CHAPTER XII.
UP THE WALLAMET TO PORTLAND.
The upper mouth of the Wallamet is about eighteen or twenty miles above the lower one—the Wallamet and Columbia being separated for this distance only by a narrow, sandy island, which in the period of the summer flood is two-thirds under water. The original name of this island (now called Sauvie's) was Wappatoo, from the abundance of a plant of that name (Sagittaria sagittifolia) found growing there. This plant has a tuberous root, which is used by the Indians for food, and grows most abundantly in marshy places or shallow lakes. "Wappatoo lakes" are also considered valuable fields for fattening hogs; and the interior of Sauvie's Island furnishes several of these. Notwithstanding that every summer their farms are under water from two to three weeks, most small farmers prefer the quick, warm soil of the island, to higher ground on the mainland. Here, after the freshet subsides, about the second week in July, crops of potatoes, melons, and vegetables may be put in, and come to maturity quite as early as if planted in the spring, on the colder soil of the uplands. Sauvie's Island is indeed the garden of the lower portion of the Wallamet Valley.
The upper mouth of the Wallamet comes out between the head of the island, and a low, sandy point opposite. From the formation of the land it appears probable that the island was once a continuation of this point—a peninsula, in fact, which was finally cut off by some heavy winter flood forcing its way over and through it. Numerous small islands form quite an archipelago above the head of the principal island. As they are all densely wooded with willow, cottonwood, and other water-loving trees, they present a very picturesque view.
Supposing ourselves to be standing on the hurricane deck of a steamer, passing among these islands, between the Columbia and the Wallamet, with stretches of both in sight; with the heavily wooded shores of both rivers plainly visible; with the Cascade Range drawn in blue on the eastern horizon, and the white peaks of St. Helen, Hood, Adams, and Jefferson rising sharp above it; and over all a rosy, sunset sky, its reflection coloring the rivers and tinting the snow-peaks—we would hardly expect ever to meet a lovelier picture than this one before us.
The Wallamet River, unlike the majestic Columbia, divides, nearly in half, a level valley of open prairie-land. Hence, and because the earliest settlers of a country always select the lands easiest of tillage, we find nearly the whole of the Oregon population in the Wallamet Valley. Had we entered by the lower mouth, and come up on the south side of Sauvie's Island, we should have found the land on either side divided into farms, and have witnessed the shipping of stock, and other signs of local trade; although here the valley is limited to a plain of half a mile to a mile and a half in breadth, bounded by a ridge of high, fir-clad hills.
From the head of the island up to Portland, a distance of little more than six miles, the hills continue to follow the southern bank of the river at about the same distance back; while the opposite bank is only moderately high, and rolling. We pass by Springville, a grain depot, on the right-hand side; and St. John, a stave factory, and small settlement, on the other. Farm-houses grow more frequent; wood-yards and gravel-banks where flat-boats are loading, tug-boats, small steamers plying to and fro, and all the signs of busy life accumulate with every mile.
As we approach Portland we observe its new, yet thrifty, appearance; the evidences of forests sacrificed to the growth of a town; and the increasing good taste and costliness of the buildings going up or recently built in the newest portions of the city. A low, level margin of ground, beautifully ornamented with majestic oaks, intervenes between us and the higher ground on which the town is built. Passing by this and the first few blocks of stores and warehouses, with their ugly rears toward the river, we haul up alongside a handsome, commodious wharf, and begin to look about us.
Portland is, we find, a cheerful-looking town of about 9,000 inhabitants; well paved, with handsome public buildings, and comfortable, home-like dwellings. It is at the head of ocean steam navigation, and owes its prominence as the commercial town of Oregon to that fact. Here the smaller steamers which ply on the Wallamet River have hitherto brought the produce of the valley to exchange for imported goods, or to be shipped on sailing vessels to foreign ports; and hero has centered the commercial wealth and political influence of the State.
One hundred and ten miles from the sea is Portland, and twelve from the Columbia. At the first glance, this fact strikes the tourist with some surprise. But when he remembers that the shores of the Columbia are rough and heavily timbered, while the Wallamet Valley is an open, prairie country, his wonder vanishes. A town at this point was a commercial necessity, so long as the whole transportation business of the country depended on river communication. What effect to change commercial bases the opening of long lines of railroad will have, can hardly be determined before the drift of trade has defined itself. But, for the present, Portland is, in every sense, the chief town north of San Francisco.
