Today, when Mother Nature gives the green light, drivers zoom past Tollgate.

This wide spot in the road sits nearly a mile high in the Blue Mountains along Ore. Route 204. The unincorporated burg marks the halfway point between Weston, on the west of the range, and Elgin to the east.

In winter, the area is a magnet for snow play. Snowmobiles roar on trails crisscrossing the high meadows and timbered ridges. Cross-country skiers and snowshoers, meanwhile, flock to Andies Prairie trails several miles east of Tollgate, passing on the way the closed Spout Springs Ski Area, which offered snow play for about three-quarters of a century and has now been closed for about six years.

The Blue Mountain Ski Club, founded in 1938, skied at Tollgate for nearly a decade. Then they slid over to the new area at Spout Springs, helping launch a rope tow in the 1940s and a T-bar lift in 1959.

In summer, Tollgate is a jump-off point to reach popular Jubilee Lake with its camping, hiking, fishing, birdwatching and berry picking.

In old days, though, travel was less speedy.

An early wagon road over the Blue Mountains was hacked from the forest in 1864 and 1865. Called the Thomas and Ruckle Road, the project was led by George Thomas, a stagecoach driver from Walla Walla, and Col. J.S. Ruckle, a steamboat pilot for the Oregon Steam Navigation Co. The pair also led building of a stage line from Walla Walla to the Idaho mines.

The Thomas and Ruckle Road over the Blues charged $3 to $5 per wagon. Farm products moving to market made up much of the traffic.

Mail was also delivered over the road, which went to Summerville, Cove and Union in the Grande Ronde Valley. La Grande was bypassed.

This helped Union win the vote for county seat in 1872, replacing La Grande, which held the seat since Union County was founded in 1865.

Later, the railroad rolled into La Grande, which grew bigger than Union and regained the county seat in 1902.

The Thomas and Ruckle Road was used for about two decades before it washed out in 1886.

It was never rebuilt.

Still, demand persisted for a shorter route over the Blue Mountains to Walla Walla than Meacham could provide. David J. Woodward filled the need.

He co-formed the Summerville and Walla Walla Road Co. and homesteaded on land near the headwaters of Lookingglass Creek.

Woodward installed a toll gate (hence the name Tollgate) where the road crossed his property.

Farm products from the Grande Ronde Valley were hauled over the mountains to processing centers in the Walla Walla Valley and other points west, so Woodward did a lucrative business.

Local counties, though, objected. In 1915 they formed the Blue Mountain Highway Association hoping to improve the road and abolish the toll. Woodward resisted.

The association completed its road, which bypassed the Woodward property, the same year, 1922, as a dam formed Langdon Lake.

Today the private lake is ringed by houses, one belonging to Gordon Smith, former Oregon state senator, U.S. senator and president and CEO of the National Association of Broadcasters.

A post office served Tollgate from 1940 until 1954. Today the mail for the Tollgate area is processed through the post office in Weston.

The post office takes advantage of a public highway completed in the late 1930s.

Ever since, Tollgate has been easily accessible from either side of the mountain — when Mother Nature cooperates.