THE WEST SHORE.
August.
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As Eifht P Monthly tamnud Piper, puWiAi M
PORTLAND) OMGOK, by
L. SAMUEL, j Wuhingtofftt.
TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION,
( Including Pcmuic to wy put of tht United Sut:)
Ou copy. re". '
Binflt Number. fO cenn.
Printed by fiio, H. HlMlf, cot. Front k W-hington-m.
SALUTATORY.
In making our first appearance, it is ex
pected that we should say a few words to
the public, and particularly to those upon
whose patronage we depend, respecting the
objects of our paper and what our readers
may look for inns columns. We are not
inclined to herald our debut with a flourish
of trumpets; we prefer yielding obedience
to a time-honored custom rather than have
the aim and purKse of our existence be
the tubjttts of misconception. Above aught
else, our efforts will be exerted to make
The Wfst Siiork, thi literary jiaper of the
Pacific Northwest to this end, we have
secured contributors from the brightest in
tcllccts and ablest writers in this Slate. We
shall devote some space to Ilic subject of
Horticulture, and this department will be
under the direction of a Horticulturist of
considerable experience. Our readers will
lie furnished with a reliable Financial and
Commercial Review from the pen of a
writer conversant with all matters relating
to those subjects. For the benefit of im
migrants, we will publish gratis, a descrip
tive list of farming lands for sale in this
State and Washington Territory,
We will secure information upon literary
and other topics for such corrcsjmndents
as may desire the same,
In addition to illustrations of a general
character, we will, from time to time, illus
trate our public buildings, schools, churches,
business blocks and resiliences, home man
ufactures and inventions. In short, no
pains will lie spared to make Tun West
.Siiohk interesting to ils readers and profit
able to its publisher, and we are convinced
that should we succed in fulfilling these ob
jects, it cannot prove otherwise than satis
factory to all (Nirties concerned.
"'ORTI.AND HOW IT CAME TO II K
-T11K OKFXiON EMPORIUM.
Prior to 1849, Oregon City, then com
monly called Wallamet Falls, or The Falls,
was the social, political ami commercial
metropolis of the country west of the
Kocky Mountains and north of Cali'ornia.
Indeed, its supremacy might be said to
have extended over San Francisco, then a
straggling adobe village called Vuba Bucna,
where lived nn enterprising merchant,
liik'lit C. I.. Ross, who in Anril. 1818. ad
vertised his country store in the columns of
the Oregon im'lrowlitan press, and referred
to its principal mcrchants-'-Kilborn, Law
ton, Alwrncthv and others.
Hut the discovery of gold in Calilornia
111 1848, soon dunned all this, and the oh
leure Ycrlu lluena suddenly shot up into
the famous San 1' ranciscn, ami overshad
owed the whole Pacific Coast. This discover)-
was soon followed by an active
trade between San Francisco and Oregon,
via the Columbia River, which brought
prominently forward the question of where
was the proper place for the future com
mercial town of Oregon. Although Tort
land had been located and named as early
at 1844, it was tel a doulnlul experiment,
; and much known, as only " a place twelve
miles below Oregon City."
! The trade and commerce of the country
were based upon the agricultural products
I iml the consumption of the Wallamet Val
I ley. The ox-team and llie row-boat par
1 ticuUrly the former were the principal, if
1 not the only means of transport between
1 tide water and the interior. The tow-boat,
carrying from 500 to 5,000 pounds, wis 1
low and laborious process of exchanging
Oregon Hour for Sandwich Island sugar
and coffee. The people on the eul tide of
the river could draw moderate loads to and
from Oregon City with their teams, but ow
ing lothe height of the mountain range on
the west bank of the river, it was difficult
to get to it with wagoris below the mouth
of the Yamhill.
But Oregon City itself was above the
head of ship navigation and the passage of
the Clackamas Rapids was then very diffi
cult and tedious for even row boats, except
for a few weeks in the June rise. While
the annual cargo of the Hudson's BayCom
pany, and the occasional supplies of the
Mission and a few independent traders,
constituted the merchandise of the coun
try, it was not so material whether the
place of trade or exchange was at or above
the head of ship navigation. But now the
cxlernal commerce of the country was
growing so rapidly that it became a matter
of the first moment to bring the prairie
schooners and the ocean-going vessels to
gether. Of the northern part of the valley, the
west side of the river was much the larger
and more productive country. The Tual
itin Plains and Yamhill District contained
large bodies of arable prairie land, to
which many of the earliest settlers of the
country were attracted ; while the corres
Knding section of the country on the east
side was comparatively densely wooded
and sparsely settled.
Various attempts had been made to es
tablish towns on the west bank of the Wal
lamet and the soulh bank of the Columbia,
with a view of commanding the trade of
this west side country. Besides Portland,
there were, among others, Linnton,' St.
