the pony was reduced to a mere skeleton of its former self. When it was decided to hold the Lewis and Clark Exposition here, several gentlemen,among them Colonel L. L. Hawkins, proposed that the pony should be brought up and exhibited as the first locomotive in Oregon. The matter was taken up through Colonel Dosch and Mr. Hewes readily consented to lend the engine to the exposition. With great generosity he had the parts which were destroyed rebuilt as nearly as possible like the original, at a cost of over $2,000, and then donated it through Colonel Dosch as the permanent property of the State of Oregon. * * * * * * * * * *
Let us listen to the first traveler over the line who appears to have taken the pains to tell posterity about it.[1] It is the editor of the Pacific Christian Advocate telling of a visit he has just made to The Dalles, a matter of two or three weeks after the trial trip:
On the Oregon side [at the Cascades] a railroad traverses the entire portage—five miles—the lower half being used with a locomotive and cars and the upper with mule cars. Upon the lower part the ties are four feet part; the Upon the lower part the ties are four feet apart; the rails are of fir, six inches square and covered with bar iron. The road is staunch and smooth, the passage over it of "the Pony"—it should be called "the Pioneer"— with a train of twenty tons making no perceptible jar. The cars run over this safely at the rate of twenty miles an hour. Over this end of the portage we rode twice, in a freight car. It was our first railroad ride on the coast, and it inspired us with animating hopes for the not dis- tant future when not only through the rocky portals of the golden west, but far beyond to the teeming cities of the Mississippi, the iron horse would thunder with its tread, slaking its thirst at Snake, Green Water, Platte and other rivers and waking the solitudes of the Rocky Mountains with its shrill neighing. That event will come. We stand upon its threshold and there are those living who will witness its full accomplishment, fii the business and travel of northern and eastern Oregon and of our sister
Territory a new era has dawned. Henceforth we shall
- ↑ Pacific Christian Advocate, May 24, 1862.
