CAMP SHERMAN, Ore. - A singing bagpipe joined the wind in the pines.

"Mull of the Kintyre" was far from out of place as a hundred friends and family watched Saturday afternoon when Thomas Herbert McAllister Jr.'s ashes were laid to rest on a small island in the Metolius River alongside his beloved wife, Barbara.

And Steve Allely's pipes were just as fitting earlier that morning in the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration in Sisters, where Tom's ashes shared the altar with the cross and a panorama view of Central Oregon's iconic Three Sisters mountain tops.

It was pure Tom, lifelong outdoor writer for The Oregonian and Oregon Journal.

And it was a celebration of his life orchestrated and choreographed by Tom in person before he died - in control even beyond the end.

Scott McAllister and his sister, Torrie McAllister, spread their father's and mother's ashes on an island in the Metolius River near a cabin they built together after World War II. (Bill Monroe)

Tom brought us into one of Oregon's most beautiful Christian sanctuaries. He encouraged us to sing "All things bright and beautiful," and "Here am I Lord," and, of course, the Navy Hymn: "Eternal Father..."

He showed us the mercy of strangers, ladies of a church who donated time and food and Father Joseph Farber, chanting Tom's chosen prelude in a clear baritone voice.

He pulled us across his beloved public land to the banks of a river once clogged with salmon and now simply meandering across multi-colored riffles, to an island where deer once dropped their fawns, protected by the softly applauding river.

And Tom McAllister took us to his resting place with the Lord's Prayer.

"He carried me...us...on his shoulders," said son David McAllister.

Indeed.



- Bill Monroe