Helens and Milton. The first named was
situate about one and a half miles below
the site of Springville. It was commenced
in 1843 upon the site of an old Hudson's
Bay Company landing, by McCarver and
Burnett. Great things were expected of it.
In 1844 McCarver wrote back to "the
States" that Linnton would soon be one of
the largest cities in America if thy could
only git mill titough. Poor Mac I What
drafts he made upon the rosy future.
Surely he was the man of whom tho poet
said :
. , v
- nopv.irinir..iDnini 111 uie numnn Drcut
Mm usv.r it, but slway. to b bint."
Within five years thcrcaflcr nothing rev
mained to mark the site of this prospective
city. Hut its hopeful projector and exalted
prophet, through many mutations of for
tune, slill dreamed of the great mart he
should build on the Pacific shore, and just
thirty ycars-from the announcement of the
future greatness of the now forgotten Linn
ton, he breathed his last, some nine score
miles to the northward of it, where he had
founded another city of the future the
deep-water iori and terminal town, Ta-coma.
In 1S46 a trail was cut through the
woods from Portland to the plains along
the comparatively low ridge between the
Canyon and the Barnes' Road. This was
the first direct communication between
Portland and the interior. Gradually this
trail broadened into a wagon road, and
the ox-team found its way to the ships at
Portland, while Linnton, comparatively Is
olated from the interior by the height of
the mountain in Us rear, languished and
died.
In the Spring of 184S Lownsd.de, who
then owned the tannery back of town, dis
covered the iass to the Plains, now called
the Canyon, and soon after Wilcox, Carter
and he explored it and ascertained lliat a
good road could lie made through it to the
Plains at a comparatively small cost.
In the rail of the nine vear, I .owns-
dale purchased the Portland Claim for
5,000 in leather, and commenced work,
ing up the project of gelling a road to the
interior and up ihe vallev through this
Canyon.
The plank road furore had lately swerjt
over the Western Slates, and the farther
wave of it had now broken upon the Oregon
shore. The "Suck-road," as the natives
called h, vat thought to be Just the thing
for the emergency. Accordingly, on Jan
uary to, 1851, an Act vat pasted by the
immature incorporating "The Portland
and Valley Plank Road Company, for the
purpose of constructing a plank road trom
Portland, in the county of Washington, to
the town of Lafayette (via Hillsboro), in the
county of Yamhill, to some point on
Mary's River, to be be determined by said
Company."
On July 30, 1851, the Company was or
ganized at Lafayette by the election of
Hembree, f landers, carter, namoers ana
Chapman as directors. Soon after the Cor-ner-nlank
of the road was laid at the mouth
of the Canyon with due ceremony and much
rejoicing. Even the great political leaders
and rivals of the day King and Dryer
fraternized on the occasion, and united in
apostrophising the American ea'le and
lauding this hrst great internal improve
ment on the Pacific Coast.
What followed is soon told. The wood
en way was not laid through the valley.
Sundry Portland subscribers failed to come
to time on the assessments on their stock,
and the farmers and others along the line
of the route who took stock with a view of
getting the road through their neighbor
hoods were compelled to make good the
deficiency. But within a year the Canyon
was cleared out and graded and a lair
plank road of cedar puncheons constructed,
to the summit. Thereafter the trade of
the valley, both on the east and west side,
was rapidly drawn to Portland. Persons
coming from the East to engage in busi
ness naturally stopped at the head of ship
navigation; and within two years from the
commencement of the plank road, most of
tne present wealthy men ot Portland had
commenced here, empty-handed, to make
their start in the world.
In the Winter of 1851-2 ihe seat of gov
ernment was practically removed from Or
egon Cay to Salem. At the same time its
trade waidiverted to Portland, and the old
Mistress V the Pacific gradually retired
from the contest and shrank into the ways
anu limits 01 a forsaken village.
For a few years afterwards. St. Helen,
through the interested aid of the officers
and agents of the then powerful Pacific
Mail Company, kept up a struggle with
Portland for the commercial emporium of
tne country, ilut with even tins great odds
against her, the position of Portland could
not be seriously affected; and in a few
years the company gave up the unprofitable
contest, and abandoned their wharves and
warehouses at St. Helen.
The problem of the emporium' was
solved by the construction of a practicable
wagon road through the mountains on the
west side of the river. By this means
1 ortland was made the place where the ox
teams of the interior and " the shis of the
sea '' should first meet and exchange car
goes, and frorn this circumstance she has
grown to her present relative greatness.
RAMBLING NOTES OX OLDEN
TIMES.
