USA > Oregon > History of Oregon, Vol. II, 1848-1888 > Part 72
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Michael Sult, born in Marion co. Ohio, emigrated overland to Oregon in 1859, in company with his sister, Mary Cruzan. He farms and raises stock at Summer Lake. He married, in 1880, Laura Bell Conrad.
George Clayton Duncan, who was born in Ill. in 1827, emigrated to Oregon in 1854, and resides at Paisley, in Lake co. He married Eliza Rinehart in 1848. They have 3 sons and 3 daughters.
Thomas J. Brattaiu, born iu Ill. in 1829, came to Oregon in 1850, over- land, and resides at Paisley. He married Permetin J. Gillespie in 1859. They have 3 sons and 1 daughter. There came with them to Oregon John, Alfred, William C., Francis M., and James C. Brattain, brothers; aud Eliza- beth Ebbert, Mary Brattaiu, Millie A. Smith, and Martha J. Hadley, sisters.
Lane county, named after Joseph Lane, was organized January 24, 1851, out of Linn and Benton. Its southern boundary was defined December 22, 1853. 1ts area is 4,492 miles, of which about 229,000 acres are improved. The value of farms and buildings is $4,600,000; of live-stock, $700,000; of farm products, $900,000; and of all taxable property, about $3,400,000. The population is between nine and ten thousand. Extending from the Cascade Mountains to the ocean, Lane county comprises a variety of topographical features, including the foot-hills of Calapooya Range, and the rougher hill land of the Coast Range, with the level surfaces of the Willamette plains. Its productions partake of this variety. Besides grains, vegetables, fruits, and dairy produce, it is the largest hop-producing county in Oregon, the crop of 1882 selling for a million dollars. Eugene City, the principal town, was founded in 1847 by Eugene Skinner. It was chosen for the county seat by a vote of the people in 1853, and incorporated in 1864. It is well located, near the junction of the coast and Mckenzie fork of the Willamette, at the head of navigation, surrounded by the picturesque scenery of the mountains which close in the valley a few miles farther south. It is the seat of the state university, with a population of about 1,200. Junction City, at the junction of the Oregon Central and Oregon and California railroads, was built up by the business of these roads. It was incorporated in 1872, and has between three and four hundred inhabitants. The lesser settlements are Cottage Grove, Divide, Latham, Cresswell, Rattlesnake, Goshen, Springfield, Leaburg, Willamette Forks, Irving, Cartwright, Chesher, Linslaw, Spencer Creek, Camp Creek, Cannon, Crow Dexter, Florence, Franklin, Ida, Isabel, Long Tom, Mckenzie Bridge, Mohawk, Pleasant Hill, Tay, Trent, and Walterville.
Linn county, named in honor of Lewis F. Linn of Missouri, was organized December 28, 1847, 'out of all that territory lying south of Champoeg and east of Benton.' Its southern boundary was established January 4, 1851,
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giving an area of about 2,000 square miles, of which 256,000 acres are im- proved. The valnation of farms and buildings for 1879 was over seven millions, of live-stock nearly a million, and of farm products almost a million and a half. The total valuation of assessable property reached to considerably over four million dollars. The population is between twelve and thirteen thou- sand. This county has three natural divisions, the first lying between the north and south Santiam rivers; the second between Santiam River aud Cala- pooya creek, and the third between Calapooya creek and the south boundary line, each of which has a business centre of its own. Albany, the county seat, founded in 1848 by Walter and Thomas Montieth, named after Albany, N. Y., by request of James P. Millar, and incorporated in 1864, is the prin- cipal town in the county, and the centre of trade for the country between the Santiam and Calapooya rivers. It has a fine water-power, and several manu- factories, and is the seat of the presbyterian college. The population is 2,000. Brownsville, incorporated in 1874, Lebanon, and Waterloo, each with a few hundred inhabitants, are thriving towns in this section. Scio, in the forks of the Santiam, incorporated in 1866, is the commercial centre of this district, with a population of about 500. Harrisburg, situated on the Willamette River and the Oregon and California railroad, is the shipping point for a rich agri- cultural region. It was incorporated in 1866. The present population is 500. Halsey, named after an officer of the railroad company, was founded about 1872, and incorporated in 1876. The lesser towns in this county are Pine, Shedd, Sodaville, Tangent, Oakville, Fox Valley, Jordan, Mabel, Miller, Mount Pleasant, and Crawfordsville.
