OREGON WORDWORKS was established in Manzanita, Oregon, in 1989, by Skip Thomsen and Cathleen Freshwater. Skip was ready to publish his first book, More Power To You!, and Skip and Cathleen were also publishing Elixir!, an arts and entertainment newspaper for the North Oregon Coast, and since it seemed this was to be only the beginning, they decided to create their small-publishing company.

In 1993, the couple moved to rural Hawaii and left Oregon Wordworks in able hands back in Oregon. At this point, the main function of the company was to take care of marketing and distributing the books. They ran ads for More Power To You! in several magazines and sales were about evenly divided between book stores and mail-order.

!993 was also the time Skip and Cathleen published their second book, The Modern Homestead Manual. Since their new home was now in another state, they thought they'd start writing under a new name and make Oregon Wordworks into the marketing and distribution service for the new publishing company, Pandanus Publishing. The Modern Homestead Manual was published under the new name, and then for various reasons, Thomsen and Freshwater decided to abandon Pandanus Publishing and just continue writing and publishing under their original company name.

In 1994, Cathleen decided to pursue some other life dreams and she moved back to the Mainland. The couple is no longer a couple, but Oregon Wordworks is alive and well. In 1998, Skip published The Intelligent Woman's (Used) Car Book, and has another book or two on the back burner.

Oregon Wordworks has recently moved to a new location in Portland, Oregon and is a growing business, marketing books all over the country to both individuals and book stores. Their newest title, Affordable Paradise, The Secrets to an Affordable Life in Hawaii, was published in december, 2001. The books are available from our Web site, through any book store, by direct mail-order from various sources (magazine ads, coupons, etc.), by credit card on the Internet from all of the usual Internet booksellers (Amazon.com., Barnes & Noble, Alternative Bookstore, etc.), and Toll-Free phone orders (credit-card orders) at 1-800-356-9315.