the prize as one would-be builder succeeded another, until finally A. B. Hammond appeared, for whom the land bounty was swelled to a value though problematical and speculative moderately estimated at between $500,000 and $1,000,000. The only other sacrifice that has ever equaled this in our commonwealth was probably the $100,000 gift from Portland citizens to Ben Holladay in 1870, for the "West Side" railroad—a tremendous public achievement for the time. Like the Portland citizens of 1870, the Astoria citizens were determined and put forth tremendous effort.
The Astoria project took many forms and suffered many vicissitudes; only brief outline can be given here; probably such outline is better because of wearisome detail otherwise. Oregon's biggest railroad men considered the project—Joseph Gaston, Ben Holladay, Henry Villard, C. P. Huntington, Wm. Reid. It may aid the memory to divide the promotion period into two parts—the one leading up to 1887, when Astoria adopted the self-help or bonus plan; the other continuing the project until the "last spike" (April 3, 1898), or the first "through train" (May 16, 1898.)
I.
Talk of the "Astoria railroad" started in 1853, at the time of the surveys then made by Governor I. I. Stevens, of Washington Territory, for the Northern Pacific. Although Governor Stevens' survey crossed the Cascade Mountains to Puget Sound, it was considered likely that the proposed road would follow the Columbia River. For many years afterward, this choice was undetermined. If the Columbia route, what more natural than a terminus at Astoria, next door to the sea, the oldest American settlement on the Pacific Coast? Why not there the great mart of the Columbia Basin? This, at least, in the thoughts of Clatsop citizens.
That Governor Stevens' survey stimulated railroad schemes in Oregon is seen in the railroad acts of the Territorial Legislature of Oregon in 1853–4. These were the beginnings of the subject in this commonwealth. Evidently the Oregon pro-
