Portland, Oregon: Its History and Builders/Volume 1/Chapter 30
CHAPTER XXX.
The growth of a city is something hke the growth of a living organism; except that it is far more complex, and not subject to accidental mortalities. The founding and building of a city opens wide the consideration of every human agency, and brings into play the whole vast and almost innumerable motives of human conduct. To commence with the beginning and follow this development and expansion of a limited and concrete organization, is a most interesting study.
The first census taken in 1850, five years after the town was started by a survey and plat of lots and blocks shows a population of 821. This could be in no sense an index to its growth; for the question was not yet then settled whether the place was "to be, or not to be"—a village, or a city. And other evidence shows that the town did not have more than 400 population in 1850.
But starting with the next census, the census of 1860, fifty years ago, and at the period when the town had taken on an assured and regular development, its growth can be followed from cause to effect with ease and certainty. The census taken in 1860 shows a population of 2,874. Two years later the census taken by S. J. McCormick for the first directory of the town, shows a population of 3,357; an increase of about 8 per cent per annum, exclusive of a floating population going to and coming from the gold mines in eastern Oregon and Idaho, which averaged probably one thousand.
At this date the town was 14 years old, and its increase up to 1860 must have been slow. And if divided into annual periods, it would not have averaged an increase of more than 208 per annum. In 1870 the population had increased to 8,293; and in 1880 to 17,577; and in 1890 to 46,385 in the city, and 6,742 in Multnomah County outside the city. In 1900 the population of the city had increased to 90,426; and in 1910, it is reported by the census authorities at 207,214.
The population of the city under the recent census has been under examination for errors. It is understood that on the face of the returns by Oregon enumerators under control of the U. S. superintendent for this congressional district, the population of Portland is shown to be 221,214. Examiners from Washington city have cut that down to 207,214 for alleged errors or "padding." This is a great injustice to the city; for the reason, that since the census was taken in April last, probably more than 14,000 persons who spent the winter in this city have left for the mines and salmon fisheries in Alaska, and the logging camps in Oregon and Washington, and the railroad construction work in central Oregon. This floating population would not be counted anywhere unless counted here.
But even taking out 14,000 for errors, a fair consideration of Portland's population would include the people who work and do business here but live in the Portland suburbs outside the corporate limits of the city. That would include Linnton, St. Johns, Montavilla, all the people on the Mt. Scott Railroad (about 15,000) and Milwaukie and Oak Grove—probably 25,000 altogether.
The first impulse of growth beyond what seemed to be the average growth of a new town in a new country, came from the discoveries of gold in California, Oregon and Idaho. The gold of Cahfornia affected this city, first by stimulating the natural trade of the town in furnishing supplies to the California miners, and secondly in the expenditure at this point of the quickly made fortunes of return- ing Oregon miners. This prosperity did not wane before gold was discovered in eastern Oregon ; and that discovery quickly and directly stimulated all sorts of business in Portland, and especially the steamboat transportation business. Then came the discovery of gold in Idaho and the distant mines of British Colum- bia. [This called for the immediate enlargement of all means of transportation, and Portland became the supply and distributing point to a wide field of mining and commercial activities.] So that by 1870 the population had more than doubled.
Portland was then in the full tide of prosperity. The merchants were pros- perous, the transportation companies were piling up fortunes. The city was rap- idly growing, and the commencement of railroad construction encouraged the more substantial construction of the city.
But about this time (1870) the town of Seattle entered the Hsts, guided by some very able and energetic men, and disputed the supremacy of Portland by bidding for all the trade of Puget Sound, British Columbia and Alaska. The fur trade of the north was then yet a very considerable item, and the gold mines of Frazer river were pouring out millions of dollars. And while Portland lost no trade in Oregon, it did lose men and capital who moved over to Tacoma and Seattle in prospect of the North Pacific Railroad making that region its terminus, as it afterward did. And while Portland did within the decade following 1870, more than double its population, it was felt at the time that the city was making but a slow growth.
But with the building of the Oregon Railway & Navigation Company Rail- road to eastern Oregon, and especially the completion of the Northern Pacific under Villard in September, 1883, the city took on a veritable "boom" of pros- perity. And while this stimulus stirred things to the bottom, yet there was no little of the excitement that wore the appearance of the many who had gone too often to the wine cask. And when Villard and his great stock speculation in the "Transcontinental Company" fell down, and the Northern Pacific went into the hands of a receiver, and the Philadelphians took control and built the Northern Pacific straight over the mountains from Pasco to Tacoma, the temperature cooled down distressingly in the latitude of Portland, Oregon, while the mer- cury rose rapidly at Tacoma and Seattle. What trade Portland had maintained with Puget Sound, Victoria and coast ports in Washington was taken away from her by the aggressive work of Seattle, which town was further helped mightily by the discoveries of gold in Alaska. And for the decade covering the years be- tween 1890 and 1900, Portland held on her way, growing slowly but surely and doggedly holding to every inch of ground that economy in administration, mod- esty in profits, and natural advantages would secure. In this fight, the city was compelled to go into the pockets of its taxpayers for hard cash to deepen the ship channel to Portland, to build portage railways around the obstructions in the Columbia river, and to fight for improvements of the Columbia river bar with the whole political influence of the state of Washington dead against it.
It was during this long siege in standing off the enemies of the city that Port- land and the whole country, was further tried and tested by the financial panic and continued depression of 1893. And during these trying years, the city and the reliable population had a still further and severer test in managing and pro- viding for a large population of unemployed and penniless men. There was no doubt of the poverty and distress of those days. Men walked the streets idle and hungry because there was no work for them to do. There are more idle men in the city now than there was in 1893 ; but they are not idle for want of work, but because there is too much work. In 1893, there was no building of houses at all, no street work, and no railroad work, and the farmers were doing all their own work and selling wheat in eastern Oregon at 25 cents a bushel.
Now the farmers can't get men to grub, or plow, or pick apples ; the street con- tractors can't get half enough men, the railroad contractors are shorthanded ; and yet there are more idle men on the streets now than in 1893, because wages are so good and employment so plentiful that laboring men can support life and get clothes, lodging, and the two prime necessaries — tobacco and whisky — by work- ing half the time and loafing the other half.
During this sore period of liquidation, a vast amount of real estate changed hands. The legislature interfered to protect debtors as far as possible, and passed a law giving debtors a year to redeem their real estate after sales by the sheriff. While liquidation was ruin to many debtors, it seemed to be absolutely necessary to get down to a solid foundation again. A great many persons had bought city and suburban real estate on a small cash payment and a large mortgage to cover balance. The collapse of values precipitated by the panic left no possible chance to sell suburban lots, and nothing btit a sale to the highest bidder for cash, or the taking over of the property by the creditor and wiping out the debt could save the community from a much longer struggle at recuperation. The worst was over by 1896, and in 1897 property took on a more hopeful view ; in 1898 real estate began to move again on inside property, and in 1899, George W. Brown began to move things out on the Mt. Scott line, selling lots at a hundred dollars apiece on monthly installments. And even at these rates, many pur- chasers, mostly wage earners, would drop their payments. Upon the renomina- tion of President McKinley in 1890, the large capitalists of the eastern states commenced to again invest in railroads and build more factories. The great steel trust was formed in this year, and that event did more to induce invest- ments from the eastern hoards of money than anything else. This all had a toning up influence on business in Portland ; and Dan McAllen commenced talk- ing up the Lewis and Clark Exposition.
It required a vast deal of hopefulness, and no little presumption to propose an exposition that must cost first and last three or four million dollars to get up something that would be a credit to the city and an honor to the great event. The details of that work are given in another chapter ; and we are dealing with the general effects only here. Portland capital had put up the old exposition building at Washington and i8th streets; but that was a cheap rough board af- fair; here was something that if built at all must be such as would compare favor- ably with all the other national shows that had preceded it — and Portland almost, very nearly, balked at the proposition. Finally, when the die was cast, and the proposition grappled with in earnest, it was felt to be not such an impossible un- dertaking. The very decision to hold the exposition, strengthened every man that put down a dollar for it; and from that very day Portland business, Port- land real estate, and Portland's great future commenced to move up — to move with confidence, courage, steadfastness, and accelerating energy; and the move- ment has never halted or hesitated from that day to this. The exposition proved a great success from every point of view. It was in itself, in its setting and its administration, a highly meritorious and successful exhibition of arts, sciences, industries and productions, that in many respects surpassed in novelty and ex- cellence anything of the kind that had preceded it in the United States. It at- tracted hundreds of thousands of people, many of them wealthy, to this city, who knew nothing of the advantages of Portland and its surroundings. They were surprised and pleased at what they found and learned, and went away to spread the story of Portland's beauty and future prospects, and then came back to invest their money in Portland property and business.
And with the exposition came the great influx of foreign capital to invest in Oregon timber. Portland became the center of that movement of capital. In 1901 Nehalem timber could be purchased by the quarter section at the rate of twenty cents per thousand feet board measure on the stump. By the time the fair had opened, that valuation had been raised to fifty cents per thousand feet; and now it is five or six times that value.
The new capital coming to Oregon from New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan,
Minnesota and Texas to invest in timber in the last seven years, has not been
less than twenty million dollars. Not only the money has come, but the people
have come with it; and new mills and various industries have been promoted by
it, employing a large addition to the permanent population of the state — all of
which has made this city the headquarters of its influence and activity.
Following in after the exposition, came the location of the great packing house of Swift & Company of Chicago and Kansas City. The selection of Portland as the headquarters of this great corporation, and the location of its packing house and all the associated industries, was not made until an exhaustive examination of the advantages offered by all other points from Seattle down to Los Angeles had been made; and then Portland was chosen because of advantages it offered superior to all other points on the Pacific coast. Portland was chosen on its merits wholly, not a dollar of subsidy bonus or other financial consideration being offered by town citizens or property holders. This great industry not only brought millions of dollars for investment, but it made Portland the central point of the live stock interests of the northwest — of Oregon, Washington and Idaho.
But the one fact, more than all others, that has indicated and established the supremacy! of Portland over all other Pacific coast cities, was the location and construction of the "North Bank Railroad" — the railroad from Pasco in eastern Washington, down the north bank of the Columbia river to Vancouver, and thence to Portland across the Columbia river by the greatest railroad bridge in the United States. This was the greatest event in railroad construction on the Pacific coast, from the fall of Villard in 1892, down to the present. Had the Northern Pacific been confined to the Columbia river valley, as was intended by Villard, and reached the Puget Sound cities from Portland, the construction of a new line down the Columbia on the north bank would have attracted but little attention. But all the capitalists of the Northern Pacific, and all the capi- talists of the Great Northern, backed by such men as Pierpont Morgan, James J. Hill, and all their millionaire friends, having deliberately ignored Portland and the Columbia river gateway, and even scouted the idea of either the Willamette city or its mountain pass being a factor that they need consider, and at a cost of forty million dollars built two lines of railway over the Cascade mountains to reach Tacoma and Seattle, and then being compelled by the immutable laws of nature and commerce to practically abandon their mountain lines and come to Portland over the very route they had condemned, was a verdict in favor of Portland that all the world must take notice of. The city of Portland could not in any way whatever have chosen or provided or asked for a more complete and overwhelming decision against all its rivals. The spending of twenty million dollars to build the North Bank Road and its Columbia- Vancouver bridge by the enemies of Portland, and their hauling their Puget Sound lumber trains two hundred miles to reach the Portland gateway, is an object-lesson that forever silences all doubts or questions of Portland's surpassing advantages and ability to secure and control not only the commerce of the Columbia river basin, but also the transcontinental commerce to China, Japan and the Indies.
