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Form A Federal Writers' Project
Circumstances of Interview Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date January 14, 1939.
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon.
Subject Ear]g Days and Ways in and around Milwaukie.
Name and address of informant Mr. Harvey Gordon Starkweather.
Manager. Broadway Buildin, Portland, Oregon.
Date and time of interview January 124 1939 10-12 A.M.; 2-3:45 P.M.
Place of interview Office of informant, Broadway Bldg., Portland, Ore.
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant
Name and address of person, if any, accompanying you
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.
A typical downtown office building, ten stories high, on Morrison St.,
between Park and West Park Avenues, Portland. A conventional private office,
one of a suite, conventionally furnished.
(Use as many additional sheets te necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
InficJioa btained should sup-,?ly
1. Ariestry 6,
2. Place and date of birth 7,
3. Ropily. 8.
4. Place lived in, with dates 9,
5. Education, with dares 10.
Form B
Personal History c4 Informant
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn Date January 14, 1939.
Address
Federal Writers? Project
Works Progress Administration
505 Elks Building. Portland. Oregon
Subject Early Days and Ways in and around Milwaukie.
Name and address of informant Mr. Harvey Gordon Starkweather
Broadway Building, Portland, Orezon
the
0•:;civ:.1n d c2cmplishments with dates
CQ7mun.. y,,nLir activities
OtA6r poiAts gainert in interview
1. Welch, Scotch and Irish. (Family came to America, 1640).
2. Near Milwaukie, Oregon, 1868.
3. Father, William Austin Starkweather; mother, Eliza Gordon Starkweather.
4. Al]. but three years spent in Milwaukie and Portland, Oregon.
1898-1899, Athena, Umatilla Co., Oregon, 1899-1901, La Grande, Union Co., Oregon.
5. Public school of district (Concord) where now living. Never saw the inside of
a high school until made principal of one.
6. Teaching. Property appraising. Real Estate.
7. Sixteen years a member of Concord School District Board; County School
Superintendent, Clackamas Co., 1896-1898. Six years a member of the Board
of Regents, State Normal Schools. Spent 10, or 15, years promoting super-
highway from Portland to Oregon City. Appraisal work on State Highway Commission;
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the proper heading
and the number to which the material refers).
Form B Starkweather 2.
Right-of-way appraiser for Mar Department for Bonneville Dam flowage ease-
ment. Appraiser for Interior Department, power lines Bonneville to Vancouver.
Appraised land for the biological survey in Marion County.
Outstanding work: On recommendation of Oregon State Grange WAS selected and
sent to Europe as member of U. S. Rural Credits Committee, in 1913. Visited
13 European countries in study of rural credits and other farm problems. (See
U. S. Sen. Doc. 214, of 1913), report on which served as basis for progressive
legislation, including Federal Farm Loan Act.
Always interested in political matters and Oregon history, and good road
development. Did considerable work toward getting the study of Oregon history
into public schools.
8. No particular religious affiliations; brought up as Presbyterian with some
Baptist influence. Interested in all federal, civic, and community affairs.
Member of State Grange, Masonic, and Odd Fellows lodges. President of Sons
and Daughters of American Pioneers, 1818-1819.
9. Large, somewhat portly man, with white hair, and twinkling blue eyes. Well
groomed and prosperous in appearance, with cordial and genial manner. Slow
in speech, and given to digressing.
10. Extremely well informed on Oregon history, but somewhat disappointing in
matters of a folklore nature, which have to be gleaned from the history related.
Form C Federal Writers/ Project
Text of Interview (Unedited) Works Progress Administration
OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES
Name of worker Sara B. Wrenn
Date January 14. 1939,
Address 505 Elks Building, Portland, Oregon
Subject Early Days and Ways in and around Milwaukie.
Name and address of informant Mr. Harvey Gordon Starkweather
Broadway Building, Portland, Oregon.
Text:
You asked about my religious activities back there, reminds me of an
old-time exhorter. He used an ox -team as a simile, where one of the oxen was
balky. A balky ox, as you probably don't know, is just out the balkiest
animal the Creator made. The good ox will pull with all his might while the
balky one is stubbornly standing in his tracks, or, to make matters worse,
retreating in the other direction. It's a pretty bad situation for the driver,
any way you take it. So this exhorter was shouting, "If my Baptist ox and my
Presbyterian ox and my Methodist ox will only all pull together we can pull a
mighty load." That's the way I've always felt. I'll just pull along with each
and any of them, without waiting to see which is Presbyterian, Methodist or
Baptist.
