Columbia County Process Serving

Columbia County, Washington — Wheat Country at the Foot of the Blues

Dayton carries the county's governmental role along the Touchet River, surrounded by wheat country rising toward the Blue Mountains.

Dayton sits along the Touchet River and serves as the county seat. Wheat farms spread across surrounding uplands, while the river corridor historically concentrated settlement, transportation and local commerce.

South and east, the land rises toward the Blue Mountains. That transition changes agriculture, vegetation, weather and recreation within a relatively short distance. Communities and rural districts such as Starbuck, Marengo and Turner occupy different pieces of a county where plateau, river and mountain foothills meet.

Rail transportation once gave grain towns and shipping points greater independence. Modern roads and farm machinery consolidated much of that activity, leaving Dayton as the principal service and governmental center for a county whose working population is spread across farms and ranches.

Starbuck adds one of the county's better naming accidents. Railroad official William H. Starbuck supplied the town's name decades before an unrelated coffee company made the near-match globally famous.

Columbia County's identity is unusually clear despite its modest population. Wheat built much of its economy, the Touchet organized settlement, and the Blue Mountains define the horizon where the farm country finally runs out.