POPULATION.
Increase of population is generally accepted as the standard of growth of all other elements of city life and business, especially if that increase has been regu- lar and continuous for many years. The increase of population at this city comes within these conditions, and may be regarded as an index to the certainty of fu- ture steady growth. The statistics given from the ten-year census periods in the first part of this chapter show that Portland growth has been regular, steady, continuous and averaging about 10 per cent per year, for the fifty years last
past. 
WILLIAM MacMASTER President of Chamber of Commerce
GROWTH OF BANKING.
The aggregate condition of the six national banks that were in operation in 1888 shown by the U. S. comptrollers report for the year ending December, 1888, that the total paid up capital of these six banks was at that date $1,250,000; that their surplus funds were $187,500; undivided profits, $573,359.94; individual de- posits (exclusive of government deposits), were $3,627,497.79; loans and dis- counts, $3,717,789.12; invested in U. S. bonds, $825,000; and total liabilities, $7,209,734.65; with a lawful reserve of more than double the requirements of the law.
That was heralded as a very flattering statement at that time, giving great credit to Portland. The banks making this aggregate showing were :
Capital.
The First National $500,000
Commercial National 250,000
Oregon National 200,000
Ainsworth National 100,000
Portland National 100,000
Merchants National 100,000
Three of these banks closed their doors in the panic of 1893, and passed out through various forms of liquidation. The old First National, the Merchants National, and the Ainsworth National held on and have come down to the present — the Ainsworth being consolidated with the Subsequent U. S. National. In a comparison of the business of 1888, and that of. 1910, it is seen that one of the surviving banks of that period, the Merchants' National, has now nearly the same amount of individual deposits as the whole six had twenty-two years ago; while another survivor from that period — The First National — has now more than four times the total deposits of the whole six National Banks in 1888.
Another comparison with the banking business of today with that of twenty- two years ago is shown by the operations of the Clearing House — and the bank- ing business is a good index to all other business. The Clearing House was opened July 15th, 1889, and taking the first three months from August ist, 1889 to November ist, 1889 — the clearings and balances of the banks are as follows:
Clearings. Balances.
August $ 7,273,339.84 $1,563,332.65
September 6,110,056.71 1,051,479.87
October 7.895,075-99 i,347P30-33
$21,278,472.54 $3,961,842.85 The clearings and balances for the corresponding months in this year of 1910, are as follows :
Clearings. Balances.
August 6 $ 9,441,813.26 $ 1,100,260.19
August 13 9,804,528.40 870,956.18
August 20 9,041,606.31 906,319.80
August 27 7,900,808.58 647,034.19
September 3 10,358,989.86 1,623,165.57
September 10 8,735,624.77 773,989.08
September 17 11,801,542.41 1,452.484.74
September 24 9,021,248.25 759>95i7i
October i 11,278,184.96 1,186,690.83
Octobers 10,861,219.41 1,006,565.43
October 15 12,840,006.19 915,56903
October 22 12,013,302.76 1,631,176.80
October 29 9,826,662.33 977.759-13
Totals $132,133,556-99 $13, For the week ending August 20th, 1910, the clearings of the Portland banks showed an increase of 31 per cent, which was a greater increase for that period than any other city in the United States except Oakland, California, Atlanta, Georgia, and Detroit, Michigan.
EXPORTS.
The total amount of exports from Portland in the year 1864 reached the sum of $8,079,631. But the larger portion of this was gold dust from the mines of Eastern Oregon and Idaho. There was some wheat, flour, fruit, potatoes and meat, sent along with the gold dust to San Francisco. Gold dust has never been regarded as a reliable index to the permanent value of any country.
By the year 1876, the character of the exports had changed. Wool and sal- mon had been added to the list, and wheat was then shipped directly to Europe, instead of through San Francisco. This year, 3,125,000 pounds of wool worth $600,000; and 480,000 cases of salmon were shipped to San Francisco to be sent East over the Central Pacific Railroad. In the same year the export of wheat rose to 1,937,787 centals nearly all of which went direct to Europe, while the export of flour amounted to 215,714 barrels ; and the export of gold dust amounted to $2,651,431. Oregon had grown to be a great factor in the production of wheat ; and it was the boast then that "with a population of forty thousand men, Oregon's export of wheat equals one-seventh of the total export of the United States."
Ten years later (1887) the export of wheat had reached 173,915 tons, and flour 45,766 tons ; with eighteen million pounds of wool and 428,000 cases of salmon ; the total cash value of export being $16,385,000.
Coming down to the end of the year 1909 it is found that the exports of wheat from Portland for 1909 is 10,649,179 bushels worth $10,317,315; and for the same period there were exported 552,324 barrels of flour worth $2,160,681, or a total of $12,477,996 for wheat and flour. For the same period there were exported 822,510 bushels of barley worth $549,485.
Portland stands next to New York city in the exports of wheat. Bulletin No. 6, of the Department of Commerce and Labor, under date of January 12, gives the total wheat exports for 1909 as follows: New York, 12,587,537 bushelsj Portland 5,571,000 bushels; Duluth is fourth with 3,996,516 bushels. And that Portland's export is only a small portion of her actual wheat business, is shown by the figures for 1909 on coastwise wheat and flour traffic. Exclusively of the 5,571,000 bushels exported as wheat, Portland last year handled an additional 8,000,000 bushels which were shipped either coastwise or as flour to the Orient.
During the period from 1883 down to the present, the two items of wool and salmon disappeared from the list of exports by ships from Portland, having taken the route east by the overland railroads. Wool and salmon are still shipped from Portland but by rail. The annual wool clip shipped east is about sixteen million pounds, four million pounds being worked up annually by the Oregon woolen mills. All the Columbia river salmon pack amounting to about 400,000 cases annually, goes east from Portland.
EXPANSION OF LUMBER INTERESTS.
The manufacture and shipment of lumber is already, and will continue to be the largest producer of wealth at this city. With three hundred billion feet, board measure, of standing timber in Oregon, and half as much more in Wash- ington, tributary to the business of this city, it must always be the center of an immense traffic built up on this one item. With a water front on the Willamette and Columbia rivers for hundreds of miles on each side on which to erect mills and to which tow logs on the rivers, with rail transportation on both sides of the river, giving ships on one side and railroad on the other side of the mills to
carry away the lumber foreign to all the world, and with the only water level SCENES IN PORTLAND HARBOR— 1910 
1—S. W. King, of Olds, Wortman & King — Department Store. 2—C. H. Lewis, of Allen & Lewis — Wholesale Grocers. 3—Adolphe Wolfe, of Lipman. Wolfe & Company — Department Store. 4—Louis Fleischner — Wholesale Dry Goods. 5—Aaron Meier, of Meier & Frank Company — Department Store. 6.—Josiah Failing — Wholesale Hardware trade.
growth and prosperity of the business, and the city growing out of the business, is incalculable.
There are no statistics of the lumber industry prior to 1903, in which year the total cut at Portland as the center of its lumber trade, was 361,000,000 feet board measure. That business had nearly doubled by the end of 1910, when the total cut reached 700,000,000 feet board measure, and which was worth, as it came from the saw, the sum of $10,000,000. Of this amount about one-third went foreign by ship's cargo and one-third to California and eastern states by rail, and the balance into buildings at Portland.
MANUFACTURES.
The first manufactures at Portland, Oregon consisted of making salmon bar- rels to pack dried and salted fish in for export to any port the ship captains could find a market at. There was one shop in Portland town, and another across the river run by "Uncle Jimmie Stevens" on his own land. It is a far call back to those days.
Manufactures at Portland made very little showing prior to the year 1870; and was confined to the immediate necessities of the town for building materials, saw- mill repairs, a little furniture and some iron work, flour milling, quartz mills, and some leather. From 1870 the growth of the manufacturing interest was steady and substantial. By the year 1890 there were 600 firms and companies engaged in converting raw materials into saleable goods, employing over 7,000 workmen on a working capital of fourteen million dollars, and producing an output worth twenty million dollars. It would be impossible in this work to give an account of the present manufacturing industries. There are now over 2,200 manufactur- ing establishments with an invested capital of more than $32,000,000, and em- ploying 23,000 persons, who earn $9,000,000 annually and who produce manu- facturing goods to the amount of fifty million dollars annually. Practically all the necessaries of life except glass hardware, crockery and cotton cloth, are made in Portland or Oregon.
STREET RAILWAY EXTENSION.
Street railway transportation in Portland commenced with horse power, which has been noticed in Chapter XVI. Some of the lines, notably the first cars on Hawthorne avenue, and down to St. Johns, and over to Vancouver, and out to Mt. Scott, and up to Milwaukie, used steam motors for motive power. Electricity came in with the road constructed to Fulton park and the cemeteries in 1889, and opened to traffic January ist, 1890. From that time on all the lines were changed to electric power as fast as practicable, so that by 1892 electricity had supplanted all other forms of motive power. The Fulton park line was the first electric road on the Pacific coast, and the third electric road in the United States, the first be- ing at Boston, the second at Richmond, Virginia, and the third at Portland, Oregon.
Since the present owner of the lines. The Portland Railway Light and Power Company, took over all the lines in 1905, great improvements and extensions of the lines have been made. The mileage and equipment has doubled since that date, and the traffic has quadrupled.
As illustrating the growth of our city in the year 1900, the number of cars crossing the Burnside bridge daily was about 140, while at the present time the number crossing in regular service each day amounts to over 1000, an increase of about 600 per cent. In 1900 all the lines were operated by about 250 men ; now it requires an army of 4,000. About 4,000 cars now cross the river each day.
INCREASE OF RAILROAD TRAFFIC.
Portland as a railroad center, has come to the front more rapidly in the past two years than in any preceding five years in its history. Seventy steam railroad
616 THE CITY OP^ PORTLAND
passenger trains and 164 electric trains, not including local service to Mt. Scott, St. Johns, Troutdale and other nearby points — and not including freight trains — move in and out of Portland every twenty-four hours. This is an average of one steam passenger train arriving or departing every twenty minutes, and one electric train every nine minutes.
October is not regarded as a month in which freight traffic moves in record quantities; but in the first three weeks of this month (1910), the railroads hauled into this city, among other commodities, 1,551 carloads of wheat, barley, flour, oats and hay. They also brought into this city in the first twenty-one days of the month, 8,755 hogs, 8,505 sheep and goats, 4,629 cattle, 1,140 calves and 210 horses; a total of 23,239 animals, or something more than 1,000 head per day. And during the year 1910 the Portland Union depot and North Bank Railroad handled in and out of the city, two hundred and twenty thousand freight cars.
EXPANSION OF GENERAL BUSINESS.
In one day this month of October, 1910, eight steamships, all bringing cargo for Portland, came into the Columbia river. The fleet included two big freight- ers from European ports, bringing nearly 5,000 tons of cargo, two passenger liners from San Francisco, a big Standard Oil tanker, and three freighters, which ply regularly between Portland and San Francisco. During the day an Ameri- can-Hawaiian liner and a lumber carrier crossed out to sea, both loaded to their capacity. .--•-.,
This fleet of ten vessels registered 14,312 tons, and had a carrying capacity of nearly 30,000 tons. All of the craft came along in the regular order of busi- ness. While the tonnage was short of record proportions for a day, it afforded a good illustration of the growth of the shipping business of the port.
