Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 3.djvu/343

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History of the Press of Oregon.
333

most part spent in the mines, and in the fall of the latter year he gave up his contemplated trip to Canada and returned to Oregon, bought a farm near the present site of Gervais, and became one of the principal farmers of that region, and was highly respected by all who knew him. He died in 1879.

The next that is known about this mission press is in June, 1846. A number of parties living at Salem, among them Dr. W. H. Willson, Joseph Holman, Mr. Robinson, Rev. David Leslie, J. B. McClane, and Rev. L. H. Judson, desiring to issue a paper, sent Mr. Alanson Hinman, then a teacher in Salem, now living in Forest Grove, on horseback to Whitman mission, to secure it for the purpose indicated. Doctor Whitman was willing that it should be used, but referred the matter to Mr. Spalding, at Lapwai, where the press was located. Mr. Hinman rode there and interviewed Mr. Spalding. He consented to have the press go to the Willamette Valley, but not without the consent of Messrs. Walker and Eells, who were at the Spokane mission. Accordingly Mr. Hinman secured an Indian guide and rode thither and obtained their permission, but was referred back to Messrs. Spalding and Whitman. Returning to Lapwai, Mr. Hinman explained the situation to Mr. Spalding, who made conditions which would give him more control over the paper than the Salem parties were willing to grant, hence they declined to take the plant. However, Mr. Spalding sent the press to Doctor Whitman, and he sent it on to Wascopum—The Dalles—where it remained until after the Whitman massacre, November 29-30, 1847. Early in March, 1848, it was transferred by Mr. Spalding to Rev. J. S. Griffin, who took it to the Tualatin Plains, near Hillsboro, and that year issued eight numbers of a sixteen-page magazine called The Oregon American and Evangelical Unionist. As it may be of in-