Two men working half a day on Powder River cleaned up two and a half pounds of gold-dust. One claim yielded $6,000 in four days; and one pan of earth contained $150. These stories created the liveliest interest in every part of Oregon, and led to an immediate rush to the new gold-fields, though it was already November when the discovery was made known.
Taken in connection with the discoveries in the Nez Percé country, which preceded them by about a year and a half, these events proved that gold-fields extended from the southern boundary of Oregon to the British possessions. Already the migration to the Nez Percé, Oro Fino, and Salmon River mines had caused a great improvement in the country. It had excited a rapid growth in Portland and The Dalles,[1] and caused the organization of the Oregon Steam Navigation Company,[2] which in 1861 had steamboats carrying freight three times a week to
- ↑ Wasco county was assessed in 1863 $1,500,000, a gain of half a million since 1862, notwithstanding heavy losses by flood and snow. Or. Argus, Sept, 28, 1863.
- ↑ The James P. Flint, a small iron propeller, built in the east, was the first steamboat on the Columbia above the Cascades. She was hauled up over the rapids in 1852 to run to The Dalles, for the Bradford brothers, Daniel and Putnam. The Yakima war of 1855–6 gave the first real impulse to steamboating on the Columbia above the Willamette. The first steamer built to run to the Cascades was the Belle, owned by J. C. Ainsworth & Co., the next the Fashion, owned by J. O. Van Bergen. J. S. Ruckle soon after built the Mountain Buck. Others rapidly followed. In 1856 between the Cascades and The Dalles there were the Mary and the Wasco, built by the Bradfords. In 1857 there was no steamboat above The Dalles, and Captain Cram of the army confidently declared there never could be. I. J. Stevens contradicted this view, and a correspondence ensued. Olympia Herald, Dec. 24, 1858. In 1858 R. R. Thompson built a steamboat above the Cascades, called The Venture, which getting into the current was carried over the falls. She was repaired, named the Umatilla, and taken to Fraser River. In the autumn and winter of 1858–9, R. R. Thompson and Lawrence W. Coe built the Colonel Wright above The Dalles, which in spite of Cram's prognostics ran to Fort Walla Walla, to Priest's Rapids, and up Snake River. The Hassaloe was also put on the river between the Cascades and The Dalles in 1858, and below the Cascades the Carrie A. Ladd. There was at this time a horse-railroad at the portage on the north side of the Cascades, owned by Bradford & Co., built in 1853. In 1858 J. O. Van Bergen purchased the right of way on the south side of the Cascades, and began a tramway, like that on the north side, but used in connection with his steamers. Subse-
Pierce brought specimens of silver-bearing rocks to be assayed. About forty persons in Oct. had taken claims in the Grande Ronde Valley, prepared to winter there. Portland Oregonian, Aug. 27, 1861; Or. Statesman, Oct. 21, 1861; S. F. Bulletin, Oct. 24, 1861; Sac. Union, Nov. 4 and 16, 1861.
