Hoping to establish a trading post that would serve as operating headquarters for the Pacific Fur Company (a division of the American Fur Co.), they primarily set out following the Lewis and Clark trail along the Missouri and had engaged an enterpreter, Piere Dirion accompanied by his wife Marie and their two children, and journeyed westward by boat until they reached the Arikar Villages where they then took up the route on horse, moving westward across the Continental Divided to the Snake River and Henry's Post where they again took up the journey by boat. Impeded by reacherous rapids, sheer waterfalls, and narrow canyons, they were forced to abandon the boats and divided into four groups to continue on foot.On the 30th of December, near North Powder, Madame Dorion gave birth to their third child and the following day, continued on horseback with the Hunt group. When they reached Celilo Falls, the obtained canoes from the Indians and arrived finally at Fort Astoria, situated at the mouth of the Columbia River, on the 15th of February 1812. The first of the group to reach this area was headed by McKenzie and included two of the four groups, and had reached the fort on Janaury 18th. The last of the group, which was presumed to have been dead, included five men, two of which were Crooks and John Day - who arrived the following May.

This expedition led to the establishment of Fort Astoria and the Louisianna Purchase which followed, opened up further opportunity of trade, but following the war with Great Britian, John J. Astor sold the Nort West company on October 16, 1813 and was at the close of this war, reputed to be American's richest capitalist.

THE DALLES - This area of rapid waters flowing swiftly between the Celilo Falls on the east and the Big Eddy on the west, became known as "The Dalles of the Columbia," a word taken from the French Canadian voyagers, and was occupied by the Indians who called the place Winquatt, as it resembled a hemmed in bowl. The first white settlment began in 1838 by Rev Daniel Lee and Rev. H.K.W. Perkins, who established a Methodist mission then known as Wascopam Mission, which was set up to minister to the Indians. Discouraged, they sold the mission at a price of $600 to Dr. Marcus Whiteman, a Presbyterian missionary and physician who had been born at Rushville, New York in 1802.

After taking over the misison, conflicts with the natives began and the matter became worse after Whitman brought other immigrants out west to assist him. The natives distrusted them, felt they numbers of white settlers were continuing to increase, and were stricken with disease of the white men, which they blamed on Whitman - who they considered was a white doctor of "bad medicine," and thus, needed to be done away with. The Indians retaliation became known as the Whitman massacre in which they murdered Whitman, his wife Naricissa (Prentiss) and twelve others on the 29th of November 1847. Fifty-three women and children were also held captive and the mission which had once been a place of rest and refuge, was abandoned and the frontier town of The Dalles, was beginning to grow.

By 1854, Wasco became a county and the town of Fort Dalles was laid out. Its name changed to Dalles City, but the post office department preferred the name The Dalles, and thus it remained. With the opening of the gold fields, many miners came through by stage, freightline and riverboat, and many stayed after the mining began to dwindle and raised stock and wheat, and built mills and warehouses. By 1872 the operations of the narrow-gauge rail line was replaced by the Oregon Short Line, which was then replaced by the Union Pacific in 1884.

In the 1900's The Dalles saw the completion of the Celilo Canal which was finished in 1915; the Bonneville Dam in 1938 which increased the town's importance as a deep-sea port and terminal for river shipping, mostly by barge; and the completion of The Dalles Dam in 1956 which spans the Columbia River at The Dalles which was constructed to generate hydro-electric power and improve navigation down the Columbia by eliminating the stretch of turbulent water hindered naviation from The Dalles to the mouth of the Deschutes River.

GRIFFIN, HENRY - One of a small party who went in search of the fabled Blue Bucket Mine in which parties previous had said to have found gold - Henry and his two companions moved eastward toward the Baker Valley and there discovered gold nuggest in a creek, afterwards called Griffin's Gulch. This brought upon the gold rush to the area, where stampedes of miners flocked into the gold fields; and after the mining began to diminish, Henry moved to Baker City where he died in January 1883.

HUNT, WILSON PRICE - Born in New Jersey on 20 March 1783, and engaged in the mercantile business in St. Louis, he was the fur trader and explorer who had courageously led the Astor Overland Expedition which included John Day and Pierre and Madame Dorion which arrived in Astoria on the 15th of February 1812.

In search of Indian trade, he sailed for Alaska on the Beaver and returned in February of 1814 to find Duncan McDougal had sold out to the British and at this point left Oregon and returned to St. Louis where he married and resided. He died on 13 April 1842.

