The Nehalem River Inn has been a social and commercial hub of the Nehalem-Mohler community since the 1930s, when it opened as a general store and later became a tavern and camp.
Michael Frank (M.F.) MacLeod, a native of Alaska who worked as a Southern Pacific railroad agent in Mohler and nearby Wheeler, opened MacLeod’s Tavern & Cabins in Mohler with his wife, Elberta Esther Brigham MacLeod.
M.F. passed away in 1937, commemorated as a “merchant and camp owner”, and he left the business to his wife Elberta.
Esther MacLeod
When Elberta MacLeod retired, her son Michael Frank MacLeod II and his wife Esther MacLeod took over MacLeod’s Tavern until 1980 when they sold the tavern to Laura Blanche Crawford, who renamed the tavern “Laura B’s.”
When the MacLeod’s sold the tavern, it was the oldest licensed tavern in Oregon under the same family name.
ABOUT MOHLER, OREGON
Originally named “Balm,” the community of Mohler opened its first post office in the late 1800s. It was renamed “Mohler” in 1911 in honor of former railroad executive Adam Leonides (A.L.) Mohler, who had served as president of the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company and Union Pacific Railroad.
Situated on the south fork of the Nehalem River, about three miles southeast of Nehalem, Mohler was promoted as a hub for timber, dairy, and fishing. With the railroad circling the town on three sides, some predicted that it would grow into “one of the best business towns in the Nehalem Valley.”
Today, Mohler is a small farming community and the smallest Unincorporated Community in Tillamook County.
HISTORIC MOHLER
For more information about the history of Mohler and Nehalem, visit the
Nehalem Valley Historical Society.