Sternberg is a community elder in Camp Sherman

Jim Sternberg, 86, has been a fixture in Camp Sherman for over 20 years.

He is one of the last of the “grumpy old men,” the 10 old-timers who sat on the benches outside the Camp Sherman Store, drinking coffee and swapping yarns.

“People would come up to us and ask if they could take our picture,” said Jim at his home. “Only Vic Johnson and myself are left from that group. In winter, there’s a pot of coffee inside the post office for us. It was originally for the ‘old men’ but anybody could take a cup and nobody asked about it.”

Sternberg lives near the store on a 15-acre site leased to him by the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife (ODFW). In winter, a blazing pellet stove warms his comfortable home.

“There used to be a fish hatchery here,” he said. “Before that, there was a dairy. ‘Cold Springs’ was where they kept the milk and butter cool before delivering it. In those days, that was raw milk.”

More recently, ODFW tried reintroducing native salmon in the Metolius River with incubator boxes located on this land where the creek runs into the river. Sternberg helped raise these fish for this ambitious project on Spring Creek (The Nugget, December 15, 1999; and March 22, 2000).

Sternberg was born in Seattle in 1919, worked as a painter, then migrated to Camp Sherman and served as caretaker at Metolius Meadows for many years.

He made a unique connection with the history of the area a few years ago.

“I found a time capsule from 1938 behind one of the walls in my home five years ago,” Sternberg recalled. “It listed family history about the Madsen family (The Nugget, May 16, 2001). “I wrote my own message and put it back in the original Alka-Seltzer bottle I found and placed it behind the wall. I don’t know if anybody in the future will find it but it’s there.”

Sternberg was co-winner of Camp Sherman’s “Volunteer of the Year” award in 1998 with his buddy, Vic Johnson, awarded by the Camp Sherman Community Association.

Sternberg crafted the “Welcome to Camp Sherman” sign and the two entry signs at Metolius Meadows were also his work.