Page:Pen Pictures of Representative Men of Oregon.djvu/201

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.



Remaining with his uncle about eighteen months, he obtainea an excellent mercantile education. At this period of his history, Mr. Whalley's father insisted on his return to Enirland, and, obedient to the paternal snnirnons, be sailed for the Old World early in 1848, where he remained until 184!), when, finding the prospect for the future gloomy in conseiiueuce of the pecuniary embarrassment of his father he determined to go to sea and seek his foituue in the East Indies. Arriving in Liverpool, and hearing of the gold fields of California, he determined to become an argonaut. Concealing the mat- ter from his father, he saw the old gentleman ofl" on one Saturday morning, to attend to his every-day duties, and went immediately imd bound himiself to the owner of the ship Antelope, bound for California as api)rentice boy. He arrived in San Francisco in July, 1849, and going to the mines he fol- lowed a miner's life with the varying fortune incident thereto mitil 18.")8. He began teaching school in Siskiyou county, California, reading law at the same time with Captain Fair and Hon. Joseph Roseborough, of Yreka, and was duly admitted to practice at the bar in 1861, after passing a good ex- amination, but deferred entering into active practice until 1864. He was married in 1865. During the time he was teaching and studying he con- tributed to the columns of the "Hesperian" and of the local press, his pro- ductions being mostly poetical, exhibiting rare geniiis, and many of which were extensively copied. In 1864 he left California and came to Oregon. Settling first in Grant county, he began practice and soon, by honest deal- ing and strict attention to biisiness, he built up a lucrative practice. In 18G8 Mr. Whalley came to Portland and began the practice of his profession with Mr. Fechheimer (who was his student while in Grant county) as his partnei-. The firm has been very successful. They made the bankrupt law of 1867 a specialty, and most of the business in that department of the legal practice came into their hands. In 1870 Mr. Whalley was elected a member of the Lower House of the Oregon State Legislature by the Republicans, and served one term, when be retired altogether from political life, devoting his whole attention thereafter to his profession, of which he is master. In 1872 he was elei^ted Grand Representative to the Grand Lodge of the United States I. O. O. F., which met at Baltimore, and embraced the opportunity to visit his old home in Europe, and he contemplates making another journey across the Atlantic during the coming year. Mr. Whalley is a ripe scliolar, devoted to elegant literature and the classics, and possessed of rare fluency as a speaker, either conversational or oratorical. He is a true and devoted friend to those worthy of his esteem, and a dangerous antagonist to those who incur his righteous displeasure. Being still in the prime of manhood, and possessed of an easy fortune, his prospects for many years of active use- fulness are far above those allotted to the average of mankind.


HON. O. S. SAVAGE.

This name is familiar to almost every resident of Eastern Oregon, and es- pecially to those of Wasco county, where he has resided for years past, and where, by the votes of the people, he has been elected time and time again to positions of responsibility and trust. He was born in Lisbon, Grafton