Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 19.djvu/27

UMPQUA ACADEMY 17 from there spread out fan-like over the Willamette Valley in that part immediately tributary to Portland. As Portland was the port of entry, so it was naturally their trading center. The country was still very new, almost distressingly so, and the educational work which was linked with and promulgated by the church was in its missionary period. In many ways the Willamette Valley is very different from Southern Oregon. The Valley lies between two parallel ranges of mountains that feed the many streams that flow from east and west into the Willamette River. The river flows gently northward and very naturally the travel and trade did and does follow it. But the Umpqua and Rogue river valleys tip west- ward and their splendid rivers with a mighty rush, character- istic of no other Oregon streams, go by leaps and bounds to the Pacific, cutting in their way mighty gashes in the Coast Range for their channels. Furthermore, these southern valleys are separted from the Willamette by the Calapooia Mountains, a short range extending east and west at the head of the Willamette Valley and connecting the Cascade and Coast Range of mountains. These sections were connected by the "Applegate Trail" made in 1846 by a party led by Levi Scott, hereafter mentioned in this article. This trail began at a point near Cottage Grove and led across the mountains via streams known as Lee Creek, Thief Creek, Elk Creek and thence southward. The gold discoveries of the West were yet new and the gold fever was acute. Prospecting was carried on extensively in Southern Oregon and Northern California and here mines were discovered and opened that are still being worked. It meant prominence to the section and attracted not only miners but, settlers as well and these two classes strove together in their interdependence for supplies and market. Their trade followed their streams, and thus in these early years the Umpqua river became prominent as a port of entry. A military road was constructed to open a way from the head of navigation to the settlements. There were, therefore, two distinct sections of Western Ore-