The building permits in Portland for the year 1909 amounted to $13,579,560; and for the current year of 1910, covering only the first eight montlis of the year, the total permits amount to $11,973,637. The "American Contractor," a Chicago journal of the building trades interests of the United States in its Au- gust, 1910, issue, in its statistics of building operations, says :
"Building operations in Portland, Oregon, for the seven months from Janu- ary I, to August I, 1910, show an increase over the corresponding period of 1909 of 31 per cent.
This gain places Portland third in the list of American cities as regards gain in building operations for this period. In the list mentioned by the contractor, there are 51 cities shown. Of these, 34 show decreases in the building operations for the early period of the year. This decrease ranges from 4 per cent to 76 per cent, which latter unenviable record is held by Scranton, Pennsylvania.
While Portland shows a solid gain for the first seven months of the year as regards the money expended for new buildings, Seattle shows a loss of 19 per cent for the same period, and during the month of August, 1910, the building operations of Seattle show a decrease of 29 per cent from August, 1909."
Portland's building record for August, 1910, rolls up an aggregate of $2,- 444,415, yielded by 643 building permits issued. It is doubted if for August so large a total was ever made by a city of the 200,000 class.
Portland's gain for the month is 133 per cent over the total for the same month last year, and 15 per cent greater than the aggregate for April of this year, which was the city's high mark. The construction of dwelling houses amounts to about three thousand per annum for the last three years.
CITY PROJECTS UNDER WAY.
Projects of a purely municipal character actually under way in Portland at the present time, aggregate the enormous sum of $4,329,000, and do not include the vast amount of hard-surface pavements laid this summer, or great sewer systems soon to be commenced. The various undertakings and the amounts are as follows :
Broadway high bridge $2,000,000
Madison street lift bridge 450.000
East Twelfth Street concrete bridge 61,000
Second Bull Run pipe Hne 1,259,000
Two huge reservoirs at Mt. Tabor 460,000
Garbage crematory 99'900
Total $4,329,900
COMPARATIVE POSTOFFICE RECEIPTS.
Receipts for December, 1909 . $ 88,937.97
Receipts for December, 1908 76,282.51
Increase $ 12,655.46
Increase per cent 16.50
Receipts for calendar year 1909 $783,579-97
Receipts for calendar year 1908 680,812.96
Increase $102,765.41
Increase
Portland not only exceeded its own postal record, but far outshone the post-
office receipts of Seattle for September, 1910. Portland's actual gain for the
month was $12,444.80, and Seattle, ijistead o£ an increase, shows a decline of
$8,541. Seattle is the only large postoffice in the union to show a loss in Sep-
tember, 1910, as compared with September, 1909. At Portland, the receipts for
the month were $78,798, and Seattle's postal receipts were ^7'/,y28.
For the month of November, 1910, the increase in four items of the business of Portland, as compared with the month of November, 1909, shows as follows :
1909. 1910.
Aggregate on building permits $ 835,430 $ 1,119,205
Portland postoffice receipts 67,171 84,613
Portland bank clearings 38,403,578 45,076,551
Portland lumber shipments, board meas-
' ure feet 15,969,247 17,806,931
This increase in business will surpass that of any other city of the United States for the period named.
INCREASE IN TAXABLE PROPERTY.
The taxable property of the county, nearly all of which is in Portland, has in- creased in value more than $207,000,000 since 1902, according to the official re- ports of the county assessor. The following shows the increase by years :
1902 $ 44,146,000
1903 51,038,000
1904 56,429,000
1905 143,860,000
1906 180,950,568
1907 233,141,058
1908 236,187,737
1909 251,389,887 As the railroad property (which will this year, 1910, be assessed by the state board), assessed at a total valuation last year of $17,000,000; it is estimated that it will this year, in accordance with the raise in other values, reach at least $20,000,000. This, then, will make the total assessed valuations for the county reach $296,167,225. Last year the total was $251,391,887.
The highest values placed on individual lots, not including improvements, were recorded against those at the southwest corner of Washington and Third, the southwest corner of Washington and Fifth, and the southwest corner of Washington and Sixth streets. Each of these lots are 50x100 feet, and were valued by the assessor, for purposes of taxation at $205,000. A year ago each of these lots was assessed at $190,000.
The total transfers of real estate in the city in 1908 amounted to $20,043,075; and in 1909, to $26,510,870. And these transfers show that the increase of values of real estate was much beyond the assessor's valuation for taxes. As for example, in a selection of twenty pieces of real estate, including both business and residence tracts, the advance in value within fourteen years amounted to five hundred per cent.
F. W. Pettygrove, who opened the first store in pioneer Portland in a log hut at Front and Washington streets in 1845, traded the whole townsite of 640 acres to Daniel H. Lownsdale for $5,000 worth of leather not then tanned. That land is now worth two hundred million dollars.
As a matter of historical interest, we copy from the first assessment roll of Multnomah County the names of the principal taxpayers in the year 1859, when the total amount of taxable property in the county was $2,831,221. The total taxable property in the county this year is $297,000,000.
The principal taxpayers were then assessed as follows :
James Abraham . $12,750
J. C. Ainsworth 1 1,000
A. P. Ankeny 1 5,000
Allen & Lewis 38,000
C. H. Lewis 11 ,000
Colburn Barrell 10,000
S. Blumauer 9,000
James Burk 12,000
Thomas Carter 41 ,725
H. Cohn & Co 15,000
W. L. Chittendon 10,870
H. W. Corbett 47,025
Finice Caruthers 24,000
Couch & Flanders 25,125
Collins & Co 9,000
Stephen Coffin 19,700
Oregon Steam Navigation Co 27,000
Thomas J. Dryer 8, 1 50
Failing & Co 31,150
Henry Failing 4,000
Josiah Failing 33,ooo
Fitch & Co 14,400
John R. Foster 8,000
Goldstone & 'Meyer 12,000
William Gray 8,000
Thomas Harkness 8,200
T. J. Holmes 20,500
A. Harker 17,500
Holman & Harker 8,000 
WASHINOTON STREET, LOOKING WEST FROM THIRD—1910
Johnson & Perkins 10,000 Amos N. King 12,300 Ladd, Reed & Co 19,000 Lewis Love n ,740 D. H. Lownsdale 30,000 Leonard & Green 6,300 Ladd & Tilton 30,000 Wm. S. Ladd i7>500 P. A. Marquam 10,000 Jacob Mayer 13,000 E. J. Northrop 14,500 Benjamin Stark 55'^*^ Sherlock & Bacon 13,500 J. Seller & Co 30,000 R. R. Thompson 3,500 Jacob Kamm 11 ,000
BRIDGE TRAFFIC.
From the days of 1887 when a ferryboat accommodated all the travel and traffic crossing the river at Portland down to 1910, there has been a mighty change ; a great expansion of the city out into the level country on the east side. Three bridges were open when the following statistics were collected — Hawthorne bridge being in process of construction.
Between the hours of 6:30 and 8:3b o'clock a. m. on the average week day 4,118 pedestrians and 1,639 vehicles, not including street cars, cross the three bridges between West Portland and; East Portland. Between the hours of 5:30 and 7:30 o'clock p. m., the number of pedestrians crossing the three bridges is 4,784 on the average week day, and the number of vehicles, not including street cars, 1,494.
An average, therefore, of nearly 9,000 persons, drivers and occupants of more than 3,000 vehicles, in addition to the thousands who patronize the street cars, and cross the bridges daily.-
More footmen use the Morrison Street bridge during the day than use the other two bridges combined. The average number crossing the steel bridge on a week day is 5,910, and the Burnside bridge 6,736, while the number using the Morrison Street bridge is 14,900.
In light vehicles, the Burnside bridge has the greatest traffic. This class includes passenger automobiles, carriages and the like. The Burnside bridge carries on a week day 2,387 of this class of vehicles, the Morrison Street bridge 2,109, 3-^d the steel bridge 808. The Morrison bridge, however, again holds the record on heavy vehicles, carrying on an average week day 3,800, as against 2,019 by the Burnside bridge, and 1,1 11 by the steel bridge.
RIVER TRAFFIC.
As this book is written, a great contest goes on, whether the land traffic across the bridges shall give way to the river traffic passing through the open draws. The statistics above were taken to settle that question.
The river traffic is enormous, and the U. S. army officers favor the river traffic.
In 1864, when there were no bridges, the largest freighter was the sailing vessel Jane A. Falkinberg, carrying 600 tons ; and she was a wonder in Portland harbor. But a few days ago (October 10, 1910) the 10,000-ton steamship Kumeric steamed into the harbor, and about the only comment made on her size was that of the hundreds of people who were exasperated at the length of time required to get her through the bridge draws. The Falkenberg was 137 feet long, 29 feet beam, and 11.9 feet depth of hold. The Kumeric is 460 feet long, 55 feet beam and 28.6 feet depth of hold. As there were eight other steamships each more than 400 feet in length, already loading in port when the Kumeric arrived, it is apparent that the growth of Portland shipping is keeping pace with the land growth which is making the port famous.
Portland's commanding position.
The facts which have induced thousands of Portland's citizens to hold on patiently and stubbornly until time should prove the correctness of their views, are the facts which have made the city what it is, and will produce the great Pacific coast city of the future. The viewpoint of the pioneer was, that Portland was the nearest point that an ocean-going sailing vessel could get to the Willamette valley farms. This satisfied the founders of the city that they had located at the right point, and that here would be the city. Theirs were the views and conclusions of common sense and practical experience. They had never heard of the rule, first published in this part of the world by Major Alfred Sears, "that the commercial capital of a region will be as close to the center of production as can be reached by sL seagoing ship." This is a world-wide rule; and Portland had that in its favor to start with. And as long as agricultural, mineral and commercial development was confined to the Columbia river valley, Portland's supremacy was undisputed.
But when Villard and his transcontinental holding company fell down, and the control of the Northern Pacific Railroad passed over to the Philadelphia capitalists that had invested their money in the Tacoma townsite, and they decided to build the main line by the Northern Pacific over the Cascade mountains and ignore the Columbia river route to the ocean, then it was that the supremacy and future of Portland was disputed. Thousands of capitalists in all the eastern cities had invested their money in the stocks and bonds of the Northern Pacific Railroad. Villard, who had completed the road across the continent to a rail connection with this city had failed to make the road pay dividends. While it was no fault of his that a railroad through thousands of miles of unsettled lands, overtaken by a national wide financial panic that suspended all business, could not pay dividends, the eastern investors held him responsible and put in a management that would move everything to Tacoma.
