History of Oregon, Vol. II, 1848-1888, Part 66

Author: Bancroft, Hubert Howe, 1832-1918; Victor, Mrs. Frances Auretta Fuller Barrett, 1826-1902
Publication date: 1886-88
Publisher: San Francisco : The History Co.
Number of Pages: 836

USA > Oregon > History of Oregon, Vol. II, 1848-1888 > Part 66

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Soon after the arrival of Dickinson, W. H. Willson of Salem offered two town lots. About half the sum required for a building was raised, while the church held its meetings in a school-house; but this being too small for the congregation, a building was purchased and fitted up for church services, in September 1854. It was not till 1863 that the present edifice, a modest frame structure, was completed and dedicated. Dickinson continued in the pastor- ate till 1867, when he resigned, and was succeeded by P. S. Knight. Condon went first to St Helen, where the town proprietor had erected a school-house and church in one, surmounted by a belfry with a good bell, and a small spire. This building, which is still standing, was not consecrated to the use of any denomination, but was free to all, and so remained. In 1854 Condon was ap- pointed to Forest Grove. They were not able to build here till August 1839, when a church was erected, costing some $9,000. Or. Statesman, Aug. 30, 1859. Near the close of 1833 Milton B. Starr, who had preached for several years in the western states, came to Albany, Oregon, and organized a church. The following spring Lyman was sent to Dallas to preach, and Portland was left without a pastor. In 1859 Condon organized a church at The Dalles, building in 1862. He remained at The Dalles for many years, leaving there finally to go to Forest Grove, where his attainments in natural science were in demand. On the opening of the state university he accepted a professor- ship in that institution. Atkinson was settled as pastor of the church in Portland in 1863, where he continued some ten years, when, his health failing, he went north to establish congregations. During his pastorate a new church edifice was erected on the ground selected in 1850; and more recently Ply- month church on Fourteenth and E streets. The organized congregational churches reported down to 1878 were nine: Albany, Astoria, Dalles, Forest Grove, Hillsboro, Oregon City, I'ortland, East Portland, and Salem. Cong. Asso. Minutes, 1878, 51. Plymouth church was a later organization.

Pacific university, founded by congregationalists, was non-sectarian. It had $50,000 in grounds and buildings, $4,000 in cabinet and apparatus, $33,000 in productive funds, and a library containing 5,000 volumes.

The first minister of the Presbyterian denomination in Oregon was Lewis Thompson, a native of Kentucky, and an alumnus of Princeton theological seminary, who came to the Pacific coast in 1846 and settled on the Clatsop plains. Wood's Pioneer Work, 27. There is a centennial history of the pres- bytery of Oregon, by Edward R. Geary, in Portland Pac. Christian Advocate, July 27, 1876. On the 19th of September, 1846, Thompson preached a sermon at the house of W. H. Gray, albeit there were none to hear him except a ruling elder from Missouri, Alva Condit, his wife Ruth Condit, and Gray and

681

PRESBYTERIAN INSTITUTIONS.

his wife. Truman P. Powers of Astoria was the first ordained elder of the presbyterian church on the Pacific coast. He came to Oregon in 1846. In October Thompson was joined by a young minister from Ohio, Robert Robe, and on the 19th of November they, together with E. R. Geary of Lafayette, at the residence of the latter, formed the presbytery of Oregon, as directed by the General Assembly at its session in that year.

In 1853 there were five presbyterian ministers in Oregon, the three above- mentioned, J. L. Yantis, and J. A. Hanna. The latter had settled at Marys- ville (now Corvallis) in 1852 and organized a church, while Yantis had but recently arrived. A meeting of the presbytery being called at Portland in October, Hanna aud Yantis became members, and it was determined to or- ganize a church in that place, of which Yantis was to have charge, together with one he had already formed at Calapooya. This was accordingly done; and through the stormy winter the resolute preacher held service twice a month in Portland, riding eighty miles through mud and rain to keep his ap- pointments, until an attack of ophthalmia rendered it impracticable, and George F. Whitworth, recently arrived with the design of settling on Puget Sound, was placed temporarily in charge of the church in Portland. On his removal to Washington the society became disorganized, and finally extinct.

