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The Goldendale Sentinel, Goldendale, WA., October 20, 1955, page 7

CAMAS PRAIRIE
History of the Glenwood Area
BY JOSIE TROH

Any man who remembers when White Salmon consisted of two houses and a combined store and a postoffice certainly is entitled to be called a pioneer.
John G. Wyers knew White Salmon when it was a "two-house" town. He raised wheat in what is now the north end of the western Klickitat county town and remembers when it the only use to which the timber was put was for fuel for the homes and to stock the steamers that plied the Columbia fifty years or so ago.
This intimate knowledge of White Salmon and its history doesn't mean that Wyers hasn't been around. In fact, he had to come a long way ever to become a Klickitat County pioneer.
He was born in Zevenaar, Holland, April 12, 1871, the son of Teunis and Marie Wyers, and came to the United States in 1888 with his parents. After farming for three years of near Omega, Kansas, the family, which consisted of the parents and John and Teunis, Jr., decided to move further west.
John G. was chosen as the trailblazer, making the trip from Kansas to The Dalles, Oregon by train, then catching a river boat to White Salmon, where he arrived in July of the same year and went to farming on Camas Prairie. The other members of the family followed a few months later.
Wyers remained on the Camas Prairie farm until 1905 when he built a house in White Salmon and moved to town with his wife, whom he had married, in 1899, and his young son, Teunis, Jr., who is now a district attorney at Hood River.
His first business venture in White Salmon was a butcher business which he operated until 1916, when he sold it. For the next six years he served as a county commissioner from his district and in 1922 formed the Wyers Trading Co., which he operated until 1940, when he retired. Since that time he has maintained his deep interest in local and county affairs and enjoys visiting old scenes and remarking at the changes that have transpired since the first saw them more than a half-century ago.
He visited in Goldendale last Tuesday, accompanying the County Commissioner Loren Triplett by way of Glenwood: Along the Goldendale-Glenwood road Wyers pointed out many places he remembered from the days he hauled flour along that route by freight wagon from the Goldendale mill.
To show that retirement and didn't mean sitting around in a rocking chair to John G. Wyers is the fact that he flew back to Holland for a summer visit.
This was his second visit to Holland and since coming to this country. He was there in the 1927, making that trip by boat and being accompanied by his brother, Teunis Wyers, who also qualifies as a pioneer of the county.
When John Wyers, of White Salmon, first came to the northwest, he was considered a "tenderfoot" among his fellows, although practically everyone but an Indian held that classification backing in 1871.
He filed on a homestead back in the Gilmer valley, between White Salmon and Glenwood, and soon after coming, several of the "old timers" decided to give the young tender foot an initiation. Jake Claterbos, R. Heyting, C.W. Chapman and George Gilmer were among those who planned the joke. They caught a black bear in a trap and decided to take it alive for, impressing upon Wyers that this was customary. One of the men lassoed the bear's front legs, and John was to hold behind legs during the process of capturing the animal alive. John carrying out his part with a slight feeling of apprehension. During of the process, the bear got loose, ripped John's clothes off, and bit his leg above the knee.

HAS "BEAR BITE"

The joke had turned out a little beyond what had been anticipated. To this day John has a nice "bear bite" to remind him that he is no longer a tenderfoot.
He was born in 1871 in Zevenaar, Holland, just across the border from Germany. There and in Arnheim he had his schooling. In 1888 his parents and six children came across the Atlantic aboard the Ryndam, a Red Star liner making the trip from Antwerp in nine days. In May they went to Kansas, where they stayed with distant relatives.

COMES TO KLICKITAT

In 1901 John came to Klickitat first going to the Gilmer Valley for about a year. Then he moved to the old Byrkett place in Bingen. Next he moved to the H.D. Cole place in Laurel, and in 1905 he came to White Salmon. There was not a town at all of then; only two houses had been built, and surveys were just being made. John built the first house on the bluff overlooking the scenic Columbia.
In 1896 his father built the White Salmon Hotel, an early landmark is still standing.
John Wyers has turned his hand at various things. In 1905 he became the road supervisor until 1909. In 1907 until 1916 he ran a butcher shop, the White Salmon Dressed Meat company, which is still using the same old picture on the checks. In 1908 he became a county commissioner. In 1922 he was manager of the Columbia Fruit Union, and later started a store which is now the Wyers Trading company, which he sold to Doherty and Kreps in 1940.
John Wyers is perhaps the best versed pioneer in this county on early days history and enjoys meeting and takes an active part in helping preserve the early day history of this county.
John's brother is Tune (Teunis) Wyers, who was featured during a summer issue of The Sentinel for a ride which he made on horseback from White Salmon to Glenwood in which he followed the same trail where he carried the first mail to be taken into the then wild outpost. There have been three men named Teunis in the family: John's father, his brother and his son, an attorney in Hood River. John's grandfather was named Jan and so is his grandson.