Well, you want folklore. Folklore, they say, comes out of history, so
perhaps I'd better give a little of that first. I've lived almost all my life
in Milwaukie, as I told you back there. Some folks say Milwaukie is so spelled
because the people who incorporated the town misspelled, making the last syllable
"ie" instead of "ee", as the town.in Wisconsin is spelled. As a matter of fact,
according to what I have been able to learn, "ie" is correct rather than nee".
(Use as many additional sheets as necessary, each bearing the heading given
above).
Form C Starkweather 2.
Vhile Lot Whitcomb platted Milwaukie, he wasn't the first settler.
Milwaukie's first settler was a man named Fellows, who built his cabin close
to the edge of the Willamette river, near the foot of what is now Jefferson
street. The site of the cabin washed away in the floods long ago. Where
Fellows came from, when he built this cabin, or where he went after disposing
of his squatter's right, nobody ever knew. Later on, Lot Whitcomb filed on
the donation land claim that afterwards included the townsite.
Lot Whitcomb was quite a man. A Yankee, born in Vermont, in 1807,
he came to Oregon, in 1847, as captain of a train of 147 wagons, that included
the wagons of Henderson and Seth Luelling the name that is always associated
with our famous Oregon cherries. Whitcomb was influenced in coming to Oregon
by a pamphlet written by old Joel Palmer, and that he wasn't a poor man is
evidenced by the fact that his own equipment consisted of six wagons, with five
yoke of oxen to each wagon, and a family carriage drawn by four hourses. That
was quite a caravan in itself six wagons, thirty oxen, and a four -horse carriage,
In addition, he had an ample stock of provisions, furniture, bedding, new carpets,
and a set of sawmill irons, such as were in use in that day. The trip across the
plains to Oregon, by Whitcomb's party, took seven months and twenty-one days.
They arrived at Oregon City in November, 1847. The next spring, Whitcomb filed on
his donation land claim, and then built the first sawmill near the mouth of
Johnson Creek, where the lumber for Milwaukie's first schoolhouse was sawed.
Alon7 with 11itcomb in the building of Milwaukie, then the rival city
of Portland, were the Kelloggs, father and sons,Orrin and Joseph, and the
brothers, Henderson and Seth Luelling, mentioned above.
The Luellings brought the first cherry trees to Oregon. Henderson
it VAS, who took the initial step in bringing that first good variety of grafted
Form C Starkweather 3.
fruit trees, the details of which are interesting. Henderson, planning to
come to Oregon in the spring of 1846, secured the cooperation of a neighbor,
by the name of John Fisher, for his plan. First, they procured a stout wagon,
then they made two boxes, 12 inches deep and of sufficient length and breadth
that when placed in the wagon -box, side by side, they filled it completely.
The boxes were then filled with a compost, or soil, consisting principally
of charcoal and earth, and in this 700 small trees were planted. The trees
were from 20 inches to four feet high, protected by light strong strips of
hickory bolted on to posts, set in staples on the wagon box. For that wagon
alone three yoke of oxen were detailed. Can't you see those men working and
planning to the utmost detail, that Oregon might have in time the wonderful
cherries and other fruit for which it is now famous? And there are those to-
day who dare to say the pioneers had no vision, that they were mere adventurers.
Well, to go on with our story. The Luelling caravan, which consisted of three
wagons for the Luellings, one for the Fisher family, two for Nathan Bockett's
family, and the Nursery Wagon itself seven wagons in all started on its
long journey across the plains, on April 17, 1846. It traveled about fifteen
miles a day, and every day, no matter how scarce the water, nor how far the
distance between watered camps, each and every one of those little 700 trees
were carefully sprinkled with water. Each little tree was a saga in itself.
The Dalles WAS reached about October 1st. TWO boats had to be constructed to
bring the families and their goods, not forgetting the cherry trees, down to
the Willamette Valley. It was November 1st, when they left The Dalles. They
got down as far as Wind River, where the boats were unloaded and reloaded
(north bank), until finally, at the Upper Cascades, the wagons were again set
up and everything hauled to the Lower Cascades (north bank). Meanwhile, the
Form C Starkweather 4.
boats had been turned adrift and went bumping down the current to the Lower
Cascades, where they were captured, reloaded, and poled and paddled to Fort
Vancouver. At The Dalles, the fruit trees had been taken out of their boxes
and wrapped in cloths to protect them not only from the handling but from
frost. They were nursed carefully the next six months and more, until their
owner found what he thought the proper place for their final planting. About
one-half of the original 700 trees survived and grew.