Marion county, one of the original four districts of 1843, called Champoeg, had its name changed to Marion by an act of the legislature of September 3, 1849, in honor of General Francis Marion. Champoeg, or Champooick, dis- trict comprised all the Oregon territory on the east side of the Willamette, north of a line drawn due east from the month of Pudding or Anchiyoke River to the Rocky Mountains. Or. Archives, 26. Its southern limit was fixed when Linn county was created, and the eastern boundary when the county of Wasco was established in 1854. Its northern line was readjusted in Jan- uary 1856, according to the natural boundary of Pudding River and Butte Creek, which adjustment gives it an irregular wedge shapc. It contains abont 1,200 square miles, of which 200,000 acres are underimprovement. Its farms and buildings are valued at nearly eight million dollars, its live-stock eight hundred thousand, and its annual farm prodnets at more than a million and a half. The assessed valuation of real and personal property is four million dollars, of all taxable property over six millions. The population is between fourteen and fifteen thousand. Salem, the county seat and the capital of the state, was founded in 1841 by the Methodist Mission, and its history has been given at length. It was named by David Leslie, after Salem, Mass., in prefer- ence to Chemeketa, the native name, which should have been retained. It was incorporated Jannary 29, 1858, and has a population of about 5,000. The Willamette university, the state-bonse, county court-house, penitentiary, churches, and other public and private buildings, situated within large squares bordered by avennes of unnsnal width and surrounded by trees, make an in- pression upon the observer favorable to the founders, 'who builded better than they knew.' Salem has also a fine water-power, and mills and factories, and is in every sense the second city in the state. Gervais, named after Joseph Gervais of French Prairie, incorporated in 1874, is a modern town built up by the railroad. Butteville, which takes its name from a round mountain in the vicinity-butte, the French term for isolated elevations, has been adopted into the nomenclature of Oregon, where it appears in Spencer butte, Beaty butte, Pueblo butte, etc .- is an old French town on the Willamette at the north end of French prairie, but not so old as Champoeg in its vicinity. They both date back to the first settlement of the Willamette Valley, and neither have more than from four to six hundred in their precincts. Jeffer- son, the seat of Jefferson Institute, was founded early in the history of the county, although not incorporated until 1870. It is situated on the north
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bank of the Santiam River, ten miles from its confluence with the Willamette, and has fine flouring mills. The population is small. Silverton is another of the early farming settlements, which takes its name from Silver creek, a branch of Pudding River, on which it is situated, and both from the supposed discovery of silver mines at the head of this and other streams in Marion county, about 1857. It was not incorporated until 1874. Aurora was founded by a community of Germans, under the leadership of William Keil, in 1855. The colony was an offshoot of Bethel colony in Missouri, also founded by Keil in 1835. On the death of Keil, about 1879, the community system was broken up. Three hundred of these colonists own 16,000 acres of land at Aurora. Moss' Pictures Or. City, MS., 82; Deady's Hist. Or., MS., 78; S. F. Post, July 28, ISSI. Other towns and post-offices in the county are Hubbard, named after Thomas J. Hubbard, who came to Oregon with Wyeth and settled in the Willamette Valley, Sublimity, Mohama, Fairfield, Aumsvulc, Turner, Whiteaker, Stayton, Woodburn, Bellpasie, Stipp, Brooks, Saint Paul, and Daly's Mill.
Multnomah county, which has taken a local Indian name, was organized December 23, 1854, out of Washington and Clackamas counties. Its boun- daries were finally changed October 24, 1864. It is about fifty miles long by ten in width, and comprises a small proportion of agricultural land, being mountainous and heavily timbered. Less than 27,000 acres are under im- provement, the value of farins, including buildings and fences, being $2,283,- 000, of live-stock less than $200,000, and of farm produce not quite $400,000. The gross value of-all property in the county is over nineteen millions, and the valuation of taxable property ahout fourteen millions. The population is 26,000. The capital invested in manufactures is nearly two millions, and the value of productions approaches three millions. Portland, founded in 1843 hy A. L. Lovejoy and F. W. Pettygrove, and named after Portland, Maine, by the latter, is the county seat of Multnomah, and the principal commercial city of Oregon. It was first incorporated in January 1851, at which time its dimensions were two miles in length, along the river, and extending one mile west from it. Portland Oregon ian, April 15, 1871. The city government was organized April 15, 1831. There is no copy of the incor- poratiou act of 1851 in my library, but the act is mentioned by its title in the Oregon Statesman for March 28, 1851, and the date is also given in an article by Judge Deadly in the Overland Monthly, i. 37. The first mayor chosen was llugh D. O'Bryant. The ground being thickly covered with a fir forest, there was a long battle with this impediment toimprovement, and for twenty years a portion of the town site was disfigured with the blackened shafts of immense trees denuded of their branches by fire. The population increased slowly. by a healthy growth, stimulated occasionally by military operations aud mining excitements. In 1850 shipping began to arrive from S. F. for lumber and farm products, and Couch & Co. despatched the first brig to China-the Emma Preston. On the 4th of December of that year the first Portland newspaper, the Weekly Oregonian, was started by Thomas J. Dryer. In March 185] the steamship Columbia began running regularly between S. F. and Portland, with the monthly mails. The Columbia, after running on this line for ten years, was hurned in the China seas. In 1853 the first brick building was erected by William S. Ladd. In 1863 there were four churches, one public school, one academy, four printing-offices, four steam saw-mills, a steam flouring mill, and about forty dry-goods and grocery stores, the cash value of the real and personal property of the town heing not much short of two and a half millions.
