Fine-Quality Cheddar Mainstay of Oregon County’s Economy : People of Tillamook Love to Say Cheese

For nearly a century, Tillamook has been synonymous with Cheddar cheese.

In Tillamook County, a lush, green patchwork quilt of small dairy farms lying between the rain-soaked Coast Range and the Pacific Ocean, cheese is the biggest thing going.

Even the local high school’s athletic team is called the Cheesemakers, a word emblazoned on the school’s football grandstand as you enter the south end of town.

Tillamook Natural Cheddar Cheese, the product of a 208-member diary cooperative, has grown in popularity year by year since it was first made near the turn of the century.

Last year’s sales by the Tillamook County Creamery Assn. totaled $75 million--triple the sales of 10 years ago. In 1984, the cheese makers--the real ones, not the high school team--sold 26.8 million pounds of Tillamook. Forty percent of the cheese was sold in Oregon and Washington, 40% in California and the rest in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana and Arizona.

“The bottom line is that the farmers here produce the highest quality milk produced anywhere in the nation,” insists Harold Schild, 47, assistant manager and official spokesman for the Tillamook County Creamery Assn. “Excellent milk means excellent cheese.”

The first cheese makers came to Tillamook (from the Indian word killimuck ) County in the late 1800s, drawn by abundant water, lush grass and a mild climate--the sort of combination that makes for contented cows.

Many of the dairy farmers came from Switzerland, including Schild’s grandfather. But one Canadian immigrant, Peter McIntosh, left his mark in 1894 when he began making cheese the way they did it in the village of Cheddar near Bristol, England.

Tillamook cheese was launched.

The Tillamook County Creamery Assn. was formed in 1909 as a quality-control organization for the 25 independent cheese factories that existed then in Tillamook County. By 1918 the cooperative had become a marketing agency as well. But it wasn’t until 1968 that all of the factories consolidated operations under one roof--that of the co-op’s big cheese factory that was built in 1949.

Many of the descendants of the pioneering families have sold out in the last 10 years as grandchildren decided on other endeavors. But about 30 of the original Swiss families continue to run dairies in the county.

About 50 of the co-op’s members are dairymen from California, mostly of Dutch descent, who were squeezed out by urban development.

These days, these small family farms average 100 acres each with 100 to 120 cows. The average farmer nets between $30,000 and $40,000 a year after taking in nearly $250,000, half of which goes into feed costs.

The cheese co-op is the largest employer in Tillamook County--population 20,000--with 250 workers.

But those numbers are dwarfed by the 600,000 tourists who stop at the co-op each year to view Tillamook cheese being made, visit the Tillamook cheese museum, buy Tillamook cheese souvenirs and eat Tillamook ice cream.

Cheese isn’t the only famous commodity produced by the dairy cooperative. The 35 flavors of ice cream, for years available only at the co-op, are being introduced at several dipping stores throughout Oregon.