Some idea of the importance of fruit in those days may be realized
from the fact that a box of apples brought by Mr. Luelling to Portland, in
1852, sold as high as 475.00. Four bushels shipped to the California gold
mines brought 4500.00.
Before leaving the story of the Luelling fruit trees, while it was
Henderson Luelling who instigated the bringing of the first fruit trees, it
is to his brother Seth that we are indebted for the toothsome Black Republican,
Royal Anne and Bing cherries. Henderson left Oregon for California, in 1854,
where he started the fruit industry of that State, dying in San Jose in 1878.
But Seth remained true to his first love. He stayed in Oregon. A great
admirer of Abraham Lincoln, Seth belonged to the "Black Republican" party,
and, saying he would make the people relish Black Republicans, he gave his
newly propagated cherry that name. The Bink cherry he named in honor of his
faithful old Chinaman, Bing, who cultivated the test rows of his nursery.
The old home of Seth Luelling still stands on Front Street of Milwmukie, shaded
by the great Babylon weeping willow, that Seth's first wife, Clarissa, planted
as a cutting so long ago; a cutting that, tradition says, was brought originally
from Mount Vernon. Every spring the old tree, as if in celebration of the start
of its long journey more than ninety years ago, transforms itself almost over
Form C Starkweather 5.
night from a waving gray mass of skeleton branches into a magical fountain
of vivid, living green.
To the Kelloggs, father, Orrin, and son Joseph, Oregon owes not
only much of her early river navigation, coincident with which was the build-
ing of the first schooner, (later taken to California and traded off in a
series of trades that ended with the purchase of the bark Lausanne, all of
which resulted in the sawmill and shipbuilding firm of Whitcomb, Kellogg and
Torrence), but the delivery in Oregon Territory of the first Masonic charter.
Orrin and Joseph came to Oregon, in 1848. On their way, they encountered a
man by the name of P. B. Cornwall. Certain Masons then living in Oregon had
petitioned the grand lodge of Missouri for a charter, authorizing the establish-
ment of a lodge in Oregon. This charter was entrusted to Cornwall. But
Cornwall, on his way, had heard of the riches of the California gold fields.
When he came to the branching of the ways one leading to the land of home-
makers and the other to the adventurous realms of fortune, Cornwall chose the
latter, not, however, before ascertaining that the Kelloggs were master Masons.
Satisfying himself as to this fact, he entrusted to them the charter, which
they brought on to Oregon, and under the authority of which, the first masonic
lodge west of the Rocky mountains was established in Oregon City, September 11,
1848. The charter still hangs on the malls of the Masonic Lodge at Oregon City;
in the anteroom of the lodge stands the little old trunk in which it was kept
en route.
Joseph Kellogg was not only a river -boat builder and navigator. He
was also a road builder. He it was who built the first macadam road in the
country, which led from Portland south along the vest bank of the Willamette
to a point known famously or infamously
001111•
according to your point of view
Form C Starkweather 6.
as the White House, just across the river from Milwaukie, and just north of
a big jutting bluff, called Elk Rock. Macadam Road was for many years a
favorite pleasure drive for early Portlanders, "fast" drivers and otherwise.
Speaking of Elk Rock, an old tradition of the early settlers was that
the name was derived from the fact that long before the advent of the white men,
the Indians were accustomed to stampeding the herds of elk then common in the
vicinity, forcing them over the precipice into the river below, where they were
finished off, and picked up by the Indians, waiting in canoes. Some color is
lent to this story by the finding, many years ago, of a pair of elk's antlers
in the bottom of the Willamette river at that point.
Joseph Kellogg it was, too to go back to the Kelloggs who built
the breakwater above the falls of the Willamette at Oregon City, on the east
shore, forming what was known as the Basin, where for many years, the up -river
boats could slip down through quiet waters and discharge their cargoes for a
short transfer to traffic below the falls. Old Orrin Kellogg, the father, was
married to an Indian woman, a Chippewa, I believe. She MRS a devoted Catholic,
and died, erect on her horse, while returning home from church. William
Johnson, of the Johnson D.L.C. of South Portland, has been quoted as saying that
one squaw was worth six white women, which shams there is no accounting for taste.