From the relative importance of Portland to the other towns of the State, it deserves more than a passing notice. The site was first taken up, in 1843, by a man named Overton, from Tennessee. From him the title passed to Messrs. Lovejoy and Petty grove about the beginning of the following year, during which the first dwelling—a log-house—was erected near the river, at the foot of what is now Washington Street. At this time the "claim" was covered with a dense forest of firs, which began to be cleared off, and the land surveyed into blocks and lots in 1845. A second building for a store was erected this winter, near the first one. It was not, like the dwelling, of logs, but a frame covered with shingles, and went by the name of the "Shingle Store "long after more ambitious competitors had arisen.
The growth of the embryo town was by no means rapid, as the year of its "taking up" witnessed the first considerable immigration to Oregon. Of these one thousand immigrants, a few stopped in Oregon City, the recognized capital of the Territory, and the remainder scattered over the fertile plains, in quest of the mile square of land for which they had come to this far-off country. The same continued to be true of the steadily increasing immigration of the following years; so that it was not until 1848 that Portland attained to the dignity of a name.
Of the two owners, one, Mr. Pettygrove, was from Maine, and desired the bantling to be called after the chief town of his native State. With the same laudable State love, Mr. Lovejoy, who was from Massachusetts, insisted on calling the town Boston. To end the dispute a penny was tossed up, and Mr. Pettygrove winning, the future city was christened Portland. When it is taken into consideration that Portland, Maine, is nearly two degrees farther south than Portland, Oregon, and that roses are blossoming in the gardens of the latter, while snow lies white and winter winds whistle over the leafless gardens of the former, the older city has no occasion to feel concerned for the comfort of its godchild.
After being named, Portland changed owners again. Mr. Pettygrove bought out his partner, and afterward sold the whole property to Mr. Daniel H. Lownsdale, receiving for it $5,000 in leather, tanned by Mr. Lownsdale in a tannery adjoining the town site. In 1848, or before the gold discoveries, money was almost unknown in Oregon; orders on the Hudson's Bay Company, the Methodist Mission, and wheat, being the currency of the country. Mr. Lownsdale, it seems, had the honor of introducing a new circulating medium, which was Oregon-tanned leather.
Still another change in the proprietorship occurred in 1849—Lownsdale selling an interest in the town to W. W. Chapman and Stephen Coffin. During this year—there being now about one hundred inhabitants—the Portlanders organized an association, and elected trustees for the purpose of erecting a building to be used as a meeting-house for religious services, and for a school-house. It was used also as a court-room; and continued to serve the public in its triple capacity for several years.
The gold excitement of 1848–9 for a time had a tendency to check improvements in Oregon; but finally the wandering gold-seekers began to return, and cultivate their neglected farms. California demanded grain and lumber; and these things Oregon could furnish in abundance. Vessels now came frequently to Portland from San Francisco and the Sandwich Islands; and in 1850 Couch & Co., of Portland, dispatched a vessel—the brig Emma Preston—to China. In the same year Captain John H. Couch had his land claim surveyed into town lots, and formed what is known as "Couch's Addition," on the north side of town. In this year, also, the pioneer steamboat of Oregon—the Lot Whitcomb—was launched on the Wallamet at Milwaukee, on Christmas day; and the pioneer newspaper of Portland—the Weekly Oregonian—was started by Thomas J. Dyer.
In January, 1851, Portland was incorporated, having then about one thousand inhabitants. In April the city officers were elected, and Hugh D. O'Bryant chosen Mayor. Oregon having been erected into a Territory by the Act of Congress, 1848—her Governor arriving in the spring of '49—an election for delegate to Congress was held in June, 1851 (just twenty-one years ago), at which Portland cast two hundred and twentytwo votes. In March of that year began the regular montlily mail service between Portland and San Francisco, per the steamship Columbia, Captain Dall.
The first brick building was erected in 1853, by Mr. William S. Ladd. Two years later the city boasted four churches, one academy, one public school, four printing-offices, about forty retail-stores of various kinds, one steam flouring, and four steam lumber-mills. The taxable property of that year was valued at $1,195,034, or about half the actual value of the real and personal property of the town.
