USA > Oregon > Marion County > Salem > Oregon and its institutions; comprising a full history of the Willamette University, the first established on the Pacific Coast > Part 17
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We have now brought up the history of our univer- sity to the present period of time, and have endeav- ored to present it so minutely that the reader cannot fail to understand and appreciate the difficulties under which we have labored, and the persevering efforts which we have been obliged to put forth to bring it forward to its present state. We have not been dealing in fiction, but in sober facts, while we have been presenting the struggles of a people, poor as to money and few in numbers, to build an institu- tion to meet the demands of teeming humanity on the shores of the great Pacific. We have shown that we have not been laboring in vain, nor spending our strength for naught, but that every inch that we have gained in our enterprise we have been able to maintain. We have shown that our institution has become a fixed fact, that its permanence is without doubt secured. We have shown that it occupies a most commanding and eligible position in the city
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of Salem, the established capital of the state of Ore- gon, and near the center of one of the most beautiful valleys upon which the sun ever shone, and com- manding scenery as delightful as ever greeted the eye of man. And we have done this for the purpose of eliciting the attention of patriots, philanthropists, and Christians, and especially the Methodist Epis- copal Church of the Atlantic states, whose offspring we are, again to a most important though neglected portion of the world, and to the necessities of an in- fant people, who, from a disposition to do all they possibly can to help themselves, are entitled to the sympathies of all those who are abundantly able to afford them the necessary aid. By the memory of a Lee, who died for Oregon's advancement, blessing his adopted country with his latest breath ; and of a Shepherd, who fell a sacrifice in the same work; and a Whitman and his wife, whose love for Oregon could not be quenched but with their life's blood ; and by all the former benevolence of the Church, when for Oregon she poured out her money like water, and by a thousand considerations which might be pressed, allow me, dear brethren in the ministry and in the membership of the Church throughout the land, to commend to your serious considera- tion, to your benevolence, and to your prayers, the interests of the Willamette University. Lay a portion of your offerings on the altar of religious education erected on the Pacific shores, and millions hereafter will rise up and call you blessed.
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CHAPTER XIII.
A BRIEF SUMMARY OF FACTS.
THE attention of the reader is called expressly to the summary of facts in relation to the state of Oregon. which is presented in this chapter of our volume. The surface and beautiful scenery of the country have been sufficiently dwelt upon in the earlier chap- ters of the book; we wish now to present another view of its resources, its present condition, its future prospects, and the present state of the Methodist Episcopal Church within its bounds.
We have seen that its area embraces one hundred and one thousand four hundred square miles. This multiplied by six hundred and forty, the number of acres in a square mile, would give the astonishing amount of sixty-four million eight hundred and nine- ty-six thousand aeres of land. Of this vast number of acres we have, according to a very careful estimate, but three hundred and thirty-seven thousand and fifty-eight acres under cultivation. It is estimated that at least ten million acres of land are susceptible of cultivation. The amount of land now cultivated produced in 1864 one million two hundred and nine- teen thousand and thirty-four bushels of wheat, eighty- seven thousand six hundred and ninety-one bushels of barley, one million six hundred and thirty-one
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thousand nine hundred and sixty-two bushels of oats, fifty-four thousand three hundred and eighty bushels of corn, two thousand seven hundred and thirty- seven bushels of rye, seventy thousand and forty-five pounds of tobacco, thirty-eight thousand and thirty tons of hay, two hundred and sixty thousand one hundred and four bushels of potatoes, three hundred and eighteen thousand seven hundred and eighteen bushels of apples, seven hundred and seventy-nine thousand four hundred and forty-six pounds of wool. The aggregate of that year of wheat, barley, and oats was nearly three million bushels. Since then every year it has been much larger, and in 1867 it was probably not less than five million bushels. Now, with the ten million acres of arable land, it would be perfectly practicable, with the requisite amount of labor, to so develop the agricultural re- sources of the state as to raise twenty times as much annually as has ever been produced in a single year.