Well, there were more than six squaws to one white woman in those days,
so I suppose we ought to be a little lenient about a man's choice. Even as late
as the early 60's, there was always a big Indian camp in the vicinity of Oregon
City. They kept the white women on edge a good part of the time. They were
peaceable enough until they got drunk. When they were drunk nobody knew what
they might do. A favorite amusement under such conditions was beating up their
wives or anybody else's wife.
From the noise and yells at the distant camp it was evident the bucks
Form C Starkweather 7.
had got hold of some firewater one evening, father being in the land office
and detained, when my mother was alone. This was confirmed, when old Solie
Ann, a squaw who helped mother in her housework occasionally, came slipping
in through the back door, asking mother to hide her, as "Indians fighting"
she said. But before she could be concealed, one of the braves, very much
"lit up" came in and demanded that Solie Ann go with him. Solie Ann was in
no mood for a "tanning." She resisted. Meantime mother, who was not lacking
in spunlr, had got hold of an old dragoon pistol one of those old powder and
ball affairs with a long bore and a beat handle. It wasn't loaded and mother
knew it, but she brandished the ferocious looking thing and managed to bluff
the drunken Indian off till help came, and Solie Ann rescued.
That reminds me of the bull fight story. The cattle that Ewing
Young brought to Oregon in the 30's were of the longhorn, Mexican variety.
He -started with 800 cattle, if I remember, and what with Indian raids and
quarrels among his own men, arrived with some 600. Later he sold Mexican
cows for as low as *3.00 each. Naturally they increased and got to running
mild through the country, and of course they were a menace, especially to
anyone afoot. Sometimes there would be as many as fifteen or twenty to a
bunch.
My grandfather Gordon had located on the Molalla river, building a
log cabin. The door was of split shakes with wooden hinges. There was no
fence about the cabin, and these long horn cattle I'm telling you about, were
roaming the country thereabout. One day a bunch appeared, led by two old bulls,
or at least one of the bulls was old, and one of his horns VAS gone. These
bulls were fighting, and they were making a gory mess of it, as they bellowed
and pawed, with the dirt flying in every direction. At the time the cabin was
Form C Starkweather 8.
occupied by two families, that of my grandfather and the family of J. G.
Hundsacker. My mother was then a girl of fifteen or sixteen, and she it
was who told me the story. The men folk were absent on this day only
the women and children at home, and from the time the bulls appeared it
was too late to do anything but watch them, and with what terrified eyes
the two women and children peered through the cabin cracks at the savage goring
and pushing. Butting enters largely into a fight between bulls. Sudden
consternation overtook the cabin's inmates, for slowly but surely the old
one -horned bull, dripping blood from the rapier -like thrusts of his opponent,
was being pushed toward their only exit, the frail door of split shakes.
Already they were but a dozen feet distant so intent on their duel for
mastery that the screams and yells of the trapped spectators availed nothing.
What would happen in that confined space when the crazy brutes crashed through
the door? Frantically the mothers piled their scanty furniture as a barricade.
Above, poles had been laid across from joist to joist, as a place for storing
arlous articles not in use. Up, on this precarious perch, they managed to
thrust my mother, with the Hundsaker baby in her arms. The other children
they crowded into the corners. Then, armed with firewood and whatever they
could find available, they awaited the inevitable. The old bull's mighty rump
was practically at the door, when, with a tortured bellow he extricated him-
self from the thrusting horns of his adversary and plunged into the woods. The
young victor turned with a snort to the cows and calves, which had been meekly
awaiting the outcome, and behind him they all filed out of sight.
Now, as to the story of the State Seal. It WAS designed by my uncle,
Harvey Gordon. First, I want to give you a little of his background. His
father, Hugh Gordon (my grandfather) was born in North Carolina in 1796. He
Form C Starkweather 9.
married Jane Bickland in Kentucky, and moved to Indiana, then a frontier,
where his three children, Harvey, Eliza (my mother) and James were born.
Grandfather farmed, but never had a wagon until he cams to Oregon. Sub-
sisting largely by hunting, he had lived always in a log cabin, with
luxuries unknown. He maintained that nobody should work more than four
hours a day. Deciding to come to Oregon in '45 he went first to Missouri
in order to get an early start for the long trip across the plains the follow-
ing spring. They wintered in Missouri, and in May, 1846, the train of fifty
wagons was off for Oregon. In the party was a family named Simpson. During
the winter in Missouri a baby boy was born to the Simpsons. The baby -Isms Sam
Simpson, afterward Oregon's well known poet.
