History
The name Yamsay is a corruption of the Klamath (a Native American tribe of Southern Oregon) name Yamsi, a form of Yamash, meaning "north wind." This mountain was supposed to be the home of Kmukamtch, the supreme being of Klamath mythology. Historically, the area by the mountain was inhabited by Klamath, Modoc, and Yahooskin Bands, all of the Snake Paiute People. The Yahooskins lived east of Yamsay Mountain, near modern-day Lakeview. Their group inhabited 22 million acres (8.9 ha) of land in Oregon and California. Traders entered the area at some point between 1825 and 1827, where they worked as trappers for the Hudson's Bay Company. After routes opened up in 1846, Fort Klamath was built (in 1863).
The city of Klamath Falls (southeast of Yamsay) sprang up in the 1920s, and featured the fastest-growing population in Oregon. Contributors to this new growth and development included the creation of the Southern Pacific Railroad, completed in 1909. This opened the area for logging and timber business, which became the focus of the profit of the area.
The mountain features a United States Forest Service fire lookout tower with an 80-foot (24 m) steel tower, built on the summit of Yamsay in 1929. It was removed after the 1970s, and only remnants of the foundation remain today. A dirt road was built to the summit to service the lookout, but this was abandoned after the tower was removed. The upper 3.5 miles (5.6 km) now form a hiking trail to the summit.
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“A poet’s object is not to tell what actually happened but what could or would happen either probably or inevitably.... For this reason poetry is something more scientific and serious than history, because poetry tends to give general truths while history gives particular facts.”
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