Meantime Thompson had built a small church at Clatsop, and was pursuing his not very smooth way in that foggy, sandy region, where he labored faith- fully for twenty-two years before he finally removed to California. Tobe or- ganized a church at Eugene City in 1833, remaining there in the ministry till ISG3, during which time a building was erected. Geary, who had undertaken a boarding-school, hecame involved in pecuniary embarrassment, and was com- pelled to take a clerkship under Palmer in the Indian department; but being discharged for seeming to covet the office of his employer, he took charge of the Calapooya church, and organized that of Brownsville, where he fixed his residence, and where a church building was erected by the members. A char- ter was procured from the legislature of 1837-8 for the Corvallis college, which would have been under the patronage of the presbyterians had it reached a point where such patronage could be claimed. There is nothing to show that it was ever organized.

An effort was made about the beginning of 1860 to revive the presbyterian church in Portland. McGill of the Princeton seminary, being appealed to, procured the cooperation of the Board of Domestic Missions, and P. S. Caffrey was commissioned to the work. He preached his first sermon in the court- house June 15, 1860. On the 3d of August the first presbyterian church of Portland was reorganized hy Lewis Thompson of Clatsop, with seventeen mem- bers, and regular services held in a room on the corner of Third and Madison streets. Caffrey's ministrations were successful; and iu 1863 the corner-stone of' a church edifice was laid on Third and Washington streets, which was finished the following year, at a cost of $20,000. Geary's Or. Presbytery, 2; Portland Herald, Jan. 26, 1873; Deady's Scrap-Book, 43, 85. When in 1869 C'affrey resigned his charge to Lindsley, there was a membership of 103, and the finances of the church were in good condition. In 1882 the church divided, and a new edifice was erected, costing $25,000, at the north-east cor- ner of Clay and Ninth streets, called Calvary Presbyterian Church, with E. Trumrell Lee first pastor. The church editice at Corvallis was begun in 1860 and completed in 1864, at a cost of $6,000, Hanna contributing freely of his own means. Richard Wylic, assigned by the board of missions to this place in the latter year, was the first pastor regularly installed in this church. Richard Wylie was one of three sons of James Wylie, who graduated together at Princeton. In 1865 the father and James and John, Richard's brothers, came to the Pacific coast, James accepting a pastorate in San Jose, California, and John being assigned to the church in Eugene City. James Wylie, sen., was examined for the ministry by the Oregon presbytery, licensed to preach, and finally ordained for the full ministry. Geary's Or. Presbytery, 2.

In 1866 the presbytery consisted of the ministers above named, with the addition of W. J. Monteith, Anthony Simpson, and J. S. Reasoner, the former

682

CHURCHES AND CHURCH SCHOOLS.

assigned to Albany, and Simpson to Olympia, which by the lapse of the Puget Sound presbytery, erected in 1858, came again under the care of Oregon. A church was organized at Albany by Monteith, and a private classical school opened, which grew into the Albany collegiate institute under the care of the presbytery, a tract of five acres being donated by Thomas Monteith, one of the town owners, and brother of W. J. Monteith. The citizens erected a substantial building, and in spite of some drawbacks, the institution grew in reputation and means. Reasoner was not called upon to labor for the church, being advanced in years and a farmer. In 1868 H. H. Spalding, whom the congregational association had advised to accept an Indian agency, became a member of the presbytery, but he was not given charge of a church, being broken in mind and body by the tragedy of Wanilatpu. His death occurred at Lapwai, where he was again acting as missionary to the Nez Perces, August 3, 1874, at the age of 73 years. The first presbyterian church of Salem was organized May 20, 1869, with sixteen members. Their church edi- fice was erected in 1871, at a cost of $6,000. Within the last ten years churches have been organized and houses of worship erected in Roseburg, Jacksonville, and Marshfield in southern Oregon.

All that has been said above of presbyterians relates to the old-school division of that church. There were in Oregon, however, others, under the names of Cumberland presbyterians, associate presbyterians, and associate reformed. Iu 1851 James P. Millar, of Albany, N. Y., arrived in Oregon as a missionary of one of these latter societies; but finding here 200 members and half a dozen ministers of the two societies, he entered into a scheme to unite them in one, to be known as the United Presbyterian church of Oregon, con- stituting one presbytery, and being independent of any allegiance to any ecclesiastical control out of Oregon. The men who formed this church were James P. Millar, Thomas S. Kendall, Samuel G. Irvine, Wilson Blain, James Worth, J. M. Dick, and Stephen D. Gager. Or. Statesman, Dec. 18, 1852. In 1858 they founded the Albany academy, with Thomas Kendall, Delazon Smith, Dennis Beach, Edward Geary, Walter Monteith, J. P. Tate, John Smith, James H. Foster, and R. H. Crawford trustees. This school was superseded by the Albany institute in 1867. Or. Laws, Special, 1857-8, 9-10; Mess. and Docs, Pub. Instruction, 1878, 81-2. A college, known as the Sublimity, was created by legislative act in January 1838, to be controlled by the United Brethren in Christ; but whether this was a school of the united presbyterians I am unable to determine.