Harvey Gordon was eighteen when he set forth for Oregon in '46.
Young as he was, he was well educated, considered a master mathematician.
He had been sent to private schools, and had had special training as a
surveyor and draughtsman. Big and husky, he was studious and serious, and
very determined. Careful of his cattle, all the way across the plains, he
was never known to ride the wagon -tongue, but grim, grimy and dirty, he strode
in the dust at his oxen's side, his whip in his hand.
When the party left Missouri, Oregon's boundary line was still in
dispute. The treaty was signed on June 15th, 1846, and none of them knew
as they plodded along whether their journey's and would be in America or
British territory. It must have given them considerable food for thought.
I have reviewed all this so as to show something of the trend of
thought of the young man, possibly, when at the age of 29, he was commissioned
to draw the first seal of the State of Oregon caused him to give thought,
and place in his drawing the departing sailing vessel of the English, as
Form C Starkweather 10.
England's dominion withdrew from Oregon's shores, while America's arriving
steamship symbolized the new, and immediately after there must have sprung
to mind the picture of the covered wagon, with that long trudge beside it
in his memory. The elk, with its "haunching" antlers, was a noble example
of our then abundant game, and what could be more typical, by 1857, of Oregon's
agricultural possibilities than the plow and the rake and sheaf of wheat. As
to the pick -axe, I am inclined to think that was added because it WAS close to
Harvey Gordon's heart. In '48 he went to California and dug out a fortune, and
a second time he went there and picked out a fortune in the gold mines. Gold
hadn't yet been discovered in Oregon. The thirty-three stars, of course,
represent the thirty-three states, Oregon making the thirty-third. The ordinary
bearing across its face, "The Union", as Oregon's motto ("She flies with her
own wings" being the territorial rather than the State motto) reveals Harvey
Gordon's strong feeling on the question of slavery and sedition, growing of
more and more paramount national interest. Though his ancestry was southern,
both he and his people were all for an undivided country.
The seal as designed was adopted by the Oregon Constitutional Con-
vention, at 2 P. M., of the afternoon session, September 18, 1857 (see page
99 of that year's Journal), and the story I have given you as to the motivating
influences of Harvey Gordon in creating the design, is the story as known to
his family and descendants, of which I am a member.
A somewhat exciting incident in the crossing of my grandfather's
train of covered wagons was when in Wyoming I think it was the way was
stopped one day by some three thousand Indians, making demand of tribute. In
full warpath regalia feathers and paint and everything to create a terrify.-
Form C Starkweather 11.
ing appearance the braves appeared as if by magic. That they were primed
for a fight, in which the handful of whites had not the slightest chance, was
evident to all, albeit they sat their ponies quietly enough, as the chief
powwowed, demanding more and yet more. The white non, with no time even to
form the usual barricade of linked wagons, did the only thing there was to
do under the circumstances. With no protest and as little resentment and
show of alarm as possible, they brought from each of their wagons' already
depleted stores, food and various articles which they piled on the blankets
spread for the purpose. At long last the chief raised his hand, permitting
them to continue. The relief with which they did so may be imagined. Their
provisions might grow short, as indeed they did, but that was a problem better
faced than massacre.
Somewhere, along about this time, two of the women got a fright. Mrs.
Baker and Mrs. Briggs had riding horses, and they had formed the habit of riding
apart from the company. One day as the slaw, dusty road wound around a bluff,
they took a short cut over the hill, where eventually they were not only out of
signt but out of hearing of the wagon train. Suddenly they were confronted by
a band of braves, all decked out in the usual paint sad feathered war -bonnets.
Naturally, the women were scared half to death, but they didn't lose their
heads. Putting on a bold front, they made known the fact that a big wagon
train was close at hand, so the Indians after considerable argument among them-
selves finally let them go. First, however, the captives had to give up their
bonnets. These were of bright calico and had taken the fancy of the young
bucks, who probably gambled for their possession. The Indians passed the wagon
train before the reappearance of the women, and Mr. Briggs was horror stricken
to see his wife's bonnet on the chief's head. She WAS not among them as a
Form C Starkweather 12.
captive; neither was Mrs. Baker. Immediately it was assumed they had been
killed when they came galloping in. And all Briggs could thinkt say
was, "What the hell, Orville, have you done with your bonnet."