From this time on the growth of Portland has been healthy and uniform. During the mining excitement of the upper country in 1864–5–6, there was a more hurried growth, and more inflated condition of trade, which subsided, however, with the excitement which occasioned it. Notwithstanding, there has been more costly and substantial improvement, both public and private, within the five years last past than ever before. Some of the business buildings and stores erected within that time are of truly metropolitan elegance and dimensions. The Court-house, the new Methodist Church, and the Custom House and Post-office, are large and costly edifices.
The city has fine public schools, and more than an equal number of seminaries, academies, and private schools. The Portland Academy, a Methodist institution, is a flourishing school for pupils of both sexes. St. Helen's Hall, a seminary for young ladies, is under control of the Bishop of the Episcopal Church; who also has recently established a grammar-school for boys. Both these seminaries are in a very flourishing condition. The Roman Catholic Church, also, has two schools, and the Jewish population one.
Of churches, Portland boasts a goodly number: two Roman Catholic, one Methodist, two Episcopalian, two Jewish, one Baptist, one Presbyterian, one Congregational, one Unitarian, one Lutheran, and one chapel for the colored population. Numerically the Catholic and Methodist denominations are the strongest, and the Unitarian the weakest.
Public amusements are only tolerably well supported. A fine theatre, however, is in course of construction, which will supply a public want. An Academy of Music, and a Musical Society, supported principally by the Jews, give occasional entertainments; and the brass bands are in the habit of discoursing sweet sounds upon the Plaza one or two afternoons in a week, when all the youth, beauty, and fashion of Portland come out for a promenade. A skating-rink furnishes amusement to the lovers of that exercise. Driving fast horses is quite a fashionable recreation; and an exhibition of Oregon stock is by no means an inferior one. A public library, comprising four or five thousand volumes, with a handsome chess-room in connection, offers attractions to the visitor and resident alike. The Young Men's Christian Association have also a reading-room in the same building.
The Odd Fellows have four associations, and a very fine temple; the Masonic Order, three associations and an elegant building; the Good Templars have three lodges, and there are several benevolent societies besides. The Fire Department consists of over two hundred active members, with two steam fire-engines, two hand-engines, and one hook-and-ladder truck, and hose carts. The department is very efficient, and large fires are of rare occurrence.
There are in Portland three large book-stores, and one or two stationery stores; three daily and weekly political newspapers, and one religious paper, published weekly; there are four banking-houses, including a branch of the Bank of British Columbia, besides half a dozen brokers, and several real-estate agents. All the ordinary branches of business are well represented, and the amount of taxable property in Portland is assessed at a value of between five and six millions. Its actual value is probably much greater. The city tax amounts to ten mills on the dollar. It is said that Portland is one of the richest towns of the size in the United States. There are ten of its business men whose incomes range from $16,000 to $50,000; ten more with incomes ranging from $8,000 to $12,000; and ten more having incomes of from $5,000 to $8,000; besides the capital owned and controlled by the Banking, Navigation, and Railroad companies. The improvements in the city for the year 1871 amount to $2,000,000.
Portland has a good drainage, the ground rising gently back from the river. It is at present supplied with plank sewers, which are generally kept in good condition. A water company supplies the city with water; and a gas company furnishes gas for lighting the streets, public buildings, and stores, and such private dwellings as are not too remote from the mains. The surveyed limits of the city include about three square miles; the higher ground at the back being very desirable for residences from its superior healthfulness, and the fine views to be obtained. From any part of the city a quarter of a mile back, Mount Hood is seen in its finest aspect, rising grandly above the fir-clad slopes of the Cascade Range. It marks the place of the sun's rising in the summer months; and passes at evening, when reflecting the hues of sunset, through many beautiful gradations of light and color. Even by moonlight its spectral shape is still discernible at the distance of sixty miles. St. Helen, also, may be seen from the upper part of the city; and, from some points. Mount Jefferson.
Portland has not a "back country"—that is, it is divided from the agricultural portion of the valley on the west by the mountain ridge, which, commencing some miles south of this place, follows the west bank of the Wallamet to its lower mouth. The road which leads to the plains leaves Portland by a narrow ravine, and, following the pass of a stream, crosses the mountains through a dense forest of firs and pines. It is a pleasant-enough drive in summer, but quite the reverse during the rainy season. By the beginning of 1872, however, the Oregon Central Railroad will have been completed from this city to the town of Hillsboro, a distance of twenty miles—four or five miles beyond the timbered ridge. There is a beautiful, short drive of macadamized road, extending about six miles south of town, along the bank of the river, and terminating at the Milwaukee Ferry, or the "White House." The road down the river is not a good one, though a very little expense would make it so, and it might be continued all the way to St. Helen, making a pleasant and useful highway; but the small steamers that run on all the rivers have made roads of secondary importance near the margins of these streams.