HV W. L. AUAMS, M. D., A. JI., U.. O,
From twenty to twenty-seven years ago,
our immigration, which came once a year,
numbered from six to eight hundred. Now
it amounts 10 nearly that every two w eeks.
iTIien, it took us six long weary months to
plow through the sage plains, climb over
mountains, and swim or ford rivers that
intervened between the "starling point "on
the Missouri River and Philip Foster's, the
"first house" in the Willamette Valley.
men, our women were heroes, they
washed, cooked, mended, nursed babies
while at rmli, besides walking much of the
entire distance from Ft. Hall through, with
out a murmur of complaint. They also as
sisled in driving the loose stock, took turns
with their husbands, when necessary, in
driving the four yoke of cattle that luuled
the wagon in which llicir effects were being
conveyed to iheir new home towards the
silling sun. My own wife did all this,
besides assisting me in carrying our entire
load by piecemeal on our backs up long
muddy mountains, an empty wagon being
all that our jaded skeleton cattle could haul
through the mire. It took us ten days of
uinauni naru travel to crass the Cascade
Mountains, from " Barlow 't Gate " to Fos
ter's. It rained on us in torrents, and some
of the mountains were so sliroerv that on.
caide could not maintain a foothold in
descending before a wagon. We unyoked
drove the cattle down loose, and then took
our wagons down by hand, after rough
locking three of the wheels with lor-eK;,,.
nd tying a small fir tree, top foremost, be
hind the wagon, to keep it from stampeding:
down the mountain. The Rev. Mr. Kelly,
who died a few weeks ago in East Portland,
and myself, with the assistance of our
women, brought our three wagons down
Sandy Mountain in this way alone. The
ten days we spent in the Cascades were
days of struggle. It was October. The .
"rainy season" though a month away, '
threatened to set in. Occasionally the
floating clouds sent down rain, as they did
after Bro. Hammond's "snails" and the
rest of the animals were housed in Noah's
ark. These ten days of struggle were the
last ten throes that ushered us into, to us, a
new world. We had been so long accus
tomed to the wilderness, that the cackling
of Foster's chickens, and the squealing of '
his pigs, was more musical to our ears than
would have been the singing of the best
trained choir, executing "Old Hundred,"
accompanied by a ten thousand dollar
organ in a forty thousand dollar church.
Our faces were literally pealed with the
alkali of the sage plains, our wagon-covers
were torn into shreds, our cattle were little
better than dry bones, our women were
wake siah halo eltau. our commissariat re
united, halo muchamuck. But Foster's po
tatoes, when roasted in our camp fire, made
us Wonder why an epicure should desire
anything sweeter than Oregon potatoes and
salt especially when washed down with'
pure crystal waters that fed a beautiful
river, which had never yet been defiled by ,
a city sewer.
At Oregon City.the then seatof government
and commercial emporium of Oregon a
small village of perhaps two hundred souls
we were pressed to dine with Mrs. Hood,
a good Samaritan lady who kept boarding- ,
house, who in feeding us probably antici
pated the double pleasure of imitating
Christ and having a talk with live immi
grants of '48. The news ran like wild-fire
through the city that an immigrant wagon
was in town. Among others who sought
us out was Doctor Locey, father of the late
J. D. Locey who was killed only a few weeks
ago by the accident to the Senator. Like
his son, the Doctor was a man of large
heart and generous impulse. He took us
into his house to spend the night, drove the
team into his yard, and turned the cattle
loose to a whole wagon load of oats. Here
our friend's table fairly dazzled my eyes
with a display of salmon, potatoes, bread
and butter, with coffee, milk and sugar.
A young squaw served Mrs. L. as a servant.
How she had been able to acquire a know
ledge of the Indian language, so as to en
able her to talk with that maid of the
forest, was a matter of wonderment to me.
The way the Siwash responded to "Mum
pin chuck-hiack " by bringing from the
stove a pot of aqua bullion with which to
replenish the tea-pot, filled me with
astonishment, and begat in my heart a
strong desire to master the beautiful lan
guage. I remembered after that, that
"chuck" was water, and supposed of course
it was a generic term, embracing liquids in
general. During the following winter I
paid considerable attention to the studyof
Indian classics, and soon flattered myself
that I wa quite a Siwash linguist; though
perhaps if I had been fortunate enough to
get hold of McCormick's Key to the lan
guage, I should have found out that my
expressions were often inelegant, if I didn't
really "coishul" some very essential rules
of Indian grammar. For want of a gram
ma and .McCormick s dictionary, I couldn't
see very often just where the laugh came"
in, when, in answer to some question I put
in our native language to my scholars, I
was responded to in a roar o( laughter as
I was one day in asking my young lady
pupils for a glass of milk" Xca hiai ticky
moomou chuck."
That school house was in Yamhill, where
we had pitched our tent, after ferrying our t
wagon over the Willamette, and swimmirw-
the cattle with the yokes on to save ferriage
money, which I dtdn t happen to have.
After settling my ferriage, I had just ten
cents left, out of two dollars loaned me by
O.. .. , . . '
ofagt agv.j