The kinds of grain, etc., named above are the staple products of the country, and can be raised in any quantities.
The adaptation of Oregon to the culture of fruits is worthy of special notice. There can be no ques- tion but that Oregon, taken as a whole, is decidedly the best fruit-growing state in the Union. It may in truth be said that in no part of the world do fruit trees grow so rapidly, bear so early, so regularly, and so abundantly, and produce fruit of so large size and of so delicious a flavor. This is true not only with respect to apples, but also with a great variety of
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fruits ; pears, plums, cherries, currants, gooseberries, raspberries, strawberries, peaches, and grapes. The last two mentioned flourish better in California than in Oregon, but with respect to every other kind men- tioned Oregon is every way superior to her southern sister. Fruit trees are generally as large at three years old in Oregon, and bear as abundantly, as they do in New York or Ohio at six or eight years old. Oregon has realized from her fruit considerable rev- enue. She has shipped annually to San Francisco, Victoria, and other places, more than one hundred thousand boxes of apples. This fruit has become so abundant all through the state that it can be gen- erally had for the gathering.
Experiments also in the culture of flax, hemp, tobacco, and hops have settled the question fully that the soil and climate are most admirably adapted to their cultivation and growth. The amount of flax seed produced from the acre averages about twenty- five bushels, and already extensive works for the manufacture of oil have been established at Salem, .under the direction of Edwin Cartwright, Esq., which promises to be a source of income to its pro- jectors, and a great saving to the state.
The stock-growing qualities of the state deserve separate mention. Perhaps there are few portions of the world where there are so many cattle and horses and mules and hogs and sheep in proportion to the population as roam over the extended pastures of the state of Oregon. They increase more rapidly, and are kept with less expense, than in any other
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state of which we have any knowledge. During one half of the winter they do not require to be fed at all, and the other half not more than from three to six weeks. This renders stock raising one of the most profitable employments in which men can engage, as the extensive mining population south and east and north, together with the cities and the shipping that visit the country, constitute an abundant market for all such supplies as can be produced.
The timber of the country demands a separate paragraph. Though it is not of a great variety, yet it is of a most magnificent growth and of a good quality. The forests are composed of fir, cedar, spruce, hemlock, balm, ash, oak, and in the lower valleys of Southern Oregon myrtle, maple, and chick- opin. Some of the kinds grow to an incredible size. It is no uncommon thing to find fir and cedar, pine and spruce trees measuring from twenty-four to thirty-six feet in circumference, and three hundred feet high. In various portions of the country there may also be found cotton-wood, alder, sumach, wil- low, and dogwood ; and the laurel is also indigenous to the country, and in many places abounds. These vast forests of the finest of timber constitute one of the most extensive and inexhaustible sources of revenue with which the country is favored.
The mineral resources of the state are varied, and of paramount importance. Mines of various kinds have been developed in almost every part of the state, and have been productive of vast amounts of money. Placer gold diggings have been extensively worked
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for years past in the southern, northern, and eastern portions ; and in Jackson County alone, in Southern Oregon, the mines which have been worked since 1850 have produced annually one million dollars. There are numerous quartz veins of silver in Southern and Eastern Oregon, permanent and enduring as the mountains, which need only the requisite capital for advantageous working to produce rich returns. It has been estimated that the amount of gold taken from the mines of Oregon in 1866 was eight million dollars, and from the whole Pacific slope belonging to the United States one hundred and six million dollars the same year. With these facts before the mind it will not be regarded as visionary if we say that there is no portion of the Union that combines within the same space, to an equal extent, all the varied and reliable elements of wealth, and a steadily increasing prosperity.