Then came Mr. James J. Hill, riding horseback 2,000 miles across the continent through Dacotah, Montana, Idaho and Washington—a modern St. John, crying in the wilderness—and he, too, would build a great city on Puget Sound, and carry all the freight from Liverpool, New York, and America to the East Indies, in the greatest steamships ever dreamed of. And he, empire builder, laid hold of the herculean job. He built the railroad; he built the ships; he spent many millions on his city; he hauled his freight up over a mountain four thousand feet high and carefully let it slide down again; he built a tunnel miles long to cut off a few feet of that lift; he hauled all the Puget Sound lumber back over the top of that mountain; and then sat down and figured up costs, expenses, profit and loss. Mr. Hill had read, as all his Pacific coast representatives had read, a widely discussed letter published in the Oregonian, November 4, 1900, in which the author of the letter. Major Alfred Sears, asserted that, "The Northern Pacific Railroad will he forced into Portland by the most direct route possible. This is simply its helpless fate, and on which Portland may sleep. The law of commerce, as I have stated, it is the inexorable, immutable law, without exception in the world's economy."
That seemed to be plain enough; but it took Mr. Hill, Mr. Pierpont Morgan, and all the other millionaires seven years to comprehend its force and surrender to the inevitable, and raise the twenty million dollars to build the North Bank Railroad through a water level mountain pass into the city of Portland. This was a victory that counted more for Portland than all other works of men in its history. It was a distinct, unanswerable and overwhelming decision by the most influential and powerful syndicate of capitalists in America, that Portland, Oregon, was "the gateway and held the keys" to the commerce and wealth of the Pacific northwest, and the transcontinental commerce to China, Japan and the Indies.
Portland not only holds the pass through the mountains, but it is on the shortest line between the great commercial centers of Europe and the great com- mercial centers of the Orient. This line is not only the shortest by fifteen hun- dred miles, but the "wind drift," the steady trade, winds from the western to the eastern continent set ofif shore toward the coast of Asia right opposite the mouth of the Columbia river. Ships from San Francisco have to sail nearly seven hundred miles north from that port to get into the "wind drift" that saves time, coal and money in crossing the Pacific ocean. To landsmen the advantages of this are not apparent. But in the practical operations of steam and sail ships, it is a very important advantage, so important that it will in the end control the route of the carrying trade. For the same reason that a rail train of fifty freight cars hauling seventy thousand bushels of wheat from Lewiston, Idaho, to Portland, can deliver that wheat at Portland for less freight money than two or three trains could haul the same wheat over the Cascade mountains and de- liver it at Seattle, so the ships running before the wind on the shorter line can transport freight from Portland, Oregon, to China or Japan, at less cost than on the longer line from San Francisco.
THE TRIBUTARY TERRITORY.
And these advantages of moving traffic both on the land side, as well as the sea side, are further greatly increased by Portland's very much larger freight producing territory in its immediate vicinity. San Francisco has the local sup- port of the Sacramento and San Joaquin valleys and coast counties, aggregating about 90,000 square miles of productive territory. Seattle has, dividing with Tacoma, the Puget Sound basin, and coast counties and the Yakima valley basin, making not more all told than 40,000 square miles. The Cascade mountains completely cut Seattle off from the great region of the Columbia river valley; and every year will prove this more and more. The great bulk of the fruit crop in Yakima and Wenatchee valleys now goes east — not west to Seattle. All the Columbia river wheat in eastern Washington will run down grade to Portland ; and Portland will have, all the territory west of the Rocky mountains to the Pacific ocean, north of California and Nevada up to the British line, (except the 40,000 square miles controlled by Puget Sound), aggregating not less than 250,000 square miles, all down grade haul territory to the ocean-going ships at Portland, and to build up Portland, as against 90,000 square miles to support San Francisco and 40,000 to support Seattle and Tacoma. Seattle has of course, the merchan- dise trade to Alaska; but the ships carry nothing back yet but gold dust. They will get coal after a while, but only in competition on the Ocean with other coal burning regions. The advantage in productive areas is already greatly in favor of Portland with its territory not one-tenth part developed ; and when central Oregon and southern Idaho is added by railroads Portland's superiority over all its rivals will be as three to one against San Francisco, and seven to one against Seattle and Tacoma.
INEXHAUSTIBLE FREIGHT RESOURCES.
The wealth producing resources of the Oregon forests have been frequently referred to, but not too often to exhaust the subject; Oregon has now three hundred billion feet, board measure of first-class standing timber, while all the states of the Union east of the Rocky mountains has not one-third that much all put together. The lumber from this timber, and its various products from the mills, with shingles, doors etc., is now hauled as far east as Boston, Massa- chusetts. It will more and more continue to be sold to the immense populations
of the Atlantic and Mississippi valley states. That timber as it now stands in
the Oregon forests is worth six hundred million dollars. It will be worth twice
that in ten years. It will never be exhausted. Self interest, if nothing else, will
provide means to preserve it from destruction by forest fires. It will grow up
again as fast as it is consumed. Groves of young fir trees will grow one hun-
dred feet high with trunks fifteen inches in diameter in thirty years. There is
more timber in the Willamette valley today than there was sixty-five years ago
when the settlers first took up the valley lands. These great forests covering
the three ranges of mountains in the state, and fed and nurtured by the rains
from the Pacific ocean, will prove an inexhaustible mine of wealth, feeding and
stimulating every industry of the state for all time.
ELECTRIC POWER.
The electric power available for the building of the city of Portland, and for the use and benefit of its increasing population, is beyond human comprehension. Just as our finite minds cannot comprehend how the great luminary of our solar system throws its rays of electricity through the immensity of ninety-five million miles of space to raise our annual crops of food, and circulate the blood in the veins of our body, so, neither can we comprehend the immensity of the problem by which water enough is lifted up from the Pacific ocean and carried inland over mountains and valleys thousands of miles and then dropped down in snows and rains on mountain tops to form rivers throughout the year which in their descent to the valleys in their return to the ocean, creates three hundred million electric horse power within 200 miles of this city when checked and harnessed to turbine and dynamo. English engineers have carried the mighty power of the falls of the Zambesi river in central Africa by copper wire 700 miles to work the gold mines in the Transvaal, and produce millions of dollars of gold from rock that would otherwise never be lifted from its place in the deep mines. And what has been done to mine gold with electricity in Africa, can be done with the same sort of power to run all manner of manufactories, to plow the fields, thrash the grain, grind the wheat, haul the railroad trains, cook the dinners, turn night into day, and winter into summer heat in every dwelling house. And thus it will be seen that human life, and all life, animal and vegetable, is but a mere incident in the vast operation of the physical laws of our solar system; the laws which clothe the earth with forests, that bring forth fruit, food and flowers in their season, and keep up the endless cycle of reproduction, age after age.
The grandeur of this proposition is beyond description. Portland, Oregon, can command a greater electric power than all the cities in the United States east of the Missouri river. It needs only common honesty, and a descent honest state and city government, to give this city a greater power to build up and sup- port a large population than is possessed by any other city on the continent. The uses of electricity are yet in their infancy, and what they may be safely developed into cannot even be imagined. It is light, heat, wealth, and comfort already. And we can imagine, that long ages after the cities of the east have exhausted the coal mines of Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Illinois and have been compelled to mine under the vast ice covered areas of the Arctic to get coal to prevent annihilation of their millions of people, Portland, Oregon, will be enjoying every comfort and pleasure, both summer and winter, produced by the inexhaustible electric power of the grand mountains within sight of every home.
THE COMING SUPREMACY ON THE PACIFIC
PORTLAND ON THE DIRECT MAIN ROUTE AROUND THE WORLD CONNECTING ALL THE GREAT COMMERCIAL CITIES AND NATIONS
CHAPTER XXXI.
1850 — 1910.
The Social Life — Economics, Prices, and IV ages — Economics, Morals and Politics — The Political and Economic Drift — The Lesson of It All.
Having traced the development of a great city from its initial log cabin, and its hesitating first settlers, down to the period when it is carried along by a vigorous confident population of over two hundred thousand souls; when its business houses are towering to the height of fifteen stories of steel and porce- lain brick ; when its railroads are spreading in every direction ; and its ships and merchandise are carried on every sea; when its banks, manufactories, and mer- chants are prospering beyond the dreams of avarice ; and its organs of public opinion circulate far and near, let us see what effect this material prosperity has had upon the life of those who have wrought the work, or been carried along on the wave.
Notwithstanding the simple sturdy life of the pioneers, they had and en- joyed the relaxation of social pleasures. And although their pleasures were wholly unlike what is seen in surfeit on every hand in Portland in 1910, their daily lives were influenced by what they had, just as the wild riot of dissipation called pleasure is influencing the lives of the people, especially the young, to- day. If anybody thinks that hard work, plain food, and scanty clothing made the pioneers blue and misanthropic, they are greatly mistaken. From the time Fred Bickel (still with us) hung his "dress coat" — the only one in town — on the bushes for an airing, and ten minutes later looked out of his bachelor's quarters in an upper room to see a noble red man of the forest striding down Stark street with the coat on his back, to the infinite glee of all the town — down to the time when Tom Mountain, (also still with us) mixed up all the babies, changed their clothing around while in his charge on the grand excursion of the Jennie Clark, while the mothers were enjoying the dance, so that the said mothers did not know their own children — on down to the time that William Beck donated the silk "plug hat he had worn at the first bridge celebration to Skookum Charley of Grande Ronde. the sturdy pioneers had their fun, pleasures and recreation in plenty ; and thereby hangs a tale.
William Beck was about the last man in Oregon that would have bought a tall hat. But the bridge celebration was to be the big event of that generation ; and Joe Buchtel and Joe Strowbridge, made a point that the celebration could not possibly come off unless the president of the Bridge Company appeared at the head of the procession dressed cap-a-pie in the best Oregon could produce — and especially with the tall hat. So like a martyr to a good cause. William Beck yielded to the clamor of the "boomers and got the hat and wore it across the Morrison street bridge and back again to the gun store ; and then put it on a high shelf. But annoyed with the presence, of what he felt to be his only indulgence in a vanity, he resolved to get rid of that hat. The first customer
623
coming in after that pious resolution was Skookum Charlie, an Indian Chief from the Grande Ronde reservation. After selling Charlie a gun, he thought of the hat, got it down from its high shelf, and offered it as a present to the Indian. Charlie did not take readily to the gift, thinking it was too much of a Boston man's hat. But Beck was not to be defeated in his benevolent enter- prise, and showed the chief how he could stick Eagle's feathers all around thicker than hat pins in a ladies hat of this day, and that it would be "big medi- cine" at Grande Ronde. The feather idea caught him, and he took the hat. and carried it back to the Indian village in the Grande Ronde in triumph. Prior to this Charlie had secured in Portland another treasure in the shape of a fine carriage. Making known his wants in the carriage line to a friend at Northrup's hardware store, and the fact that he had cash to purchase with, some wag, possi- bly, Ed. Northrup himself, directed the Indian Chief to Ewry and Garnold's undertaking shop, with a hint to them that they might sell the Indian a hearse. It was a capital idea. They had a hearse they did not need; in fact there was scarcely any use for a hearse those days, and they would sell it cheap ; a fine car- riage, glass side panels, fine seat in front, cloth curtains, tassels, etc., and the price not more than a dozen bear skins. And the Indian took and hauled it home, proud as a veritable lord of all the reservation. And then came Barnum with his circus. The circus is the event of a lifetime with an Indian; and Skookum Charlie must take the whole family in the new carriage to Portland to see the sights. The tall hat was brought out and decked all round with colored eagle's quills ; and they all started for Portland — the chief and wife number one on the driver's seat of the hearse carriage with a half dozen little Indians stowed away inside, gaz- ing out at the wonders of the world through the glass pannels. Arriving at Portland, they camped alongside of the circus in King's cow pasture, where the big apartment houses are now at King and Washington streets. The circus men were not slow to catch on to a good idea — they would have Sookum Charley drive in the grand parade down town with the show wagons. At first the chief demurred, as too much display, but with liberal gifts of candies to the little Indians, a circus rider ladies tinsel dress to the squaw, and free tickets to the whole family, the manager captured the piece d'resistence of the whole show — • and Charley got a prominent position in the parade with his ponies and hearse, the chief and wife on the driver's seat, the little brown faces flattening their noses against the glass panels, while the big boy stood up with his body protruding through a hole cut in the top of the hearse where he swung his candy cane to the cheering multitude on the sidewalks. It was a great day — and a great show — - and Portland got the worth of its money.
