Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 8.djvu/220

212 PROFESSOR THOMAS CONDON. gold-bearing black sands?' 'Have we the right geological formation for artesian water ? ' ' Have we cement rock, copper, or limestone ? ' Letters on all of these and many other problems kept coming to Mr. Condon from near and from far. These questions and the investigation necessary for their answers resulted in his acquiring an extensive knowledge of the indus- trial problems of the State. If any one wished to bore for artesian water, his advice was asked. The discoverer of a fresh prospect for coal, copper, asbestos or marble, must send him a sample specimen and ask his opinion of its value, and he was always ready with a word of advice, a bit of encourage- ment or a needed caution. "All these years he had been glad to share his rapidly in- creasing knowledge with the people of the Northwest. The old river steamers and slow moving trains of early Oregon often carried him to fill lecture engagements, and he was usually cumbered with many heavy packages of specimens and choice fossils to illustrate his subject. Sometimes the lecture would be before a cultured Portland audience; sometimes it was a course of lectures for some growing young college or perhaps a talk to the farmers at the State Fair upon the formation and composition of soil. But as the years passed, most of his time and strength were given to his teaching at the University, while his summer vacations were spent with his family at his Nye Brook Cottage by the Sea. "Here his life was almost unique, but it again brought him into the most friendly relations with many classes of people from all parts of the Northwest. Sometimes there were formal lectures before a summer school, but more often there was an informal announcement that 'Professor Condon would lecture on the beach, ' perhaps near Jump-off Joe. And here his audi- ence would gather around him in the shelter of the bluff or headland, some standing, some sitting on the rocks, others perched upon the piles of weather-bleached driftwood, while the children sat 'Turk fashion' upon the dry, glistening sand. And he, with his tall alpine stalk in his hand, his broad hat and loose raglan coat made a picturesque figure standing in their midst. Perhaps he talked of the three beaches, the one upon which they stood and the two old geological beaches so plainly visible in the ocean bluff behind them. The banker, the college president, the physician from a distant part of the State, the young city clerk, the carpenter, the teacher of the pountry school, the farmer and his family taking an outing by