It WAS Horace Baker, of this wagon train, who settled on the 640
acre donation land claim near Clear Creek, on the south bank of the Clackamas
river. Being a stone mason he built a stone -and -clay fireplace in his 20 x 30
foot log cabin, with its shake, or clapboard, roof. Shortly afterward he
established a ferry, operated on a cable, across Clackamas river, with a toll
of $2.00 for a team, and 50 cents each for foot passengers. Baker's Ferry
WAS operated until 1883, when it was replaced by a bridge then and now
known as Baker's Bridge, though the present bridge is not the same. When the
Willamette Locks were constructed in the early 70's, Horace Baker quarried
the stone therefor on his farm.
It is not generally known, but the Western Star of Milwmukie, the
motto of which was, "As far as breeze can bear or billows foam, survey our
empire and build our home", was in existence for some time prior to the Weekly
Oregonian (Number 15) (From which it would appear the paper started November 1,
1850) of Volume 1, "MilwRukie, Oregon Territory, February 27, 1851," was a copy
of this old paper from which I supervised the printing of a duplicate some
years ago. Some of the items may be of interest, as, for instance: "TERMS,
invariably in advance. For one year, per mail, 47.00; for six months, $4.00;
single copies for sale at the office.
Advertising. On square, (12 lines or less) two insertions, $2.00 each;
for every additional insertion, $1.00.
A liberal deduction to yearly advertisers."
Form C Starkweather
To The Public
Having entered into arrangements by which "THE WESTERN STAR"
Establishment with the dues of the same, have passed into the hands of
Messrs. Waterman Carter, who have been engaged in the office since its
commencement, I take this occasion to recommend them, and the paper to my
friends and the public generally believing as I do that the "Star" will
continue to be as useful and able as heretofore. I therefore bespeak them
a generous share of the public patronage.
LOT WHITCOMB
The readers of the "Western Star" will see by the above that we have
purchased the "Western Star" Establishment together with the dues now stand-
ing upon the books of the office. It will therefore become necessary for us
to make our collections which the books show due, as fast as our patrons can
find it convenient to remit the same. We shall endeavor to continue the
"Star" in accordance with its first intention for the interests.of the
Territory and our common country.---- We are well aware that our business is
hard, and perhaps the amount of manual and intellectual labor necessary to
furnish a paper like ours is not always known to its readers. But we rely
upon the intelligence and patriotism of the people of Oregon for their patron-
age and support.
John Orvis Waterman,
William Davis Carter.
THE NEW STEAMER
LOT WHITCOMB OF OREGON
Will commence her regular trips from
Milwaukie to Astoria
On Monday, 3d instant
Leaving Milwaukie on Mondays and Thursdays at 12 o'clock M, on each
Form C Starkweather 14.
of the above named days, touching at Portland, Ft. Vancouver, Milton, St. Helens,
Cowlitz, Cathlamet (or Burney's) on her passage up and down between Milwaukie
and Astoria, and, when practicable, will run from Pacific City to Oregon City.
Downward Trips
Milwaukie, Portland to Ft. Vancouver to Astoria 420
Milwaukie to Portland 2
to Fort Vancouver 5
to St. Helens and Milton $10
to Cowlitz $12
to Cathlamet or Burney's $15
Upward Trips
Astoria to Cathlamet and Cowlitz 410
to Milton and St. Helens 415
to Oregon City $22
to Ft. Vancouver, Portland and Milwaukie $20
Board not included in the above rates.
An arrangement has been entered into with Messrs. Allan McKinley Co.
of Oregon City, to meet the steamer at Milwaukie.
The following are the rates of freight, &c., on their boats:
Passengers $2, baggage not included. Down freight, $8 per ton. Up
freight, 410 per ton. The boats will start from their landing in Oregon City,
on Mondays at 9 o'clock P. M. All merchandise shipped from San Francisco to
Oregon City by the Milwaukie Line of Barks will be delivered at 425 per ton.
Freight from Portland to Oregon City, $15 per ton.
LOT WHITCOMB
Milwaukie, Feb. 3, 1851.
MAIN ST. HOUSE,
Oregon City
S. Richmond
Having taken the Main St. House in Oregon City, recently kept by S.