FIRST ASCENT OF MT. HOOD.
In those early days the whole country was wild, fresh, new and healthy. There were deer, elk, bear, grouse, pheasants, on every hill side and trout in every stream. The pioneers had the cream of Oregon. They were great eaters, and hunters and fighters. They took to the mountains every summer. The first attempt to scale the heights of Mt. Hood was made by Thos. J. Dryer, editor of the Oregonian on August 19th, 1854; and other efforts to get to the top of the mountain in 1857 and 1858; but none of these succeeded. But in the last days of July, 1859, Mr. Dryer and others, renewed the attempt and got safely up to the top of the mountain and down again without loss or injury to any one. We take from the Oregonian of August 5th, 1859, some account of the first successful ascent of Mt. Hood by white men.
(From the Weekly Oregonian, Saturday morning, July 16, 1859, T. J. Dryer, Editor.) ,
Personal: The editor will leave on Monday morning next for the mountains and will probably be absent two or three weeks. In the meantime, Mr. Henry Pittock, always to be found at the Oregonian office, is fully authorized act all business connected with the office. Our readers will hear from us as often as circumstances will permit.
(From the Weekly Oregonian, Portland, Oregon, Saturday morning. August 6th, 1859.)
TRIP IN THE MOUNTAINS.
We left this city on the 18th of July, in company with T. Myers, H. W. Davis, and J. M. Blossom; overtook our companions, C. Pickett, A. G. Myers, and M. McLaughlin, who had left on the Friday previous with pack animals, stores, etc., about 20 miles on the route toward the Cascade mountains. The advance party had encamped to await our coming. Upon our arrival we found the camp well stocked with grouse, pheasants, rabbits, squirrels, etc., upon which we all feasted to the entire satisfaction of a most voracious appetite.
The next morning at an early hour, our whole party, consisting of seven men and eleven horses, packed up and got under way, and proceeded towards the mountains. After several hours march, we left the main trail, known as the Barlow road, some five or six miles east of Philip Foster's, on a trail leading to a fine prairie about five miles south, where Mr. Foster informed us we would find an abundance of grass, good water, fine camping-ground and splendid hunting.
The next morning all the hunters left camp at an early hour, with an understanding to shoot any sort of game that wore hair or carried feathers. About noon Myers came in with a load of grouse and pheasants; Davis and Pickett soon followed, each with a respectable number; and Blossom still later with nothing, in consequence of conscientious scruples of firing a first-class yager at small game, and a determination to kill either an elk, bear, or deer or nothing.
After a considerable picking of feathers we enjoyed a good game supper, and prepared our mountain bed for the night. Proceeding on towards the mountain up Zigzag, Rock creek, Sandy and getting lost, the party finally made camp two days afterward as follows:
About two o'clock P. M. the whole party got into camp, where we found an abundance of grass and every convenience for comfort. Fishing-rods were cut, fines strung, and in a few minutes the frying-pans were over the fire, full of fine mountain-trout, weighing from a half to one and a half pounds each. They were no sooner cooked than despatched by as hungry a set of pleasure-seekers as ever surrounded a camp fire. Some of the party had shot a brace of grouse on their way in, and as trout were plenty within a few rods of the camp, and we were all very tired, it was decided that all would remain in camp and rest for the remainder of the day.
The next morning early Blossom, Pickett, McLaughlin, Davis and Young Myers started out for a hunt, leaving the elder Myers and ourself to keep camp and catch trout. We soon heard the echo of Blossom's yager on the mountain side, and soon after the signal—two shots from a revolver in quick succession — to come out. In less than half an hour we reached Blossom, where lay at his feet a fine, large fat black-tailed deer. It was soon packed into camp, and very soon several of his ribs stuck on sticks were before the camp fire. In the afternoon about a dozen grouse and pheasants were brought into camp, and several long strings of trout hung up on the camp poles. The next day being Sunday, was devoted to shaving, bathing, fishing, hunting, eating, drinking, reading, smoking, lounging, chatting and yarn telling.
On Monday morning early we struck camp and left for Mt. Hood. We soon reached the main trail, or Barlow road, and followed it to within about two miles of Summit prairie—eight hours' march. The road is comparatively good for pack animals, but impracticable and impassable for wagons. In two and a half hours after leaving the Barlow road, "we pitched our tents" near the upper edge of timber on the south side of Mt. Hood, where we found an abundance of grass between the large fields of snow which surrounded us on every side, and which extended down to the main trail or Barlow road.The next morning the two Myers, Blossom, Pickett, Davis and ourself mounted our riding horses and started for the summit at four o'clock. After five hours' "beating" as sailors would term it, we attained an altitude much higher than we were able to do on horseback last year, in consequence of the large quantity of snow yet on the mountain. We left our horses under the lee of a large ledge of rock and commenced the ascent on foot. At twelve and a half o'clock we had all reached the extreme summit in good condition, save somewhat jaded. The party partook of the lunch which each had brought with him, with a relish seldom enjoyed by the most fastidious epicure. After feasting our eyes for an hour or more upon the world below, until all were satisfied that no man who has never been on this mountain's top, can form the remotest idea of the grandeur and sublimity of the scene, and that no man can by language describe it intelligently to another, we resolved to return to camp. The descent for a portion of the way was far more difficult than the ascent. We were compelled to come down the main peak by the aid of a rope looped over the crags of rock. When all were down to a standpoint the rope was overhauled and again fastened, when one after another descended until finally we regained the snow where every man adopted his own way and pursued his own course in descending. Some of the party took it into their heads, after we had got down to where the snow was smoother and the angle about 45 or 50 degrees, to try another mode, to-wit: place the "seat of honor" on the snow, a mountain stafif in each hand drawn up closely under the arm as a drag, hoist your heels, and away you go with a speed equal to a locomotive. Thus several descended for a couple of miles in double-quick time. We reached our horses in safety and regained our camp, just as the sun was sinking into the Pacific ocean.
After a good supper, a good smoke, and listening to a great variety of opinions in relation to Mt. Hood, and a universal surprise expressed that people did not have a more correct idea about it, we retired to our blankets and were soon sound asleep, dreaming of towering mountains, fearful chasms, tumbling rocks, volcanoes, earthquakes, etc., etc."
Mountain exploration and climbing was reduced to a science later on by Mr. W. G. Steel who organized the society of the "Mazamas"—from "Mazame" — the 'Mexican for mountain goat. Through the efforts of Mr. Steel, and the organization of the Mazamas, headquarters at Portland, Oregon, nearly all the great mountains of Oregon and Washington have been ascended, explored and mapped, adding largely to the stock of knowledge of animal and vegetable life on these lofty uplands. Many young and even middle aged women have become members of the Mazama organization, and make enthusiastic and successful mountain climbers; although it is a most severe trial of physical strength and endurance to ascend a rugged mountain to the height of two and a half miles above sea level, covered with ice and snow, bearing immense glaciers, seamed with awful crevices, threatening life at every turn.
THE ROSE FESTIVAL.
Portland has the most unique annual festival of any city in the United States, lasting an entire week, with the opening of the roses in June of each year. One hundred thousand dollars was spent in producing this week of festivity in 1910. More than one-quarter of a million visitors were entertained at this jubilee in 1910. More than 5,000,000 beautiful roses were used in decoration. Portland has a thousand miles of roses. If set side by side, they would reach to Los Angeles.
Tokio is noted for its cherry blossom parades. Florence, Naples, Venice and Nice are famous for their floral carnivals, and New Orleans for its Mardi Gras. Portland with her peerless floral pageants has won world-wide renown as "The rose city."
W. G. STEEL, PRESIDENT OF THE MAZAMAS.—ASCENDING MOUNT HOOD
Portland was named "The rose city" by Mr. Frank E. Beach, president of the North Western Insurance Company. It was made "the rose city" by the indefatigable labors of Mr. Frederick V. Holman, an enthusiastic rose culturist, who talked, taught and wrote all about the culture of roses for years while he practiced law and wrote history.
"The rose festival" was proposed by Mr. E. W. Rowe, who was also the first president of the Rose Festival Association ; and was made the great success that it is by Mr. George L. Hutchin, who has always been the general manager of the festival, and by Mr. Ralph W. Hoyt, now president of the Rose Festival Association, and who has devoted his time and money freely to the work of raising funds and generally promoting the success of the grand annual festival.
George Washington's birthday anniversary, February 22d, is rose planting day at Portland, Oregon, and this patriotic remembrance of "the father of his country" is thus happily united with the festival that brings recreation, pleasure and joy to the hundreds of thousands of people who lay aside all business cares to rejuvenate health and strength.
Portland has in common with all other American cities, ample means of social culture, and society dissipation. Much of this has been noticed, but the great mass of what goes under the name of social culture is foreign to the purpose of this history. Portland has its "race" days, its hunt club, golf club, boating clubs, livestock shows, kennel clubs and shows, society columns in the Sunday papers, and newspaper pictures of loving maids and lovesick swains that get married ; all of which may be an index to various sorts of people.
The county clerk gives another view to the social "swim," and reports that during the year 1909 there were 2,726 marriage licenses issued at the court house in this city ; and during the same time 420 divorces granted by the courts at the same place. In the first four months of 1910 there were 794 marriage licenses issued and 147 divorces granted at the same seat of justice; in August, 1909, there were 29 divorces granted, but in August, 1910, the number jumped to 41 ; so that the divorce court is rapidly gaining on hymen at Portland, Oregon.
And as showing the difference betwen the policy of our own country, and that of our neighbor, Canada, with a population greater than all the Pacific coast states, we quote the following official statement for 1910:
"Canada has an average of 10 divorces a year, and does not propose to let down the bars to separation scandals, such as are furnished by the United States. The Dominion will fight any proposition that savors of an attempt to disrupt homes or to check the colonization of its vast area.
Recent efforts to establish divorce courts, where persons of moderate means could secure legal separation, have met with general opposition.
At the last session of parliament, there were granted by the senate 20 di- vorces. This was an increase of three over the previous year, and this small increase was viewed with alarm as a menace to the future development of the country's social life.
During the last eleven years the senate has granted 11 1 divorces, an average of ten each year. During the last three years the average has come up to 15 a year."
LABOR UNION CONTESTS.
From sports, recreation and social interests, to industry and hard work is but a single step in the life of a western city. Trade unions are organized to control the workers in every line and item of productive industry. There are hundreds of these unions in Portland, with an aggregate membership of 8,000. As in every other city, they seek to control the day's wage and the hours of
work, and exclude all non-union men from employment in the same trades.
