CHURCHES AND CHURCH SCHOOLS.
The early history of the Methodist Church is the history of the first American colonization, and has been fully given in a former volume; but a sketch of the Oregon methodist episcopal church proper must begin at a later date. From 1844 to 1853 the principal business transactions of the church were at the yearly meetings, without any particular authority from any conference.
On the 5th of September, 1849, the Oregon and California Mission Conference was organized in the chapel of the Oregon Institute, Salem, by authority of the general conference of 1848, by instructions from Bishop Waugh, and under the superintendence of William Roberts. The superintendents of the Oregon Mission were, first, Jason Lee, 1834–1844; George Gary, 1844–1847; William Roberts, 1847–1849, when the Mission Conference succeeded the Oregon Mission, under Roberts. The mission conference included New Mexico, and possessed all the rights and privileges of other similar bodies, except those of sending delegates to the general conference and drawing annual dividends from the avails of the book-concerns and chartered funds. Four sessions were held, the first three in Salem, and the fourth at Portland. Under the mission conference the following ministers were appointed to preach in Oregon: in 1849–50, W. Roberts, David Leslie, A. F. Waller. J. H. Wilbur, J. L. Parrish, William Helm, J. O. Raynor, J. McKinney, C. O. Hosford, and J. E. Parrott; in 1850–1, I. McElroy, F. S. Hoyt, and N. Doane were added; in 1851–2, L. T. Woodward, J. S. Smith, J. Flinn, and J. W. Miller; in 1852–3, Isaac Dillon, C. S. Kingsley, P. G. Buchanan, and T. H. Pearue--never more than fourteen being in the field at the same time.
In March 1853 Bishop E. R. Ames arrived in Oregon, and on the 17th the Oregon Annual Conference was organized, including all of Oregon and Washington, which held its first session at Salem, and gave appointments to twenty-two ministers, including all of the above-named except Leslie, Parrish, Helm, McElroy, McKinney, and Parrott, and adding G. Hines, H. K. Hines, T. F. Royal, G. M. Berry, E. Garrison, B. Close, and W. B. Morse. Since 1853 there have been from thirty-three to seventy-four preachers annually furnished appointments by the conference. In 1873 the conference was divided, and Washington and eastern Oregon set off, several of the pioneer ministers being transferred to the new conference. According to a sketch of church history by Roberts, there were, in 1876, 3,249 church members, and 683 on probation; 74 local preachers; 60 churches, valued at $167,750; parsonages valued at $29,850; Sunday-schools, 78; pupils, 4,469; teachers, 627; books in Sunday-school libraries, 7,678, besides periodicals taken for the use of children. The first protestant church edifice erected on the Pacific coast, from Cape Horn to Bering Strait, was the methodist church at Oregon City, begun in 1842 by Waller, and completed in 1844 by Hines. Abernethy added a bell in 1851, weighing over 500 pounds, the largest then in the territory. He also purchased two smaller ones for the churches in Salem and Portland, and one for the Clackamas academy at Oregon City. Or. Statesman, July 4, 1851. These were not the first bells in Oregon, the catholics having one at Champoeg, if not others. Religious services were held in Salem as early as 1841, at the Oregon Institute chapel, which served until the erection of a church, which
was dedicated. January 23, 1853, and was at this time the best protestant