MEEKS, STEPHEN - Born in Washington county, Virginia on 4 July 1807 and older brother of Joseph Meek (Sherrif & U.S. Marshall), he was a trapper and mountain guide who went to work for William Sublette, in 1827. Meeks came to Oregon in 1835 and worked for Dr. John McLoughlin at Fort Vancouver, accompanied Tom McKay on a trip from French Prairie to Yerba Buena (now known as San Francisco) and guided a party from Independence, Missouri to Fort Hall in 1842.

Among his explorations, Meeks helped survey the townsite of Falls City (now part of Oregon City in 1842; guided a party from French Prairie to Fort Sutter, CA in spring of 1843; went to St. Louis in 1843 and while there married an immigrant girl, Elizabeth Schoonover, in 1845.

This same year he led a 200-wagon train of Oregon immigrants from Fort Boise on August 24th of 1845. Attempting to find a new route, the parties split at Fort Hall and when Meek's party did not arrive at The Dalles, a search party headed by Moses "Black" Harrison, was sent out to rescue them. They were located somewhere on the Crooked River and though they had suffered much and lost many lives, it was also on this disasturous trip that gold was found and the story of the Blue Bucket mine began to spread bringing miners to the area.

From this point, Meeks lived at Linn county from 1845 to 1848 at which time he went to the California mines and then returned to Oregon in 1850 and the mines in 1851. He acquired a fortune of $34,000 and invested it in land at Watsonville, California but lost land and money through litigation. He then mined in Amador county, California until 1865, the same year his wife died. Three years later, he piloted a part of thirty men to the Malhueur River mines and continued to trap and hunt the remainder of his life, which ended on 11 January 1886.

POWDER RIVER MINES/VALLEY - In 1862 three South Carolina immigrants ettled on farmlands along the north bank of Powder River and named the area Sumpter. Gold mines began to spring up over the next few years in such places as Auburn and Griffin Gulch - this area being panned and explored and brought with it hundreds of Chinese. This era was followed by the opening up of rich ore veins after the Sumpter Valley RR came in 1896 and was able to bring in the necessary machinery to mine the tunnels.

The mining town triangle consisted of Sumpter, Bourne (which was first called Cracker) and Granite which at one time boasted a three story, thirty-room hotel, but as the mining of the hard rock mines were worked out, the population began to dwindle and the buildings were deserted. Only the Sumpter Valley RR stayed to serve the agricultural and lumbering needs of the communities, and with the more modern machinery they were able to re-work some of the huge dumps of rock. The community also was shortly revived during the thirties depression period when the price of gold rose and some of the mining activity returned, but with the advent of World War II, the prosperity of the old mining regions began to fade.

WHITE, DR. ELIJAH - Born in New York in 1806, he was educated at the medical college in Syracuse and in 1836 appointed by Methodist Church as its physician to the Wilamette Valley mission. He sailed from Boston on the Hamilton with his wife, infant son Jason and adopted son, George and arrived at Sandwhich (now Hawaiian) Island and arrived in July at which time he and his wife taught school. The following May he arrived in Oregon and was stationed at the Lee Mission on the Willamette , but due to differences in mission policies between himself and Jason Lee, Elijah resigned and returned to the Eastern States in 1841.

Appointed sub-Indian Agent for Oregon in 1842, he led a wagon train of more than 100 hundred persons and was able to establish a code of law with the Nez Perce Indians. He sought to appease the Cayuses and Walla Wallas who were threatening to attack the mission, and was a member of the Committee of Twelve named at the second Wolf Meeting to talk of civil and military protection for the settlers.

He was prominent in the Cockstock Affair which was a dispute between two black settlers at Oregon City in which an Indian named Cockstock was hired to labor a land claim and receive a horse for payment, but before the work was finished the owner, Winslow Anderson, sold the land claim and horse to James D. Saules who refused to give the horse to Cockstock. Dr. Elijah White ordered the horse surrendered but Cockstock had enlisted four Molalla brave and they returned to Wilamette Falls armed. The clerk and recorder of the Provisional Government, George W. Le Breton, was fatally shot and another man named Rogers, was wounded by a poisioned arrow. Winslow Anderson retaliated by striking a blow to Cockstock's head, killing him. This incident prompted the organization of the Oregon Rangers in 1844, which was the first military force in the Oregon county, but because the Indians remained peaceful, it was never called into action.

In 1845, Dr. White located a pass through the Coast Range to the head of Yaquina Bay. In 1850 he became the partner of James D. Holman promoting the town of Pacific City and was in 1861 commissioned Indian Agent for the territory west of the Rockie, but went to California. In 1838 his son Jason drowned when the canoe in which Mrs. White and Rev. David Leslie was returning from a visit to The Dalles overturned in the Columbia River; and adopted son George also drowned attemtping to cross the Willamette on horseback. Eljiah died on the 3rd of April 1879.

Updated 26 Dec 2007
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