In 1856 the city government took the volunteer fire-companies in charge and purchased an engine. Pioneer Engine Company No. 1 of Portland, the first organized fire-company in Oregon, was formed in May IS51. Its foreman was Thomas J. Dryer of the Oregonian, assistant foreman D. C. Coleman, secretary J. B. Mcer, treasurer William Seton Ogden. Among the members were some of Portland's most honored citizens, but they had no engine. Vigilance Hook and Ladder Company No. 1 was the next organization, in
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July 1853; foreman J. B. Smith, assistant foreman H. W. Davis, secretary Charles A. Poore, treasurer S. J. McCormick. In August of the same year Willamette Engine Company No. I was organized, and secured a small engine owned by G. W. Vaughn. The company was officered by foreman N. Ham, assistant foreman David Monastes, second assistant A. Strong, secretary A. M. Berry, treasurer Charles E. Williams. It was admitted to the depart- ment in July 1854, and furnished with an engine worked by hand, provided by the city council in 1856, since replaced by a steam apparatus. Multno- malı Engine Company No. 2 was admitted to the department in November 1856, using Vaughn's small engine for a year, when they were supplied with a Hunneman engine, the money being raised by subscription. Its first officers were James A. Smith president, B. L. Norden secretary, W. J. Van Schuyver treasurer, William Cummings foreman. These three companies composed the fire department of Portlaud down to June 1859, when Columbia Engine Com- pany No. 3 was organized. In October 1862 Protection Engine Company No. 4 was added; and in 1873 Tiger Engine Company No. 5. A company of exempt firemen also exists, having a fund from which benefits are drawn for the relief of firemen disabled in the discharge of their duty. Portland has suffered several heavy losses by fire, the greatest being in August 1873, when 250 houses were burned, worth $1,000,000. This conflagration followed close upon a previous one in December 1872, destroying property worth $250,000. The Portland fire department in 1879 numbered 375 members, composed of respect- able mechanics, tradesmen, merchants, and professional men. Each of the six companies had a handsome brick engine-house and hall. A dozen alarm-sta- tions were connected by telegraph with the great bell in a tower seventy feet in height. In 1881 steps were taken to secure a paid fire department, which was established soon after. Water-works for supplying the town with water for domestic purposes were begun in this year by Stephen Coffin and Robert Penland, under a city ordinance permitting pipes to be put down in the streets. The right was sold to Henry D. Green in 1860. In 1868 there were eight miles of mains laid, and two reservoirs constructed. The price of water at this date was $2.50 a month for the use of an ordinary family. A charter was granted to Green to manufacture gas for illuminating Portland, by the legislature of 1858-9, the manufactory being completed about the spring of 1860. Laws Or., 1858-9, 55; Or. Argus, Sept. 24, 1859; Oregonian, Jan. 21, 1860. Price of gas in 1868, $6 per 1,000 feet.