This has naturally produced friction and opposition not only from non-union
workers, but from employers who favor freedom of employment, to secure
which, a powerful organization called the "open shop" has been organized to
protect non-union men and their employers. This organization has been strength-
ened by the recent events of the teamsters' strike, during which many non-union
teamsters were clubbed and beaten by the union men, so that the mayor and chief
of police were compelled to put on an extra force of policemen to protect the
non-union men; which extra force cost the city $18,000 for pay of men.
THE COXEY ARMY.
The first and severest trial of the patience and patriotism of the so-called laboring class in the city of Portland came to a crisis in May, 1894. The finan- cial panic, which had closed many of the banks, and a great many of the indus- tries in 1893 all over the United States, bore down heavily on the men who de- pended on their daily wage for their daily bread. The business houses and well to-do citizens of Portland met the crisis with large-hearted sympathy and gener- osity, contributing freely to the support of places to house and feed the desti- tute, as well as take care of the families of those in need. The winter of 1903-4 wore away without any special demonstration from the army of unemployed men ; but with the coming of spring there arose a new sensation in the land, which, while it did not help the penniless laborer, made him forget his troubles. A sporadic genius suddenly arose at Massillon, Ohio, like a comet in the sky, calling himself "General Coxey," and appealed to the unemployed throughout the land to form a grand army, "the Army of the Commonweal," and march to Washington city in such divisions as was convenient and demand relief from the president and congress. Armies formed all over the country ; one at Los Angeles, one at San Francisco, one at Portland, and one at Seattle. The Los Angeles army made the longest march, going to El Paso, Texas, thence to St. Louis, and finally reaching Indianapolis, where it disbanded. The San Fran- cisco army marching by Salt Lake and Omaha, reached Eddyville, Iowa, and dis- banded. The Seattle army marched as far east as Spokane and went to pieces. The Portland army under the lead of General Sheffler, got as far east as Coke- ville, Wyoming, got employment in the coal mines and disbanded. The only army that finally reached Washington was that commanded by Coxey himself ; marching on foot all the way from Massillon, Ohio, to the capital, where the General, being refused admission to the presence of congress, delivered a peti- tion for redress of the grievances of the laboring man to the sergeant-at-arms of the house of representatives at the east portico of the capitol.
These armies from the Pacific coast did not march much of the way on foot, but seized railroad trains and ran them as far as they could before being stopped. General Sheffler marched out of Portland with over 1,200 men, with their blankets on their backs, and a few days' rations. Following the line of the O. R. & N. Co. railroad, they halted at Cleone, 12 miles east of Portland, where they seized the first passenger train going east and ran it to Caldwell, Idaho, where it was halted by a detachment of U. S. soldiers, and most of the men rounded up into a stockade. But afterward, making terms with the railroad company, they got a train of box cars that carried them on to Cokeville, where they got employment. On all these marching lines the people sympathized with the marchers and furnished them food and shelter.
ECONOMICS, PRICES AND WAGES.
From the Spectator at Oregon City, of October 18, 1849, we learn that the price of beef on foot was given at 6 to 8 cents a pound ; in market 10 to 12 cents a pound, pork at market 16 to 20 cents per pound; butter 62 to 75 cents per pound; cheese, 50 cents; flour, $14 per barrel of 200 lbs.; wheat, $1.50 to $2.00 a bushel, and oats the same. Potatoes, $2.50 per bushel, and green apples $10
a bushel. Groceries and dry goods were much less than formerly. The prices of provisions had been raised by the rush to the California gold mines, while store goods had fallen from increased importations.
PORTLAND PRICES.
1850 1870 1890
Apples, dried, per pound $ .50 $ .07 $ .06
Peaches, dried, per pound 50 ... .12
Beef, fresh at block, per pound 18 .12 .12
Pork, fresh at block, per pound 16 .10 .07
Hams .16 .12
Butter, fresh, per pound i.oo .30 .25
Cheese, per pound 50 .20 .14
Flour, per pound 10 .03 .02
Coffee, green, per pound 18 .25 .22
Sugar, brown, per pound 20 .12 .05
Sugar, loaf, white, per pound 50 .18 .07
Tea, per pound i .00 i .00 i .00
Molasses, per gallon 1.50 .75 .75
Tobacco, per pound 75 i.oo 1.50
Rice, per pound 20 .15 .06
Lard, per pound 40 .18 .10
Salt, per pound 06 .03 .02
Iron, per pound 16 .04 .04
Nails, per pound 18 .06 .05
Chickens, per dozen 4.00 6.00
Eggs, per dozen i.oo .35 .15
Wheat, per bushel 3.00 .80 .65
Potatoes, per bushel ". 6.00 .75 1.50
Oats, per bushel 1.50 .40 .38
Baled hay, per ton 1 1 .00 16.00
Rough lumber, per thousand 75-0o 14.00 10.00
Cooking stoves 75-00 30.00 25.00
Hops .20 .10
Whiskey, good, per gallon 1.50 4.00 5.00
$
1910
.08
•15 .20 .20 .20
.36 .18
•03 ,20
.10
.07 I.oo I.oo 2.00
•05
.20
.01
.02^ .04
/•50
•35 .90
1-25
•50 20.00
14.00
30.00
•15 6.00
WAGES IN PORTLAND, I9IO, COMPARED WITH SCALE IN OTHER LARGE CITIES.
Portland, Oregon. Wages.
Barbers, per week $16.00
Bartenders, per week 18.50
Carpenters, per day 3.50
Cigarmakers, per day 3.50
Electricians, per day 3.50
Longshoremen, per day 4-95
Painters, per day 3.50
Plasterers, per day 5-50
Plumbers, per day 5.00
Printers, per day 5.00
Steamfitters, per day 5-00
Structural iron workers, per day 4.50
Tailors, per day 3.00
Teamsters, per day 2.75
Tilesetters, per day 5-50
Waiters, per week 12.50
Waitresses, per week 9-00
Working hours per day.
10 10-12 8 8 8 9 — 10 8 8 8
7-7/2-8
8
8
8—10
9 10 IT
8
10 — 12
10
Seattle, Butte, San Fran,
Wash. Mont. Cal.
Barbers, per week $17.00 $24.00 $16.00
Bartenders, per week 20.50 25.00 20.00
Carpenters, per day 4-50 5-00 5-00
Cigarmakers, per day 2.75 3.50 3.50
Electricians, per day 5.00 6.00 5.00
Longshoremen, per day 3.50 5-00
Painters, per day 4-5^ 5-50 4-50
Plasterers, per day 6.00 7.00 6.00
Plumbers, per day 6.50 8.00 6.00
Printers, per day 5.25 5.50 5.50
Steamfitters, per day 6.50 8.00 6.00
Structural Fn w'k'rs. per day 4.50 5.50 5.00
Tailors, per day 3.25 4.00 3.25
Teamsters, per day 2.25 3.50 3.50
Tilesetters, per day 5.50 6.00 6.00
Waiters, per week 12.00 21.00 12.00
Watresses, per week 9.50 16.00 9.00
9 to
Working , hours per day.
10
10-12
8
8
8
10
8
8
8
7-7/2-8
8
8
8 to 10
9-10-11
8
10-12
10
Los Phila- Working
Angeles delphia hours
Cal. 111. Penn. per day.
Barbers, per week $14.00 $14.00 $12.00 10
Bartenders, per week 20.00 10.00 16.00 10-12
Carpenters, per day 3.50 5.00 4.50 8
Cigarmakers, per day 3.00 3.00 2.50 8
Electricians, per day 3.50 5.00 4.00 8
Longshoremen, per day 4.50 , 6.00 3.50 9 to 10
Painters, per day 3.50 4.40 4.00 8
Plasterers, per day 5.00 5.50 4.50 8
Plumbers, per day 5.00 5.00 5.00 8
Printers, per day 4.50 5.00 4.75 7-7^-8
Steamfitters, per day 5.50 5.50 5.00 8
Structural Fn w'k'r's. per day 4.00 5.00 4.50 8
Tailors, per day 3.25 3.00 2.50 8 to 10
Teamsters, per day 2.25 3.50 2.50 9-10-11
Tilesetters, per day 4.00 5.50 4.25 8
Waiters, per week 10.00 10.00 9.00 10-12
Waitresses, per week 8.00 7.00 6.50 10
New York, Boston,
N. Y, Mass.
Barbers, per week $12.00 $12.00
Bartenders, per week 17.00 16.00
Carpenters, per day 5.00 4.50
Cigarmakers, per day 3.00 3.50
Electricians, per day 5.00 4.00
Longshoremen, per day 3.50 3.50
Painters, per day 5.00 4.00
Plasterers, per day 5.00 4.50
Plumbers, per day 5.00 5.00
Working Hours, p er day.
In London, England, on same dates, reported by United States consular agent,
Henry Studmiczka:
Common laborers, $4.38 per week with board.
Common laborers, 12 cents per hour without board — average.
Stone masons, 21 cents per hour.
Brick layers, 21 cents per hour.
Plasterers, 22 cents per hour.
Plumbers, 22 cents per hour.
Carpenters, 21 cents per hour.
Painters, 18 cents per hour.
Furniture makers, 21 cents per hour.
Machinists, 20 cents to 28 cents per hour.
Boiler makers, 203^2 cents per hour.
Compositors, 20^ cents per hour.
Bakers, first-class hands, 13^^ cents per hour.
Iron Founders, 20 cents per hour.
Policemen, 21 cents per hour.
Letter carriers, $8.51 per week to old soldiers.
Teamsters, $1.60 per day of 15 hours, — average.
Street cleaners, 1.13 per day.
Street car conductors, 16 to 24 cents per hour.
Sailing vessel seamen, $14.60 per month.
Cost of living in London on same date:
ARTICLES.
Apples, second and third quality ; pound, 4 to 6 cents.
Bread, four pounds, 12 cents.
Butter, dairy, pound, 32 to 34 cents.
Cheese, Canadian, pound, 14 to 16 cents.
Coffee, pound, 16 to 36 cents.
Eggs, 12 to 16, 24 cents.
Salmon, pound, 6 to 8 cents.
Fish, various kinds, pound, 4 to 12 cents.
Flour, second quality, 3^ pounds, 9 to 10 cents.
Bacon, pound, 16 to 24 cents.
Beef, frozen, pound, 10 to 14 cents.
Beef, fresh, pound, 16 to 20 cents.
Pork, steak and ribs, pound, 12 to 16 cents.
Milk, fresh, pint, 4 cents.
Potatoes, pound, i to 2 cents.
Potatoes, per cwt., 72 to 96 cents.
Rice, lowest quality, pound, 4 cents.
Sugar, white, pound, 5 cents.
Sugar, yellow, pound, 4 cents.
Tea, pound, 20 to 60 cents.
Tomatoes, pound, 8 cents.
Vegetables, general, pound, 3 to 4 cents.
Not less than 75 families were visited, and from all the information gathered from these interviews, a family of man and wife and possibly two small children may subsist on the following foo d per week:
Articles Quantity
Pounds. Cost.
Bacon 2 $ .48
Bread 30 " -QO
Butter I .24
Cheese i -14
Coffee % -06
Currants i .06
Meat, frozen 6 .60
Milk 10 .40
Potatoes 14 -24
Rice or equivalent 3 .12
Sugar 5 -20
Tea i^ .12
Vegetables 5 -lo
Total $3-66
ECONOMICS, MORALS AND POLITICS.
