In 1916, encouraged by the numerous inquiries about permits for summer homes, W.G. Hastings of the Forest Service surveyed lots at East Lake, Paulina Lake, Odell Lake, Crescent Lake, and along the Metolius River, the lots to be offered at between $5 and $15 for a year's rental. The only strict requirement was that the (summer) "houses were not to be shacks . . . only substantial, neat houses would be erected." The maximum period of occupancy was not to exceed 30 years and the lands were to be used for summer homes, hotels or stores. The improvements had to be constructed within a reasonable time and the buildings provided with the necessary sanitation. 

In the Metolius area, one of the stipulations was that cabins had to be built at least 50 feet back from the edge of the river and that the river frontage was to be kept open for the public. Today, river trails in front of the cabins parallel the Metolius along both the west and east banks. 

In the fall of 1916, William Henrichs, 0.L. Belshe and Martin Hansen, after obtaining permits from the Forest Service, constructed summer cabins along the Metolius with the help of carpenters from Sisters, Judge Henrichs, county assessor of Sherman County, was credited with marking the road to Camp Sherman. The trek from the Agency Plains near Madras included a steep dusty road down to the canyon of the Crooked River. 

Negotiating bridges over the Crooked and the Deschutes rivers, climbing a steep dusty road up the canyon walls of the Deschutes River, motorists journeyed past Grandview on the juniper and sage flats of the Lower Desert, then over Green Ridge to the Metolius Valley. Henrichs marked this route with all the old license plates that he could find. He put them in pairs as a cross on telephone posts to mark the turns. The road was also posted "Camp Sherman" at a time when the growing community was looking for a name for the soon-to-be-opened post office; it was Bill Henrichs who suggested the name Camp Sherman after Sherman County.