The first theatre erected in Oregon was built by C. P. Stewart at Portland in 1858. It was 100 feet long by 36 wide, and seated 600 persons. It opened November 23d with a good company, but was never permanently occupied. Or. Statesman, Nov. 30, 1858. In 1864 theatricals were again attempted, the Keene company and Julia Deane Hayne playing bere for a short season. In 1868 a theatre was opened, called the Newmarket, and used for any musical or theatrical performance; but down to 1884 no special theatre building was erected, or theatrical representations kept going for more than a few weeks in the year. Portland, besides lacking the population, was domestic and home- loving in its habits, and also somewhat religious in the middle classes, pre- ferring to build churches rather than theatres. The population at this time was but 1,750, there being but 927 voters in Multnomah county. In 1860 the population had increased to nearly 3,000; in 1862 to a little over 4,000; in 1864 to 5,819, and in 1877 to 6,717. In 1870 the census returns gave 8,300. Since that time the increase has been little more marked, the census of 1880 giving the population at 17,600, to which the five years following added at least 5,000. The original limits were increased, by the addition of Couch's claim on the north and Caruthers' claim on the south, to about three square miles. most of which is laid out, with graded, planked, or paved streets. One line of street-cars, put in operation in 1868, traversed First Street, parallel with the river-front, and one, incorporated in 1881, ran back to and on Eleventh Street. The general style of domestic architecture had improved rapidly with the increase of wealth and population, and Portland business houses became costly and elegant. The gross cash value of property in Portland in 1868 was about
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MULTNOMAH AND PORTLAND.
ten millions, and in 1884 was not far from eighteen millions. Deady, in Over- land Monthly, i. 38; Reid's Progress of Portland, 23. The principal public building in Portland in 1868 waa the county court-house on Fourth Street, which cost about $100,000, built of brick and stone in 1866. The United Statea erected the post-office and custom-house building on Fifth Street, of Bellingham Bay freestone, in 1869-70, at a cost, with the furniture, of $150, - 000. The methodist church on Taylor Street was finished in 1869-the first brick church in the city-costing $40,000. The Masonic Hall and Oddl Fel- lows' Temple were erected about this time, and the market and theatre on First Street. From this period the improvement in architecture, both do- mestic and for business purposes, was rapid, and the laying-out and paving or planking of streets proceeded at the rate of several miles annually. A million dollara waa expended in enlarging the gas and water works between 1868 and 1878. A mile and a quarter of substantial wharves were added to the city front, and a number of private residences, costing from $20,000 to $30,000, were crected. Since 1877 these fine houses have multiplied. that of United States Senator Dolph and ex-United States Attorney-general Williams being of great elegance, though built of wood. The squares in Portland be- ing small, several of the rich men took whole blocks to themselves, which, being laid out in lawns, greatly beautified the appearance of the town.
Among the prominent business men of Portland, who have not been hith erto named, I may mention Donald Macleay, who was born in Scotland in 1834, and when a young man went to Canada, where he engaged in business at Richmond, in the province of Quebec. From there he came to Portland in 1866, going into a wholesale grocery trade with William Corbitt of San Fran- cisco, and carrying on an importing and exporting business. In 1869 his brother, Kenneth Macleay, was admitted to the firm, which does a large ex- port trade, and has correspondents in all the great commercial cities. This firm made the first direct shipment of salmon to Liverpool, and is interested at present in salmon-canning on the Columbia. It has exported wheat since 1869-70, and more recently flour alao, being the first firm to engage in the regular shipment of wheat and flour to London and Liverpool. In 1872-4 it purchased several shipa, which were placed in the trade with China, Ana- tralia, and the Sandwich Islands. One of these, the Mattie Macleay, was named after a daughter of D. Macleay. Since hia advent in Portland, Macleay has been identified with all enterprises tending to develop the country. He is one of the directors of the Cal. & Or. R. R., and has been vice-president; and has been vice-president of the N. W. Trading Co. of Alaska, in which lie is a stockholder, a director in the Southern Or. Development Co .; local presi- dent of the Or. & Wash. Mortgage Savings Bank of Scotland, which brought much foreign capital to the country; and trustee of the Dundee Trust Invest- ment Co. of Scotland, representing a large amount of capital in Oregon and Washington. For several terms he has been president of the board of trade, and at the same time has not been excused from the presidency of the Arling- ton Club, or the British Benevolent and St Andrews societies. Few men have discharged so many and onerous official duties.