Moss, is happy to inform his friends and the public, that as his house is large
Form C Starkweather 15.
and commodious, and having undergone thorough repairs, he can furnish them
with very good spacious sleeping rooms, either double or single, with good
clean beds, &c., and that his tables will be got up in the best style, and
furnished with the best eatables the country affords, and no pains will be
spared to make his guests comfortable. Having a large supply of barn room
and stables, he is ready to furnish the traveler's horses with the best of
stables and feed. Thinking he has every facility for the accommodation of
his guests, he solicits a share of the public patronage.
Oregon City, Dec. 20, 1850 6tf.
TAVERN NOTICE
The undersigned having opened a HOUSE OF ENTERTAINMENT, in the town
of Salem, (Sign Salem House) would respectfully invite the travelling public to
call and try us, and see if we will do.
Rate of board, $7 per week; 50 cts. Single Meal; Supper, Breakfast and
Lodging,
41•
Feeding Horse, 50 to 75 cts.
Weary traveller call and see,
Do not pass us by.
For Breakfast we will give you Coffeand Steak,
For Supper, Tea and Pie.
CEAPNAN COLE
Salem, Marion County, O. T. Jan. 16, 1951.
(From the replica edition of the Western Star, being an item
inserted by Mr. Starkweather)
Milwaukie BOMB of Direct Legislation
"Milwaukie is entitled to the honor of creating the organization that
after ten years of agitation and education secured adoption of the initiative
and referendum in the constition of Oregon. At a session of the Milwaukie
Farmers Alliance at the home of Seth Levelling, Alfred Lewelling read portions
of the book, "Direct Legislation in Switzerland" by J. W. Sullivan of New York.
Form C Starkweather 16.
The members present realized at once the great power the adoption of this
system would confer upon the people and advised that it be taken up with the
state convention of the Farmers Alliance and the State Grange. This was done
and persistently followed until the measure was finally approved by the people.
One of the first steps of this movement was the purchase and distribution of
1000 copies of Mr. Sullivan's book at the publishers' cost price of 4125.
Following that 50,000 copies of an eight page pamphlet were issued explaining
and advocating the adoption of the principle.
"Times were hard and the people had very little money; these pamphlets
were all folded, sewed and mailed by the women of about twelve families living
in the town of Milwaukie. Some of the men of the same families usually were
delegated to the county or state republican, democratic or people's party con-
ventions of those days and always obtained resolutions endoreing the principle
of the proposed amendment. There was always some one from Milwaukie attending
the meetings of the State Grange and Farmers Alliance urging the adoption of
favorable resolutions. In fact, the people of Milwaukie and vicinity were the
prime movers in proposing and securing adoption of the Initiative and Referendum
in Oregon."
Here's a story that illustrates the "moving spirit" of the early set-
tlers. Starting from Pennsylvania, maybe, on the Atlantic Coast, they would
move to Ohio. Then, having got a taste of new lands, and adventures, and
despite the fact that Ohio was a rich, fertile country, they would pack their
belongings on the heavy -wheeled and springless wagons, gather their families
together and, behind their plodding oxen, rumble and bump their way over well-
nigh impassable roads to Indiana, or further on to Missouri. If they happened
to live near the Ohio river, they might trust their lives and household goods
Form C Starkweather 17.
to a scow or big flat -boat, which, with poles and rude oars, they propelled
down the swift current. A year or two in Missouri, or Indiana, as the case
might be, and the fabulous tales of Oregon's fertility and marvelous climate,
again produced the itching foot. This time the trek was longer, more haz-
ardous, but after a few months' of preparation they were off, with arid,
dusty plains, treacherous rivers and the unknown dangers of practically track-
less mountains, not to mention hostile Indians, ahead of them. Once Oregon
was reached, this wanderlust could take them no farther west; the north was
not inviting. Their trail must turn south. There WAS one such man of those
long -ago days, who, though his wife begged him to "stay set" in the Willamette
Valley, refused to listen to her. After a year, and off they went, lurching
and bumping toward California. Then, one day, they came to a beautiful expanse of
country just where it was, deponeth sayeth not but anyway they came upon
such a place. There was grass and water, and there was plenty of trees for wood,
although the eye could see for miles and miles, and in all that vista there was
no solitary sign of habitation or human being. The man slowed his oxen and
stopped the wagon. "Here we are, Maria," he said, "here's where we stay. Get
the young 'uns out." So they set up camp, and cooked and ate their supper, and
after a good night's sleep got up early to survey their domain.. The man was up
first. He was chopping firewood, when suddenly he stopped. "Maria:" he called
excitedly, "Come here quick." Maria ran out, "What, John, what is it?" she
cried, "Look", said John, "do you see what I do?" Shading her eyes with her
hand, she stared about, but saw nothing to disturb her. John grew impatient.