For fully one-half the population of all American cities, the three subjects of economics, morals and politics is materially influenced by the habits and tastes of the people in the matters of amusements and patronage of alcoholic beverage dispensing saloons. The right to regulate these drinking places has been main- tained by every community for at least a hundred years ; and total prohibition of the manufacture and sale of ardent spirits has been enforced locally in a great many towns and counties, and in some of the states, and in about one-third of the state of Oregon. The retail liquor business in the city of Portland so far as trade statistics show it, stands as follows for the year 1910:
Number of Business licenses
issued.
Breweries 4
Wholesale liquor dealers 20
Wholesale liquor dealers and rectifiers 10
Saloons, dram drinking places 419
Groceries — liquor 10
Restaurants selling liquor 35
Theaters, first-class 8
Nickelodeons , 8
Nickelodeons 24
And as showing the size and influence of the liquor traffic in Portland and its close relations with the city government, the following statistics are quoted :
"Liquor licenses last year in Portland made up $360,800 of the general fund of $630,299.47, or $101,300.53 more than all other licenses, fees and moneys which go to make up the city's general fund.
"Liquor licenses have borne about the same ratio to the general fund in pre- vious years as last year and the present year. In 1901, liquor licenses made up $169,730.96 of the $234,422.40 in the general fund; in 1902, $193,084.06 of the $225,655.89 in the general fund; in 1903, $140,683.35 of the $294,280.98 in the general fund; in 1904, $163,799.75 of the $330,957.20; in 1905, $208,891.95 of the $383,464.75 in the general fund; in 1906, $218,166.60 of the $392,114.02 in the general fund; in 1907, $330,241.46 of the $504,065.25 in the general fund; in 1908, $367,425 of the $577,655.82 in the general fund; in 1909, $390,800 of the $630,299.47 in the general fund; in 1910, $364,939.95 of the $672,088 in the gener al fund."
In the political contest just closed (November 8, 1910) in this state, state
prohibition was the paramount question with the great mass of the steady-going
thinking voters. It is not the purpose of this book to discuss the policy or right-
fulness of this or any other moral or political question, but simply to point out
the trend and efforts of economic causes. The entire cost of operating the 419
saloons and the 40 or more cheap theaters, nickelodeons, etc., must be set down
to economic waste, a waste of time, labor and capital. The sum total of cash
expended and of waste of time cannot be less than three million dollars per
annum.
But the waste of the money is not all of the results of this patronage of sa- loons and amusements. Those who profit and live by it are continually put on the defensive to defend it from the attacks of those that would destroy it. This compels the saloon interests to go into politics to protect a business rather than a political principle. And to the extent that any political party submits to control or influence by any special business interest, moral or immoral, it becomes the agent of personal rather than political policies. The same may be of course justly said of the financial interests represented by railroads, banks, or protected manufacturing monopolies. These influences modify the life and character of any community and of the children raised in such community.
It is easy to see, and capable of absolute proof by living examples of thou- sands of successful men, that any laboring man in this city of Portland, or else- where in Oregon, if working for only the lowest wage of two dollars per day, can save money enough in a few years, over and above the necessary cost of living in a decent, honorable way, to purchase land, or otherwise make himself independent of the daily grind of a wage servant and make himself an honorable, respected and useful member of society.
That the saloon and the cheap theater has an influence on the morals as well as the economics and politics of any community there can be no dispute. The Catholic church in America is the most liberal and broad-minded of all the re- ligious organizations on all questions of morals. And for both moral and econo- mic reasons, this great organization has taken, along with the Protestant churches, a positive and unyielding stand against the saloon. The question, then, of the advance or retreat of public opinion on the question of prohibition of the liquor traffic, becomes pertinent to any history of any community. The city has re- cently defeated by a majority of 6,500 votes, the proposed law to prohibit the saloon in Portland ; and recorded its voice and influence in favor of local regu- lation as against state prohibition.
But notwithstanding this decisive vote against total abstinence, there have not only been changes, but also progress. Forty years ago Portland had for two years a city council of nine members, six of whom were saloonkeepers ; and the mayor himself, Hamilton Boyd, was a patron of saloons; and the marshal (chief of police), James H. Lappeus, was also the proprietor of a saloon. There were at that time about thirty saloons in the town ; and it was a straight whiskey propo- sition. The marshal enforced the ordinances strictly, and the council gave the city a clean, honest government without grafting contractors of any kind. The saloon was not then used as an aid to gambling, robbery, or the debauchery of women. With the increase of population and strife for money, came the demor- alization that aroused the dormant conscience of the church, and the forethought of the parents of children, to place restrictions on the .saloon or destroy it al- together. This battle is now on throughout the nation. It will not cease. There are a hundred prohibitionists now to the one who preached to empty benche.-, forty years ago.
MORALITY, THE MUNICIPAL ASSOCIATION.
As a bond of union or connecting link between the vital interests of industry, morality and politics, the Portland Municipal Association deserves honorable mention in this chapter. Organized July 14th, 1903, the association acco mplished
a great work for public morality and civic virtue within the first four years of its existence. Its first board of directors was composed of F. S. Akin, J. W. Bell, W. H. Markell, E. C. Bronaugh, F. A. Frazier, Miller Murdoch, John A. Patterson, and W. L. Johnston ; and of which board, W. J. Honeyman was presi- dent, John Bain, secretary, and D. A. Patullo, treasurer. The membership of the association was about two thousand voters in the city; and the total income from membership dues and special contributions for the first four years was $4,453. The association justified its organization, and proceeded to active work upon the following principles :
"The welfare of the state is superior to the interests of any single enterprise or class.
Party politics should have no place in municipal government.
The vices of a city form the breeding-ground of graft.
The morality of a community is the foundation of its prosperity."
Upon the above platform, within its first four years, the association put an end to prize fighting in the city, open gambling, slot machine lotteries, restaurant and saloon "boxes," dance halls and combination "houses," closed the liquor saloons on Sundays, drove the social evil into hiding, and overthrew a city govern- ment presided over by the most distinguished and popular citizen of the state. No other citizen organization in the history of the city ever accomplished so much, and with so small an amount of money. Throughout this strenuous conflict for the four years, Mr. John Bain, the secretary, Miller Murdoch, the attorney, and David A. Patullo the treasurer bore the brunt of the battle.
The laws are enforced by the present mayor, Joseph Simon, and his chief of police, A. M. Cox. In the month of July, 1910, 25 convictions were secured in the police court against highly respected citizens for violating the speed law against automobilists.
Violations of the liquor and gambling regulations have been followed closely. Grill rooms where women were served have been put out of business. Violations of the Sunday closing law have shown diminution.
Fines and forfeitures collected in July will exceed $4,cxx), as against $1,831 for the corresponding month last year.
THE POLITICAL DRIFT.
For many years the political sentiments of the city presented a solid un- broken front in favor of the republican party. And like most all other American cities, the hosts of the dominant party were handled by a skillful restricted leader- ship. The official plums and juicy party patronage was distributed with a dis- criminating sagacity that suggested the vital importance of standing well with and close up to the party leader. As long as the fires of the southern rebellion could be worked to throw a halo over the partisan warwhoop, the republican lead- ers had little trouble in keeping their adherents in line. There came, however, a time when the issues of the civil war seemed to have been decently buried and the grass grown over their graves. Then came questionings and doubts as to the absolute necessity of always voting an absolutely straight ticket. Hard times came on and new political issues arose. The populist party was organized. It rushed on to the battlefield as the friend of the people, and as the defender of unlimited coinage of silver money. Its advent was resented by both the republican and democratic parties ; and they united to defeat the new party men — and did defeat them, and finally drove the populists from the field.
But they retired only to re-appear in another form. In their brief career as a party the populists had made a wide acquaintance among farmers, union labor men and small tradesmen. They were the people, and they appealed, not to millionaires, and great corporations but to men of moderate or humble circum- stances. They brought forth three new political propositions. First, a direct primary nomination of all candidates for public office, by the votes of the electors and not by the selection by a convention. Second, the making of laws by the ini
tiative of the people upon petition filed with public officials, and voted upon direct
by all the electors, and third, the referendum from the acts of the legislature, or
law making body, whereby the electors at the next ensuing election could by ballot
directly affirm or disapprove of any act of the legislature.
The first result of these innovations was to enable the people to propose and adopt laws that under the old regime could not get a hearing before the legislature. The second result was that the legislature, which never represented the average intelligence of the state, is reduced to a mere body of clerks to prepare laws for rference to a popular vote of the people. The third result is disorganization of both the old political parties.
Disorganization of the party starts at the primary election. With money in hand to foot political log rolling accounts, a skillful and unscrupulous political manager of one party may emasculate and corrupt the primary of the opposing party, by votes from the ranks of the opposition who falsely registered their po- litical party associations at the county registry ; and thus name for a party a can- didate or candidates that cannot poll the strength of the party at the general elec- tion. In such a pass, the machine manager puts forward an "all things to all men" candidate, and defeats the candidate he had already imposed upon the opposition party. This scheme has been twice successfully carried out in Oregon, on the most important offices in the state.
In the present (1911) legislature the republicans will have 13 senators and 30 representatives in favor of the assembly plan of suggesting candidates for office; and 14 senators and 27 representatives who are opposed to the assembly plan. Thus while it is possible for the anti-assembly republican senators, with the aid of three democratic senators, to organize the senate and pass such laws as they choose, the assembly members of the house of representatives holding one-half the vote of that body, can defeat any bill passed by the senate; and thus dead-lock the legislature on a question of purely party management. This dilemma is fur- ther complicated by the fact, that while the republicans having a registered voting electorate of 85,000 in the state to a registered democrat electorate of 26,000, the democrats have elected their candidate for governor by a majority of 6,000; and he will stand ready to cast his veto power, for or against legislative measures ac- cording to his view of their political influence on the future interests of his politi- cal friends. The questions of education, saloon regulation, taxation, corporation control, bank guarantee, pure food, or the tariff on foreigners or foreign goods, have now no certain standing and support in the legislature or before the people.
By making an issue and division inside the party lines, of "assembly" or "anti- assembly" for the suggestion of candidates, a political party is "slaughtered in the house of its friends." For if there can be no consultation and unity of action, the weakest and worst men in the party will be imposed on that party as its candidates by the action of the opposing party falsely registering, and falsely voting at the primary.
The effect of all this political "crookedness" does not end with the party that is divided and defeated. The corrupting practices cannot be made successful without demoralizing the party that contributed to their success ; and without ruin to many worthy and aspiring men in its own ranks. And sooner or later the dis- honorable trick planned to ruin the opponent will return to plague the inventor. The great mass of the electors intend to be honest and play fair. They may be hoodwinked and misled for a season, but eventually dishonesty in politics like dishonesty in business, will overwhelm the guilty parties. The famous saying of Lincoln will be verified over and over — that a part of the people can be fooled all the time; and all the people can be fooled part of the time; but all people cannot be fooled all the time.
THE LESSON OF IT ALL.
Soon after the adoption of the national constitution in 1789, Washington wrote a letter to his bosom friend, General LaFayette in France, from which the foHow- ing extract is taken :
"I expect that many blessings will be attributed to our new government, which are now taking their rise in that industry, and frugality, into the practice of which the people have been forced by necessity."