The great necessity for the development of the capabilities of this interesting state is an increase of population. The present population of the state, as near as can be estimated from the census of former years, is about eighty thousand, and she needs and could set to profitable employment one million of people, and is capable of sustaining ten times that number. Possessing the capabilities which we Lave delineated, and offering the strong inducements of a bland and wholesome climate, and of inexhaustible stores of natural wealth, together with the fact that she must ultimately command a large share of the trade of Northern Russia, China, and the islands of
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the Pacific Ocean, and that the time is not distant when the neighing of the iron horse will be heard, as with lightning swiftness he comes rushing down from the gorges of the Cascade Mountains, and darting along the valleys-and when we consider also that the God of providence never could have intended that a conn- try of such unrivaled beauty, such amazing fertility, such salubrity of climate, and with such exhaustless stores of wealth standing in her forests, and embedded in her mountains, should remain forever in the pos- session of the Cayote and the besotted savage, unde- veloped and unblessed, but that it should become the home of civilization, intelligence, and refine- ment, a place of schools, academies, and colleges, of towns and eities, and courts of justice and temples of worship, and manufactures, and institutions of charity and benevolence, and teem with every excellence that the religion of the meek and lowly Jesus can confer upon such a land-there can be no question but that in the order of events there must be, and that speedily, a vast increase of population not only in Oregon, but in Washington Territory, and in every other eligible portion of this extended coast. The increased population may be what the present is, and what it has been from the beginning, a mixed multitude from many lands ; but the Christianity of the Bible, wielded by heaven's appointed instrumen- talities, shall mold the moral masses until they shall be prepared to receive the impress of true religion. The Churches in the land have a fearful responsi- bility resting upon them. They should lay broad
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and deep the foundations of righteousness and god- liness and peace and love. They should lay aside all party spirit and party strife and non-essentials, and under the power of the spirit of Christian unity and unreserved consecration to a course of self-deny- ing, prayerful, vigorous, and persevering labor for God and salvation, prepare the country for the on- coming multitudes which, with the certainty of the rush of the majestic Columbia westward to ocean's bed, will fill every valley, line every river, adorn every hill side, and spread over every extended plain of this heaven-appointed land. God has ordained it, and he will surely bring it to pass.
Many persons may read this volume who will desire more information in regard to the summer and winter seasons of Oregon ; and for the benefit of such attention is called to the following remarks, which were penned by the author more than twenty years ago, and which, by so many years of subsequent observation and experience, have been confirmed as correct :
" An Oregon winter is vastly different from a win- ter in the Eastern States occupying the same degrees of latitude, mainly for the reason that in the Eastern States the prevailing winds are from the north and west, and on the Pacific coast they are from the south. There is no definite period when these winter winds in Oregon commence blowing, but the different sea- sons vary much in this respect: As a general rule the commencement may be considered as about the middle of November. When they do come they
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bring with them continued falls of rain, and hence the period of their continuance is properly called the rainy season. They generally continue, with occa- sionally a short interval, for two or three months, and sometimes four, after which there is usually a month of warm, pleasant weather. This sometimes comes in February, sometimes in March, but is generally followed by three or four weeks of chilly, rainy weather from the southwest.
" Though the winters are disagreeable on account of the humidity of the atmosphere, yet the cold is very moderate, the mereury seldom falling as low as the freezing point. As a matter of course, the ground is seldom frozen; and as to skating privileges, there is so little ice in the country that it is seldom that skates can be found in the market, and plowing is often done during a great portion of the winter. Occasionally, however, there is an exception to this.
" At one time the mercury fell in the Willamette Valley to five degrees below zero, and at the Dalles on the east side of the Cascade Mountains to fifteen degrees below zero. This intense cold lasted at that time for several days, and the lakes were all frozen over, and the Columbia River was bridged with ice as far down as the mouth of the Willamette. It will be correctly inferred from what has been said, that, as in the Eastern States, there is a great difference in the winters of Oregon. Some are vastly more rainy than others; but one half of the winters on the Pacific coast are not characterized by as much falling weather as is frequently experienced in the state of
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New York, and are, in consequence of their warm- ness, decidedly pleasant.