Richard B. Knapp was born in Ohio in 1839, where he resided until 1858, when he went to Wisconsin, from which state he came to Oregon the follow- ing year. In 1860 his brother, J. B. Knapp, together with M. S. Burrell, founded the house of Knapp & Burrell, dealers in hardware and agricultural implements, to which he was admitted in 1862, and from which his brother retired in 1870. This house was the first to engage in the trade in agricultu- ral machinery, for a long time the only one, and is still the most important in the north-west. It has done much to develop the farming interest of eastern Oregon and Washington, and recently of British Columbia,
Although Portland is 112 miles from the sea, and twelve above the junc- tion of the Willamette with the Columnbia, it was made a port of entry for the district of the Willamette. In 1848, when the territory was established, congress declared a collection district, with a port of entry at Astoria, the president to name two ports of delivery in the territory, one to be on Puget
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Sound. Nisqually and Portland were made ports of delivery by proclamation January 10, 1850, and surveyors of customs appointed at $1,000 per year. Abont the time when there had begun to be some use for the office it was discontinued, 1861, and foreign goods were landed at Portland in charge of an officer from Astoria. But in July 1864 an act was approved again making Portland a port of delivery, U. S. Acts, 1863-4, 353, in answer to numerous petitions for a port of entry, a great deal of circumlocution being required to deliver goods to the importer, whether in foreign or American bottoms. Deady, in S. F. Bulletin, July 6, 1864. The legislature of 1864, by resolution, still insisted on having a port of entry at Portland; and again, by resolution, in 1866 declared the necessity of a bouded warehouse, suggesting that the gov- ernment erect a building for the storage of goods in bond, and for the use of the federal courts and post-office. Such an appropriation was made in 1868, and the bonded warehouse erected in 1869-70, in which latter year Portland was the port of entry of Willamette collection district. Cong. Globe, 1869-70, ap. 604-5. Later steam-vessels for Portland entered at Astoria (Oregon dis- trict) and cleared from there to Portland (Willamette distriet). Outward bound they cleared at Portland, entering and elearing again at Astoria, some sailing vessels doing the same. The harbor is safe though small, the channel requiring the constant use of a dredger. Pilotage to Portland and insurance were high, drawbacks which it was believed would be overcome by the application to river improvements of a hoped-for congressional appropria- tion. A comparison of the exports and imports of the two distriets are thus given in Farrish's Commercial and Financial Review for 1877, 20-4. Foreign exports cleared from Portland to the value of $3,990,387; from Astoria, $2,451,357. Foreign imports entered at Portland, $461,248; entered at As- toria, $27,544. The number of coastwise vessels entered at Portland in this year was 177, with an aggregate tonnage of 188,984. The clearances coast- wise were 114, with a tonnage of 125,190. The number of foreign vessels entering was 37, with a total tonnage of 12,139. Most if not all, of these vessels loaded with wheat and salmon for Euglish ports. About an equal number of American vessels for foreign ports loaded with wheat and fish. The wheat was taken on at Portland and the salmon at Astoria. At the close of 1878 the wholesale trade of three firms alone exceeded nine million dollars. Eight ocean steamers, sixty river steamers, three railroads, and a hundred foreign vessels were employed in the eommeree of the state which centred at Portland, together with that of eastern Washington and Idaho. The year's exports from the city amounted to $13,983,650. The value of real estate sales in the city were nearly a million and a half, with a population of less than eighteen thousand.
There were in 1878 twenty sehools, public and private, sixteen churches, thirty-five lodges or secret organizations, fifteen newspaper publications, three publie and private hospitals, a public library, a gymnasium, a theatre, market, and four publie school buildings. I have spoken fully of the Portland schools in another place. Of societies and orders for benevolent and other purposes, Portland in particular and all the chief towns in general have a large number. Of different Masonic lodges, there are the Multnomah Council of Kadosh, 30th Degree, No. 1; Ainsworth Chapter of Rose Croix, ISth degree, No. 1; Oregon Lodge of Perfection, 14th degree, No. 1; Oregon Commandery No. 1; Grand Chapter; Portland Royal Areh Chapter, No. 3; Grand Lodge; Willamette Lodge No. 2, Harmony Lodge No. 12; Portland Lodge No. 55; Masonic Board of Relief; Washington Lodge No. 46, East Portland. The Masons have a fine building on Third Street. The Grand Lodge of Odd Fellows meets annually at Portland in the Odd Fellows' Temple, a handsome edifice on First Street. Ellison Encampment No. 1, Samaritan Lodge No. 2, Hassalo Lodge No. 15, Minerva Lodge No. 19, Orient Lodge No. 17, all have their home in Portland. The Improved Order of Red Men have three tribes, Multnomah No. 3, Oneonta No. 4, Willamette No. 6. The Great Council meets where it is appointed. The Good Templars have three lodges, Multnomah No. 12, Nonpareil No. 8G, Portland Lodge No. 102, and a Grand Lodge of Deputies.
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