The pioneer of the Cumberland presbyterians was J. A. Cornwall of Arkansas, who came to Oregon in 1846 by the southern route, as the reader may remember. Cornwall was the only ordained minister until 1851, when two others, Neill Johnson of Illinois, and Joseph Robertson of Tennessee, arrived. By order of the Missouri synod, these ministers met in 1847, at the house of Samuel Allen in Marion county, and formed the Oregon presbytery of the Cumberland presbyterian church, W. A. Sweeney, another minister, being present. Five ruling elders, who had partially organized congregations, were admitted to seats in the presbytery, as follows: John Purvine from Abiqua, Joseph Carmack from La Creole, Jesse C. Henderson from Yamhill, David Allen from Tualatin, and D. M. Keen from Santiam. There were at this time four licentiates in the territory; namely, B. F. Music, John Dillard, William Jolly, and Luther White. The whole number of members in com- munion was 103.

There was no missionary society to aid them, the ministers being sup- ported by voluntary offerings. But in the spring of 1853 an effort was made to raise funds to found a college under their patronage, and in the following year a building was erected at Eugene City, costing $4,000, with an endowment fund amounting to $20,000. The school was opened in November 1856, under the presidency of E. P. Henderson, a graduate of Waynesville college, Penn- sylvania, with fifty-two students. Four days after this auspicious iuaugura- tion the college building was destroyed by an incendiary fire. Not to be defeated, however, another house was procured and the school continued,

683

THE BAPTISTS.

while a second building was erected at a cost of $3,000, the second session doubling the number of students. The attendance increased to 150 in 1857, hut again, on the night of the 26th of February, 1858, the college was burned. A stone building was then begun, and the walls soon raised. Be- fore it was completed a division took place on the issue of bible-reading and prayer in the school, and those opposed to these observances withdrew their aid, and the unfinished building was sold by the sheriff to satisfy the me- chanics. I find among the Orejon Special Laws of 1857-8 an act incorporat- ing the Union University Association, section 4 of which provides that the ' utmost care shall be taken to avoid every species of preference for any sect or party, either religious or political.' This was probably the form of protest against sectarian teaching which destroyed the prospects of the Cumberland school. Henderson, after a couple of sessions in a rented house, seeing no hope for the future, closed his connection with the school, which was sus- pended soon after, and never revived.

About 1875 W. R. Bishop of Brownsville completed a commodions school building as an individual enterprise, and established a school under the name of Principia Academy, with a chapel attached. In 1861 the Oregon Cumber- land presbytery was divided, by order of the Sacramento synod to which it belonged, and all of Oregon south of Calapooya Creek on the east side of the Willamette River, and all south of La Creole River on the west side of the Willamette, was detached and made to form the Willamette presbytery, while all north of that retained its former name. In 1874 the Oregon presbytery was again divided, that part east of the Cascade Mountains and all of Wash- ington being set off and called the Cascade presbytery, with four ordained ministers, the Oregon presbytery having begun its operations in the Walla Walla Valley in 1871, when A. W. Sweeney organized a church at Waitsburg with eighteen members, since which time several others have been formed, and churches erected. By order of the general assembly of the Cumberland in May 1875, the Oregon synod was constituted, composed of these three presbyteries, which have in communion 700 members, and own thirteen houscs of worship, worth $19,000. See centennial sketch by Neill Johnson, in Port- land Pac. Christian Advocate, May 4, 1876.

Among the early immigrants to Oregon were many Baptists, this denomi- nation being numerous in the western and south-western states. As early as 1848 a society was organized and a church building erected at Oregon City. Other churches soon followed, Portland having an organized society in 1855, although not in a flourishing state financially. It was not until June 1860 that a missionary, Samuel Cornelius of Indianapolis, arrived, appointed by the American Baptist Home Mission, to labor in Portland. His introductory sermon was preached in the methodist church on the first Sunday in July, but a public hall was soon secured, and the organization of the Frst Baptist Church of Portland took place on the 12th of August, with twelve members; namely, Samuel Cornelius and wife, Josiah Failing and wife, Douglas W. Wil- liams, Elizabeth Failing, Joshua Shaw and wife, R. Weston and wife, and George Shriver and wife. First Baptist Church Manual, 1. This small body made a call on Cornelius to become their pastor, which was accepted, and on him and the two deacons, Williams and Failing, devolved the task of building a house of worship. A half-block of land on the corner of Fourth and Alder streets had been donated for the site of a baptist church by Stephen Coffin sev- eral years before, and on this was begun a building, which was so far completed by January 5, 1862, that its basement was occupied for religious services. In September 1864 Cornelius returned to the east, leaving a membership of 49 per- sons, and the church was without a pastor for two years, during which the ccacons sustained as best they could the burden of the society to prevent it from falling to pieces. Then came E. C. Anderson of Kalamazoo, Michigan, sent by the Home Mission Society to act as pastor, in December 1866. The church was incorporated in March 1867. Anderson continued in the pastorate five years, and increased the membership to seventy, the church editice cost- ing $12,500, being dedicated in January 1870. The incorporators were Josiah

