<I>The Eagle/Cheryl Jessup</I><BR>From left, producer Beth Harrington, leading actress and John Day resident Charlene Hopkins, cameraman Todd Sonflieth.

JOHN DAY – Doc Hay gingerly fingered his patient’s wrist and checked the pulse, readying for a diagnosis and likely, an herbal remedy.

In this scene from Grant County history, the healer was an actor and the shooting location was John Day’s Kam Wah Chung Museum. An Oregon Public Broadcasting crew was in town last week to film a documentary as part of OPB’s “Oregon Experience” television series.

According to producer Beth Harrington, the program will focus mainly on Chinese immigrants Ing “Doc” Hay and Lung On and their role in the John Day area, as part of the Chinese influence in Oregon’s history.

Kam Wah Chung was first established as a trading post in 1876, later converted to a store and apothecary run by Hay and On. It became a vital center for the John Day Chinese community at that time.

In 1973, the Kam Wah Chung Museum was listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and in 2005 was designated a National Historic Landmark.

The crew spent a day filming re-enactments involving Doc Hay’s work, as well as various interior shots of the museum.

John Day resident – and now local actress – Charlene Hopkins, played the “hands on” part of Doc Hay. According to Hopkins, it was her slender fingers, closely resembling those of Hay, that won her the role.

Hopkins is also a volunteer with the Kam Wah Chung Museum and Interpretive Center.

Andy Lockhart played the part of Jay McKern – Mt. Vernon resident Wilma Bauer’s father – who was treated for lockjaw by Hay. Harrington herself played the part of Lola Johnson who, as a young girl, went to Doc Hay for bronchial problems.

In additon to scenes of Doc Hay checking pulses, re-enactments were also done of Hay mixing herbs in a pot as well as an episode of then city councilman, Gordon Glass, shining a flashlight inside the darkened building when it was first re-opened back in 1968. Until then, the long-abandoned store had been closed up for about 20 years, according to museum curator Christy Sweet.

The program will air on OPB sometime in 2009, with the date to be announced later.