The river in front of Portland is about one-quarter of a mile wide, with water enough for large vessels to lie in; and the rise and fall of the tide amounts to a couple of feet. During the winter flood in the Wallamet, which is occasioned by heavy rains, the water rises about eight feet. For this reason the wharves are all built in two stories—one for low, and one for high-water. The great flood of 1862, and that of 1870, brought the water over the upper wharves and even over Front street, which is twenty-five feet above low-water mark. The summer flood in the Columbia, occasioned by the melting of snow in the mountains where it has its sources, backs the water up in the Wallamet as far as the falls at Oregon City, which again makes it necessary to abandon the lower wharves. These two rises keep this portion of the Wallamet supplied with water through the greater portion of the year; but it is necessary to dredge the channel below the city in the latter part of the summer. Since the dredger came into use no vessels have been stopped by bars, but all discharge their freight at the wharves.
There is a regular line of ocean steamers belonging to the North Pacific Transportation Company—Holladay and Brenham, owners—which makes three or four trips a month between San Francisco and Portland; and another line owned by the same company, making about the same number of trips to Victoria and Puget Sound. The Oregon Steam Navigation Company run steamers upon the Columbia River and several of its smaller tributaries—semi-weekly to Astoria, daily to the Cowlitz River and intermediate points, and daily to the Cascades and Dalles City; semi-weekly, or tri-weekly, from Dalles to Wallula; and at stated periods on the Snake River and Northern branch of the Columbia. Sailing vessels run quite regularly to the Sandwich Islands, China, South America, and New York, as well as to San Francisco; and the trade is yearly increasing.
The facilities for travel in the Wallamet Valley, and southward, are: first, the Oregon and California Railroad, which is already in running order to the head of the valley on the east side, connecting with a line of stages to Red Bluff, in California; and, secondly, a steamer line on the Wallamet River, owned by the Railroad Company, and plying between Portland and all points on the river north of Eugene City, when there is a sufficient stage of water. A stage line starting from Portland on the west side of the valley, carries passengers to Corvallis, where they connect with the railroad. The Oregon Central, or "West Side" road, will soon do away with staging through this portion of the valley also. Travel by land is by no means difficult in any portion of the Wallamet Valley, the roads being excellent and the conveyances good. On some of the smaller streams there are steamers plying, connecting with the main lines of travel; and each year increases these facilities for locomotion.
Portland is well supplied with hotels, which in general answer very well to the awkward guest's description of his dinner, "Good enough, what there was of it; and enough of it unless it were better." The latest built, and very well conducted, is the St. Charles, on Front Street. Another and larger one will soon be finished near the steamer landing; but the town seems to need a commodious hotel farther back from the river, away from the confusion and crowd of business movements.
East Portland, on the opposite side of the river, contains about one thousand inhabitants. It has a fine, level site, and a pleasant country back of it. Considerable importance attaches to it on account of its being the initial point of the Oregon and California Railroad, and the location of its machine-shops and warehouses. A steam-ferry connects it at present with Portland, and it is soon to be united to the latter place by a bridge over the Wallamet, the contract for getting out the timbers having been given to the St. Helen Milling Company. Improvements are rapidly increasing in East Portland, and property is held at a pretty high figure. The Railroad Wharf is 1,250 feet long by 70 in breadth; is built in a slope to accommodate it to the different stages of water, and has a substantial warehouse upon it 370 feet long by 42 wide—being just half the size of the corresponding wharf and warehouse on the west side of the river.
East Portland contains some fine residences, several churches, and a bank, and supports a newspaper of its own, as well as several societies and orders.
About two miles above the town are the machine-shops and car-building establishments of the Oregon and California Railroad; and about four miles above town is the Company's saw-mill—one of the largest and most complete in the State. When in full operation it employs sixty men as sawyers, attendants, loggers, and drivers; and is capable of cutting 1,000,000 feet per month.