This West Linn house, birthplace of Oregon prepaid health plans, is on National Historic Register

A West Linn house used as the home office of a physician who helped established one of the first prepaid health plans in the nation during the Great Depression has been listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

The Dr. Edward and Anne McLean House was deemed significant by the National Park Service for its association with the development of a groundbreaking physician-sponsored medical insurance group.

People who worked in local paper mills or for timber companies and their family members could receive health services for a fixed annual fee. The name: Physicians' Association of Clackamas County.

Prepaid, HMO-style healthcare, which covered a member’s medical, hospital and pharmaceutical services, was slowly adopted nationwide.

The concept was developed and the physicians association founded by efforts conducted at the house, which was built in 1927 for rural doctor Edward McLean and his wife, Anne, an anesthetist nurse.

Dr. McLean’s home office, a well-preserved room on the second floor, best represents the origins of the Physicians' Association of Clackamas County, according to architectural historian Kristen Minor, who researched and wrote the document that successful supported the house’s historic significance.

McLean, working from his home office, led Dr. William O. Steele and Dr. John (“Jack”) G. P. Cleland in developing the nonprofit Physicians' Association of Clackamas County between 1932 and 1938.

Their mission was to provide healthcare coverage that was high quality, affordable and designed to fit the needs of area residents as well as physicians, Minor found.

The century-old house on the southern bank of the Willamette River is also notable for its eclectic Colonial Revival architectural style paired with an English Cottage rolled-edge imitation thatched roof. Most important, the layout of the three-story residence and many interior features are original.

Oregon’s State Advisory Committee on Historic Preservation, which endorsed the nomination, cited the polished oak flooring, native black walnut baseboards and Craftsman-influenced glazed tile fireplace surround.

Original full-wall windows on three sides remain in the sunroom, a built-in corner cupboard with an arched glass front exists in the formal dining room and hexagonal tile floors are still in bathrooms. Cast-iron radiators and many antique light fixtures have also survived over the decades.

The staircase with turned wood balusters leads to four bedrooms and the now famous office. The McLeans lived in the house with their children Mason, Anna, Edward N., Margaret and Jean.

A separate apartment above the garage was designed as a maid’s quarters and includes a bathroom with a built-in tub.

The McLeans hired the Henderson-Bankus Company, owned by realtor-builders who sold lots in new developments, to design and build their high-end, 17-room home.

The McLeans added landscaping, a tennis court and pony barn.

The property at 5350 River St. was originally four acres but was reduced to 2.5 acres by the 1970 construction of Interstate 205’s Abernethy Bridge linking Oregon City and West Linn.

The McLean House has been owned by the City of West Linn since 1969, and is also listed on the West Linn Historic Inventory.

Neglected and in need of repairs, the house was to be sold when a group of volunteers stepped forward to save it. The Friends of the McLean House, along with civic and Scout groups, worked to restore the home and grounds, said Minor.

The McLean House nomination document included that West Linn was established on a part of the Willamette River that was a major source of food for the Indigenous peoples of the lower Willamette Valley. The area was also a trading center for the Kalapuyan, Molalla and Clackamas Chinookan peoples.

When the foundation for the McLean house was dug out by a horse-drawn scoop almost 100 years ago, the construction crew unearthed cultural artifacts such as bead ornaments, stone implements, grinding stones, arrowheads and ax heads.

The McLeans

Edward Huntington McLean was born in 1886 in Klamath Falls (formerly known as Linkville). He was the son of a Presbyterian minister and missionary who moved his family in 1902 to Puerto Rico to help construct the Presbyterian Hospital in San Juan, according to the West Linn Historical Society.

Edward McLean graduated from high school in San Juan in 1904, Princeton University in New Jersey in 1908, and Columbia University in New York, where he earned a medical degree in 1912.

He met his future wife, Anne Mathida Cooper, during his internship and surgical fellowship at St. Luke’s Hospital in New York City. Anne, who was born in Delaware in 1888, was the daughter of a homeopathic physician. She graduated from St. Luke’s training school for nurses in 1913.

They married in 1916 and she worked as a nurse, an assistant at Edward’s medical office in Oregon City, and as an anesthetist. She also taught home nursing courses for the American Red Cross during World War II, according to Minor’s research.

Edward McLean served as a captain in the Oregon National Guard stationed on the Mexican border. He was also an assistant professor of pathology at the University of Oregon’s medical school campus in Portland, and was a staff volunteer at the People’s Institute, a free medical clinic and dispensary for Portland’s poor.

— Janet Eastman covers design and trends. Reach her at 503-294-4072, [email protected] and follow her on X @janeteastman.

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