" If the winters of Oregon are rather stormy and unpleasant, the summers are sufficiently delightful amply to compensate for the wintry blasts. In the months of March and April the weather usually be- comes sufficiently warm to start vegetation, so that thus early the prairies become beautifully verdant, and many of Flora's choicest gifts appear, to herald the approach of summer. Now the summer winds, which are from the west and north, begin to prevail ; the howl of the winter storm, and the roar of the southern winds, are hushed to silence; the hills and val- leys are gently fanned by the western zephyr from the bosom of the Pacific; and the sun, pouring his floods of light and heat from a cloudless sky, causes nature, as by enchantment, to enrobe herself in all the glories of summer. The delightful weather thus ushered in continnes with but little variation throughout the entire summer, with occasional showers; but these are much 'like angels' visits, few and far between.'
" Generally, in the months of July, Angust, and September the ground becomes exceedingly dry ; but the rains that fall in April, May, and June, with the moisture which is deposited in the heavy dews of the valleys, serve to insure the crops by bringing the grains and vegetables to maturity.
"The temperature of the summer ranges from sixty- five to eighty degrees at noon in the shade, but the evenings are much cooler. There is no such thing as sultry weather on this part of the Pacific coast. The
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nights in this respect are admirable for rest and sleep."
From a personal experience and observation ex- tending through a period of twenty-nine years, we are fully prepared to express the opinion that the climate of Oregon is decidedly favorable to the pro- motion of health. And why should it not be? The temperature is remarkably uniform, particularly in the western half of the country. Oregon is not sub- ject to the evils resulting from the sudden changes from extreme heat to extreme cold, as are most of the states east of the Rocky Mountains.
The exhilarating ocean breeze, which fans the coun- try almost every day during the summer, contributes greatly to purify the atmosphere; and this circum- stance, in connection with the facts that there is little decaying vegetable matter, and but few dead swamps and marshes to exhale their poisonous miasma to infect the surrounding regions, are suffi- cient to show that this country must be the abode of health, and that human life is as likely to be pro- tracted, and men and women as likely to die of old age here, as in almost any other portion of the world.
But every country has its defects, and this is not free from them. It is neither the garden of Eden, nor is it a barren waste. That it is a land of valleys and mountains, of rivers and streamlets, of mighty forests and extended prairies, of a salubrious and healthy climate, a rich and productive soil, of abundant de- posits of mineral wealth, and of boundless lumbering
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agricultural, pastoral, mechanical, and manufacturing resources, the foregoing remarks will fully show.
Such are the main characteristics of the field of our operations as a Church within the limits of the Oregon Conference. It is not assuming too much to say, that, for the moral, intellectual, and religious culture of the present population, and of the multi- tudes who are destined in the future to crowd every part of that extended country, there rests upon the Methodist Episcopal Church a very great responsi- bility. Her system in every respect is fully adapted to the condition of the country, and no other system extant can compete with hers. Her spiritual Chris- tianity, her itinerant and extemporaneous preaching, her songs of praise, her high religious experience, and all her ancient modes of worship, and especially her camp-meetings, to which the bright, clear summers of the country are peculiarly adapted, cannot fail, if properly brought to bear upon the masses by a con- secrated ministry in connection with a sanctified literature, to check the progress of error and vice, to counterbalance the influence of Skepticism and Popery, to roll back defiant Mormonism and Deism and Spiritism to their native hell, to quicken dead souls into spiritual life, and to preserve the country to a pure religion, a true patriotism, substantial happiness, and a perpetuated prosperity.
The Methodist Episcopal Church has the right to lead on the sacramental hosts of God's elect on the Pacific coast, arising from priority of occupancy and organization. She was the first established; and the
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locality of the first class, which was organized by Rev. Jason Lee, in the fall of 1834, was at a point ten miles below the city of Salem; but subsequently the class removed to that place, so that really, the Salem Church was the first Christian organization in the Oregon Territory, and first Protestant Church west of the Rocky Mountains.