Grabbing her by the arm, he turned her in the proper direction, "There," he
snarled, "don't you see that smoke, over there to the west near that mountain:
Yes, it's smoke all right. God damn, this country is too thickly settled for
me. We'll have to move on."
Form C Starkweather .18.
Here's another story of pioneer hospitality. My father was very
hospitably inclined, and being something of a politician and a leading light
in the territory at that time, he was always bringing guests home. Once
when he was at the state legislature he sent word that two of his fellow
legislators were coming with him for the week -end. Mother and grandmother
were in a dither. There weren't beds enough to go 'round for our big family,
let alone strangers. There was nothing for it but to build a bedstead, which
they did. It was crude, but it served the purpose, they thought, and, of
course, they had plenty of comforts and quilts. Women were always doing
patchwork. When the guests arrived, one proved to be very short and the other
extremely tall. The partitions were thin. When father and mother had retired
to their room, they could hear the visitors preparing for bed. The tall one
got in bed first, they could hear him stretching and yawning, then they heard
him say, "Bill, when you get your clothes off, would you mind hanging them over
my feet and legs. This bed's just a little bit short for me, and I'm afrain
I'm going to. be cold."
Starkvreather Form C (additional) -19.
The Rynearsons
Taljor Jake Rynearson, whose brother, Peter M. Rynearson, filed on
a mile -square donation land claim at the junction of the Clackamas and All-
lamette rivers, was prominent as a fighter in the Cayuse Indian disturbances.
Following one fight with the Indians, he found, an abandoned little Indian
boy of about ten years of age, who, from all that could be learned, was of the
Yez Force tribe, who had been taken prisoner and held by the Cayuse Indians as
a slave. Major Jake, as he was familiarly called, brought the boy home and
gave him to his brother, Peter.
One of the pleasant customs of the Indians was to clip the ears of
their slaves. This boy had clipped ears, of which, as he grew older, he
became more and more sensitive, always wearing his hair long enough to cover
them, At Peter Rynearson's he grew up to manhood, spending his life with them
as chief cook and bottle -washer.
how the Rynearson family was an exceedingly prolific one. Old Peter
was married twice. By his first wife he had six sons and two daughters. To
enumerate them sounds rather biblical. They were: Abraham, Isaac, Cicero,
Peter, Cornelius and Frank; Sarah Jane and Kate. His second wife, a widow,
brought to his household two daughters: Kate and Clara, and two sons, Bill and
Dick. Of Peter's second union there were born four children, Emma, George,
Jake and Ed. Now, that makes sixteen children, doesn't it? To that number
add Peter and his wife, makinr eighteen, in addition to which there was the
hired man, and the cook himself, Indian Dave. So Indian Dave had twenty people
in all to cook for and he wasn't any too clean, though he might have been
just as dirty with a family of two or three. I think he would.
Starkweather Form C (additional) 20.
Peter Rynearson was a just man, as I think you'll agree, when I tell
you this story. In fact he almost fell backward in his justice in this case.
It happened this way. Major Jake WAS digging a well, the dirt being carried up by
bucket and windlass. Somebody let the bucket fall on Jake's head. It made such
a dent in his skull that he had to have a trepan operation, with a silver plate
inserted to protect his brain. Old Peter didn't drop the bucket, but he felt
so responsible that in compensation he gave Jake the north half, consisting of
320 acres, of the Donation Land Claim.
Peter Rynearson was a big man. He must have been six feet arid a half
tall, bony end spare; and he always walked stooping from the hips. He had
sorrel -colored hair and beard, and he always wore a slouched or what had once
been slouched hat with no brim and full of holas, from which his sorrel hair
stuck out. From this description you will see that he looked a good deal like
an animated scarecrow. Querulous,, intolerant, and uncouth, Peter WAS pictur-
esque in his language, and he was a great braggart. His crops were the best,
and his horses and pigs and cattle were the best in the country. He sold some
pigs to a relative of my first wife-- in fact it was her father bought them.
They were little when they were bought, but by his manner of saying "Them're
the dern-dest pigs them're the dern-dest pigs", he gave the impression that,
like everything else he possessed, they were of a very superior breed. When
they grew up well they were the "dern-dest" pigs sure enough, but not of the
sort hoped for.