684

CHURCHES AND CHURCH SCHOOLS.

Failing, Joseph N. Dolph, W. S. Caldwell, John S. White, George C. Chandler, and W. Lair Hill. Again no one was found to supply the place of pastor for a year and a half, when A. R. Medhury of San Francisco accepted a call, and remained with this church three years, during which forty new members were added, and a parsonage was presented to the society by Henry Fai.ing, since which time the church has been fairly prosperous. In 1861 the number of baptists in Oregon was 484, of churches 13, ard ordained ministers 10.

The first baptist school attempted was Corvallis Institute, which seems not to bave had any history beyond the act of incorporation in 1856-7. An act was also passed the following year establishing a baptist school under the name of West Union Institute, in Washington county, with David T. Lennox, Ed H. Lennox, Henry Sewell, William Mauzey, John S. White, and George C. Chandler as trustees. At the same session a charter was granted to the baptist college at MeMinnville, a school already founded by the Disci- ple or Christian church, and turned over to the baptists with the belongings, six acres of ground and a school building, as a free gift, upon condition that they should keep up a collegiate school. The origin of McMinnville and its college was as follows: In 1852-3, W. T. Newby cut a ditch from Baker Creek, a branch of the Yamhill River, to Cozine Creek, upon his land, where he erected a grist-mill. In 1854 S. C. Adams, who lived on his donation claim 4 miles north, took a grist to mill, and in the course of conversation with Newby remarked upon the favorable location for a town which his land presented, upon which Newby replied that if he, Adams, would start a town, he should have half a block of lots, and select his own location, from which point the survey should commence. In the spring of 1855 Adams deposited the lumber for his house on the spot selected, about 200 yards from the mill, and proceeded to erect his house, where, as soon as it was completed, he went to reside. Immediately after he began to agitate the subject of a high school as a nucleus for a settlement, and as he and most of the leading men in Yam- hill were of the christian church, it naturally became a christian school. James McBride, William Dawson, W. T. Newby, and Adams worked up the matter, bearing the larger part of the expense. Newby gave six acres of lan l. The building erected for the school was large and commodious for those times. Adams, who was a teacher by profession, was urged to take charge of the school, and taught it for a year and a half. Among his pupils were John R. McBride, L. L. Rowland, J. C. Shelton, George L. Woods, and Wm D. Baker. But there had not been any organization, or any charter asked for, and Adams, who found it hard and unprofitable work to keep up the school alone, wished to resign, and proposed to the men interested to place it in the hands of the baptists, who were about founding the West Union Institute. To this they made no objection, as they only wished to have a school, and were not secta- rian in feeling. Accordingly, Adams proposed the gift to the baptists, and it was accepted, only one condition being imposed, and agreed to in writing, to employ at least one professor in the college department continuously. It was incorporated in January 1858 as the baptist college at McMinnville, by Henry Warren, James M. Fulkerson, Ephriam Ford, Reuben C. Hill, J. S. Holman, Alexius N. Miller, Richard Miller, and Willis Gaines, trustees. The Washington county school was allowed to drop, and the MeMinnville college was taken in charge by G. C. Chandler in the collegiate department, and Mrs N. Morse in the preparatory school. The incorporated institution received the gift of twenty acres of lind for a college campus from Samuel and Mahala Cozine and Mrs P. W. Chandler. It owned iu 1882 three thou- sand dollars in outside lands, a building fund of twenty-one thousand dollars, and an endowment fund of over seventeen thousand, besides the apparatus and library. From addresses by J. N. Dolph and W. C. Johnson in McMinville College and ('atalogue, 1883. A new and handsome edifice has been erected, whose corner-stone was laid in 1882. The Beacon, a monthly denominational journal, was published at Salem as the organ of the baptists.

Several attempts were made to have colleges free from sectarian influence, which rarely succeeded. The Jefferson institute, incorporated in January

685

EPISCOPALIANS.

