№2 Impermanence

I dedicate today’s letter to the memory of my dad. He passed away unexpectedly last Friday at the ripe old age of 87. His 88th birthday would have been yesterday. Born into the fascist Nazi regime, my father later grew up in communist East Germany; he despised both forms of oppression. Despite these conditions, and undeterred from following his dreams of flying airplanes and seeing the world, he escaped East Germany in his 20s. He became a pilot with West Germany’s flag carrier, Lufthansa, for 36 years. He retired with his beloved biplane in the United States. Happy birthday, and rest in peace, Dad; happy flights wherever you are now.

Wolf H.O. Trautmann ٭October 16th, 1936 — ✝October 11th, 2024

Before my appointment with the funeral home director to discuss the details of what exactly should be done with my father's remains, I drove to the little hamlet of Ariel, Washington, in unincorporated Cowlitz County, to photograph its small post office. Ariel is located on the lower part of the Lewis River, about 11 miles east of Interstate 5. The town was originally located a few miles upriver but needed to be relocated in 1929 when the Merwin dam flooded the area. The hamlet was named by the first postmaster in 1899, who decided to name it after his son, Ariel.1

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As I took photos of the post office and its surroundings, an old lady emerged from the back of the building and suspiciously asked me what I was doing. She felt relieved when I introduced myself and told her about my post office project, and a conversation ensued. Her name was Shirley, and she had been the postmaster from 1967 until 1988; this one-room post office I was shooting was connected to her residence and had been here since 1971.

Shirley told me that before 1971, the post office had been co-located in a general store and tavern closer to the Merwin dam; the building was still there but empty. She gave me directions, and I decided to take a look.

When I saw the sign attached to the building, I immediately recalled the mysterious story of air pirate Dan “D.B.” Cooper. I decided to do additional research on the Ariel Store once I returned to the studio.

Built in 1929, the Ariel Store served as a general store, tavern, and post office for the workers who built the Merwin dam (the one that flooded the town's original location). Decades later, the building became the central point for one of the biggest manhunts in modern history.

On Thanksgiving Eve, November 24, 1971, a man by the name of D.B. Cooper hijacked a Boeing 727 passenger aircraft in Portland bound for Seattle. He demanded $200,000 in ransom and four parachutes. Upon receiving the money and equipment, he demanded to be flown to Mexico. Shortly into the Mexico-bound flight, Cooper put on a parachute, strapped on the bag of money, and jumped out of the plane's rear, never to be seen again. The Ariel Store, in the immediate area where he could have landed, became a hotspot for the hundreds of federal agents and soldiers conducting the manhunt for Cooper.

In 1974, the store’s owner decided to launch an annual event named, appropriately, the “D.B. Cooper Days Festival” to celebrate “the man that beat the man.” The festival attracted Cooper fans and conspiracy theorists of all types. Held shortly after Thanksgiving, the annual festival included food, music, dancing, lively exchanges about the D.B. Cooper mystery, and even a D.B. Cooper look-alike contest.

After 40 years of D.B. Cooper Days, the festival ended with Dona Elliott's death in 2015. Elliott had owned the store since 1990 and perfected the annual spectacle.2  Attempts to keep the business and festival going after Dona’s passing were not fruitful.

Here is a short video of Donna talking about the Ariel Store and D.B. Cooper Days on the History Channel 10 years ago; she died shortly after that.

Since this interview 10 years ago, the building has been in decline, as evidenced by my snap of the interior through a window.

As I’ve started in on this project to photograph small post offices across the West, I’m left with the feeling that I’m in a race against time to record artifacts and their stories before they’re forgotten and erased from the American landscape. Like realizing that my phone call last Thursday with Dad was the last one. This project — it’s a reminder of impermanence — of things, people, and places. Perhaps this project is my way to prevent what David Eagleman, in his book “Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives,” calls “the third death” from happening too soon.

Death and Nonbeing

We are all dying, every moment that passes of every day. That is the inescapable truth of this existence. It is a truth that can paralyze us with fear, or one that can energize us with impatience, with the desire to explore and experience, with the hope—nay, the iron will!— to find a memory in every action. To be alive, under sunshine, or starlight, in weather fair or stormy. To dance with every step, be they through gardens of flowers or through deep snows. (Salvatore, 2001, pp. 11-12)

P.S. The Washington State Historical Society has one of D.B. Cooper’s parachutes on exhibit. This artifact from this monumental crime is on display at the WSHS Museum in Tacoma, WA, until March 16th, 2025.