The history of the rise and progress of the Meth- odist Episcopal Church within the limits of the Oregon Conference would be replete with interest ; but it must constitute the subject of a future volume, our present plan not permitting us even to introduce an outline. All that we have space to furnish is a simple statement of the present condition of the Church in the wide-spread field which is covered by the Oregon Conference.
Within this field, the boundaries of which have been given in the first part of this volume, there are six presiding elders ' districts, three of which are entirely within the state of Oregon, and one, the Walla Walla District, is divided by the line between Oregon and Washington Territory, and the other two lie within the limits of said Territory. Each one of these districts, if we except the Yakima Indian Mis- sion, is much larger in extent of country than many of the conferences of the Atlantic states.
In the whole conference there are upward of fifty appointments, besides the districts, the institutions of learning, and the Pacific Advocate. There were but fifty-five preachers to supply this vast field of labor, and, consequently, many portions of it will fail to be
19
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reached by the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church during the present year. Besides the fifty- five effective men there are five who are returned superannuated, and two supernumerary, making in all sixty-two preachers, embracing those who are yet on trial. There are sixty-eight local preachers, four thou- sand two hundred and eighteen members and proba- tioners, forty-three houses of worship, estimated at sev- enty-five thousand dollars, twenty-seven parsonages, worth thirty thousand dollars, sixty-two Sabbath- schools, five hundred and thirty-four officers and teachers, three thousand two hundred and ninety- nine scholars, and thirteen thousand nine hundred and eighty-two volumes in libraries.
When compared with the numerical strength of the Church in many other conferences, the Oregon Conference looks indeed very small; but considered in proportion to the population of the state, it will compare favorably even with the conferences em- bracing New York.
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CHAPTER XIV.
REMINISCENCES OF MISSIONARY LIFE.
IT was on the 18th day of August, 1840, that Rev. Jason Lee, Dr. Elijah White, myself, and an Indian guide, whom we designated by the name of Captain, started from the old mission premises on the Willamette to perform a missionary tour to the Umpqua Valley, then to white men but little known. Our specific object was to explore the country watered by the Umpqua River, with a view to the establishment of a missionary station some- where within its limits. Report had made the num- ber of Indians in the country so great that it was thought to be a very eligible position for the estab- lishment of missionary operations. But before deciding in reference to a mission, we resolved to examine the country and satisfy ourselves. The mode of traveling we adopted was on horseback, and in addition to our riding horses, we had three for carry- ing our baggage, and four spare ones, that in case of the loss or failure of any we might not be left destitute. This was a precaution in those days indispensably necessary to be taken by all who would secure their ultimate safety in traversing the extended plains of this wild country. As this was the first prairie expedition with which I had ever
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been connected, it was necessary for me at the outset to learn the peculiarities of horseback traveling on the Pacific coast. Mr. Lee had performed two jour- neys across the Rocky Mountains, and was well quali- fied to be my instructor. Watching him closely while he was packing our bedding, provisions, and cooking utensils on the backs of the horses, I soon observed that it required considerable skill and practice to wind the lash-rope around the pack and the body of the horse, so as to secure the burden to the back of the animal in case of fright, stumbling, or running against any obstruction, all of which, in the process of binding the packs, it was necessary to guard against with the utmost precaution.
Mr. Lee magnified his office as our instructor by packing the three horses himself; then we all mounted, each man with his gun athwart the pom- mel of his saddle, and our little cavalcade put off on a moderate gallop across the beautiful and fertile plain lying in the rear and south of the mission premises. Traveling ten miles to the south, at noon we reached the place where the city of Salem now stands, then known by the Indian name of Cheme- kete. Here the Oregon Mission had broken ground preparatory to the erection of a saw and grist mill, and here it was in contemplation to establish the Mission Manual Labor School. This locality, though almost a perfect solitude so far as the existence of humanity was concerned, appeared to us to be one of the most delightful that we had ever seen. The extensive and fertile plains surrounding
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