I857, and located at Jefferson, is an exception. This school is independent, and has been running since its founding in 1856-7. Any person may become a member by paying $50 into the endowment fund, which amounts to about $4,000. The hoard consists of fifteen trustees, five of whom are annually elected by the members. Three directors are elected by the board from their own number, who have the general management of school affairs. The first board of trustees were Geo. H. Williams, J. H. Harrison, Jacob Conser, E. E. Parrish, W. F. West, T. Small, H. A. Johnson, C. A. Reed, N. R. Doty, J. B. Terhune, J. S. Miller, James Johnson, L. Pettyjohn, Manuel Gonzalez, and Andrew Cox. Mrs Conser gave a tract of land in eight town lots. The building cost $3,000. C. H. Mattoon was the first teacher, in 1837. Portland Pac. Advocate, Feb. 24 and March 2, 1876; Rept of Supt Pub. Instruc., 1878, 91-2. The number of pupils in 1884 was about one hundred. The curricu- lum does not embrace a college course, but only the preparatory studies. The Butteville Institute, established by legislative act in January 1859, was an independent school, which, if ever successful, is now out of existence.

The pioncer of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Oregon was St M. Fack- ler, who crossed the plains with the immigration of 1847 in search of health, of whom I have spoken in another place. He found a few members of this church in Oregon City, and held occasional services in 1848 at the house of A. Mckinlay, but without attempting to organize a church. The first mis- sionary of the episcopal church in the east was William Richmond of the diocese of New York, appointed by the Board of Domestic Missions in April 1851 to labor in Oregon, and who organized congregations at Portland, Oregon City, Milwaukee, Salem, Lafayette, and other places before the close of that year, adding Champoeg, Chehalem, and Tualatin plains the following year. In the fall of 1852 he was joined by James A. Woodward of the diocese of Pennsylvania, who like Fackler had made the overland journey to better his physical condition, and had succeeded, which Fackler did not. After the ar- rival of Woodward, services were held in the congregational church at Oregon City until a room was fitted up for the purpose.

In January 1853 John McCarty of New York diocese arrived as army chap- lain at Vancouver. At this time there were about twenty members in Port- land who formed Trinity Church organization. At the meeting of the general convention held in New York in October 1853, Thomas Fielding Scott of the diocese of Georgia was elected missionary bishop of Oregon and Wash- ingtou, but before his arrival Richmond and Woodward had returned to the east, leaving only Fackler and McCarty as aids to the bishop. Two church edificcs had already been erected, the first, St John's at Milwaukee, the secon:1, Trinity at Portland. The latter was consecrated September 24th, about three months after the arrival of Scott. In 1855 the church at Milwaukee and another at Salem were consecrated, but without any increase of the clerical force until late in this year, when Johnston McCormack, a deacon, arrived, wbo was stationed temporarily at Portland. In 1856 arrived John Sellwood and his brother, James R. W. Sellwood; but having been wounded in the Panamá riot of that year, John was not able for some months to enter upon his duties. His brother, however, took charge of the church at Salem. The first episcopal school for boys was opened this year at Oswego, under the management of Bernard Cornelius, who had recently taught in Olympia, and was a graduate of Dublin university. Seventy acres of land, and a large dwelling-house, pleasantly situated, were purchased for this purpose. James I. Daly was ordained deacon in May, giving a slight increase to the few work- ers in the field. St Mary's church at Eugene City was consecrated iu January 1859 by Bishop Scott; and there arrived, also, this year five clergymen, Carl- ton P. Maples, T. A. Hyland, D. E. Willes, W. T. B. Jackson and P. E. Hyland. Two of them returned east, and one, P. E. Hyland, went to Olympia. T. A. Hyland married a daughter of Stearns of Douglas county. He was for many years a pastor and teacher at Astoria, but returned to Canada afterward. St Paul's chapel at Oregon City was dedicated in the spring of 1861; and in the autumn Scott opened a girls' school at Milwaukee,

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History of Oregon, Vol. II, 1848-1888, Part 66

Author: Bancroft, Hubert Howe, 1832-1918; Victor, Mrs. Frances Auretta Fuller Barrett, 1826-1902 Publication date: 1886-88 Publisher: San Francisco : The History Co. Number of Pages: 836

Author: Bancroft, Hubert Howe, 1832-1918; Victor, Mrs. Frances Auretta Fuller Barrett, 1826-1902
Publication date: 1886-88
Publisher: San Francisco : The History Co.
Number of Pages: 836