1950s for field and potato-shed work.