As many persons are prone to expect from the forms of government those benefits and blessings in life which can only come from industry, frugality and morality, it seems necessary to point to this eminently wise and good man, very properly named "The Father of His Country," as a teacher of that which is true, sound and safe on the subject of our municipal as well as national prosperity. No code of laws, form of government, or manner of its administration, can con- fer happiness and prosperity upon any people burdened with paupers, misled by ignorance or demoralized with vice or dissipation. Eminent for industry, frugality and all the virtues of private life, Washington had, more than any other man of his time, taken note of the things that made men strong, useful and successful, and clearly saw that while the new constitution and government was a necessity to bind the people together and found a nation, yet it was the virtues of the in- dividual man that must bring happiness and prosperity to all the people.
And with this index to the prosperity and happiness of our forefathers, we can see in the lives and acts of the pioneers of Oregon and Portland, the setting of the tide towards the prosperity and happiness of their descendants. Satisfied with the old fashioned simple ways of life, they devoted their energies to the development and cultivation of those qualities and virtues which promote the per- manent welfare of all men. They devoted their resources, economized their sav- ings, and freely gave of their substance to lay the foundations broad and deep to maintain the institutions of education, morality and religion. The pioneers clung to the never-failing all-conquering virtues of industry and frugality. Their lives would not adorn a modern novel. They may seem hard and uninteresting to their gregarious joy-riding, happy-go-lucky successors. But they had no need for a penitentiary, and nobody to lock up in an insane asylum ; no state wide convul- sions to restrain the demoralization of saloons, and no prosecutions of the un- speakable "white slave traffic." They wrought for the real, the enduring good of their fellow-men and women. Great wealth and vulgar display had no attrac- tions for them. They would fight for what they considered righteousness and jus- tice; and would not compromise for temporary gain. They professed a religion of fixed and unyielding dogmas, and lived up to its tenets as necessary to salva- tion. They established schools to teach what they believed, and that enforced a discipline that produced vigorous self-respecting men, and supported them with their own money and not that of the state. Football sluggers, college yells, and hazing ruffianism had no place in their curriculum.
In any comparison with present day conditions and people, the old pioneers will rest in honored graves and enjoy for all time an immortality of fame.
It would be interesting to inquire how far the pioneer spirit influenced present day conditions. The three questions that provoked the most discussion in the pro- visional government legslature (leaving out the national question) were those of education, temperance and morality. The impress of the pioneers in education comes down to the present in the three successful colleges they established — the Willamette, the Forest Grove, and the McMinnville; and the St. Paul's and St. Mary's seminaries. And these schools substantially hold to pioneer ideals in thor- oughness, high moral aims, and utilitarian results. The foot-ball craze does not in these schools overawe all other forms of training. From one of these schools graduated an editor of national reputation, and without a superior in the nation. From the same school graduated the state's most efficient member of congress in the past ; from another of these schools went the state's most efficient member of congress of today, and the third school sent forth a president of the American Medical Association, a United States senator, another congressman and a supreme judge; and a long list of other men of equal fame and honorable public service — all sons of pioneers. A long list of other men and women in addition to many names already noticed in this book might be made, showing the fiber and persis
tence of the pioneer stock. What school of the modems can make any such show-
ing? Not even the colleges of other states can send here men of equal ability,
honorable record, and public service. And the test of public service can be fully
equaled in all ranks and employments in the state where the sons and daughters
of the pioneers have been brought into comparison with the standards and com-
petitors produced by modern ideals and teachings.
It is not necessary to claim that the sons and daughters of the present era^ the actors on the present stage, have not equal natural ability with the children of the pioneers. It is not a question of abihty, but a question of training and environment. The moderns have not less ability, but different training. Just as the twig is inclined the tree is bent. The people of the present day have allowed themselves to be persuaded that a vast amount of training, the study of a great number of books, and "cramming" the youthful mind with a multitude of subjects is necessary to an education. It is not education at all, but dissipation. If a de- partment store brain and equipment for life is the aim of the parent, then he will get a department store clerk as the outcome of his boy in nineteen cases out of twenty. That will be the result of training.
As to environments, the conditions are even worse for the boy than the popular college. Called to take their places in the ranks of modern town society, the young man or woman finds themselves beset on every hand with all manner of in- fluences to divert their minds and attention from the real and serious things of life, to the dissipation of time and money on the "attractions — advantages of so- ciety." Many of these things occupy the mind to the exclusion of more useful and important concerns, and not a few of them are morally debasing. It will not be claimed that relaxation from study and business should not be indulged in. Neither will it be claimed that clean and healthful amusements have no value. All work and no play will make Jack a dull boy in the majority of cases. It is not the play, but the character of it, and the extent of it that dissipates the mind. Evil influence comes in where "money making" insinuates its graft on the minds and morals of the young. Fifty years ago, the idea of playing base ball for money, or "slugging" on a foot ball field for the gate fees, would have provoked the same horror to parents, as the Roman holiday, which two thousand years ago, cast malefactors and Christians alike to an arena of Numidian lions.
The one chief factor that has changed the standards of character and rectitude in modern times, from the standards of the pioneer days, east and west, is the cor- rupting influence of corruptly accumulated wealth. The old Jewish prophet was not mistaken when he declared that "the love of money was the root of all evil." Go back as far as you please, and you will find that the pioneer founders of all the abiding benefits of American civilization, were satisfied with a very modest amount of this world's goods and gear, as compared with their descendants of the third generation.
What do we see now ? Greater inequalities of wealth and position in the United States within 134 years after its founding, than in any European nation that is a thousand years old. Direct poverty alongside of single fortunes of two hundred million dollars accumulated in forty years. Working men clubbing and beating working women in a contest for labor and bread, in a city of two million people which is not yet two generations old ; and where men have accumulated fortunes of fifty million dollars, from the labor of their fellow men, in a single gen- eration. Combinations of capital to fix prices, and raise or depress wages, increase or decrease the supply of commodities, and drive out competition, with a more effective and autocratic power than was ever exercised by any absolute monarch of any old world dynasty. Unscrupulous adventurers, casting behind them all the restrictions of honor, decency and fair play, with millions accumulated from reck- less gambling or downright extortion, buying their way to the highest legislative or executive offices, to disport their vanity and corrupt the public conscience.
It is therefore, little wonder that the laws of nation, state, and municipality has had to be reformed, on a stricter basis than the Jewish lawgiver's ten com
mandments. So that we now see the bounds of theft and robbery defined to the
Hmits of a hair's breadth; and the tax payers compelled to support men to pre-
vent short weights in every commodity, to prevent adulterations of every article
of food that can be mixed, watered, sanded, diluted, or substituted. And with
all the acumen of reformers, and the vigilance of honest voters, the purgation of
cheats, frauds, and mountebanks has so far failed to reach that last refuge of the
rascal — the patriot that buys his way into the United States senate.
Sixty years ago the banker, manufacturer, tradesman or farmer would have been horrified at the idea of a public officer set to watch his dealings and compel him to be honest. And in those halcyon days no voice or suspicion was ever raised or needed to be, that any public official was anything but the honest man his neighbors took him to be. There was not then any Aldriches in the United States senate voting millions of dollars into their private purses through tariflf taxes upon their neighbors; and there were no diletante golfers disgracing seats alongside of Daniel Webster, Henry Clay or honest old Tom Benton.
These observations do not apply any more to Portland than to other cities — not even as much. Look at old Virginia, when a colony of farmers, producing George Washington, Thomas Jefiferson, John Marshall, James Madison, James Monroe, Patrick Henry, John Randolph, "Light Horse Harry" and Richard Henry Lee. The world never before, or since, beheld such a group of intellectual giants. Every man of them reared on a farm. What is Virginia in the national councils today ? Nothing ! The same may be said of Massachusetts and any other of the eastern states. Ohio and-Io-wa are about the only states that can make tolerable comparisons of the present with the past ; and both states are very largely a state of farmers, small traders and artisans. New York with all its millions, has nothing to show but Roosevelt and Hughes. To be sure, there is Rockefeller, Morgan and Carnegie — but they will never be enrolled among the patriots or the saints.
That was a favorite piece of declamation among the boys and girls at the coun- try log school houses sixty years ago, where Edward Everett tells the American people, "We must educate, we must educate, or perish by our own prosperity." Edward Everett was the most perfect and conspicuous example of not only all that collegiate culture could do for a man, but he had, from favorite fortune been able to add thereto all that foreign travel and distinguished associates could con- fer. And he was the best specimen of the conservative statesman prominent in the public affairs of his era. He was willing to temporize with slavery in the south, even when Whittier's lines were burning up the fame of Webster, and Phillips and Garrison were shaking the fabric of national peace with their thundering appeals to the conscience of the people. How much of this character Everett owed to his inherited temperament, and how much to the environment that made him the polished man of letters it is useless to guess. He was a type of a large class of men who trusting more to books and colleges halted and hesitated to grapple the monster that threatened national unity to preserve national disgrace. In that supreme trial of all that was good, grand and heroic, in the patriot, the man who came to the front to save the nation knew nothing of collegiate culture, or even the advantages of the common schools. The character which placed him next to "The Father of His Country," was of the heart and conscience, rather than of the head or of culture, and education.
It was from principles of action rather than ability to act. The uneducated man with right principles is a safer citizen than the man with all knowledge and education, and no principles. "I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right; stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong."
Upon that platform the people gave Abraham Lincoln their supreme unre- served confidence and support. And with that principle, made the rule of action of every boy and girl, the city will be safe, clean, honored and prosperous for all
THE GLASGOW VOTER
(Scotland)
My city is governed by the Council and my ballot contains just the single office Councilor from my ward. I have one man to choose and it's so easy for me to itnow what I'm voting for that I never get buncoed. That's why Glas- gow is the best governed city In the world.
THE DES MOIXES (IOWA) VOTER
My city is governed by a commission of Five, and my ballot contains just those five offices. I have just five men to choose and you can't fool me into voting for a man I don't really want. No long ready-made tickets for me — I'm boss myself with this Short Bal- lot, and the politicians in this town are out of jobs.
(Scotland)
My city is governed by the Council and my ballot contains just the single office Councilor from my ward. I have one man to choose and it's so easy for me to know what I'm voting for that I never get buncoed. That's why Glasgow is the best governed city In the world.
THE DES MOINES (IOWA) VOTER
My city is governed by a commission of Five, and my ballot contains just those five offices. I have just five men to choose and you can't fool me into voting for a man I don't really want. No long ready-made tickets for me—I'm boss myself with this Short Ballot, and the politicians in this town are out of jobs.
THE PORTLAND, OREGON VOTER, WITH A BALLOT THREE FEET LONG
My city, county and state are governed by hundreds of elective officers and my ballot is so long with seventy-five candidates and thirty-two initiative laws, that no one but a professional politician can vote it intelligently. I'm voting half the time for men I wouldn't vote for if I could find out about them. My ballot is designed to favor the expert politicians and befudge the plain voter, and it succeeds. That's why I have government by politicians instead
of government by the people."There is a moral of all human tales,
'Tis but the same rehearsal of the past,
First, freedom, and then glory—when that fails.
Wealth, vice, corruption—barbarism at last.
And history, with all her volumes vast, hath but one page."
But over against that is the life of the individual soul, or family, determined to not fail. Society and all its privileges, functions, advantages or drawbacks may have done its best, or its worst, yet anchored to the immutable principles of truth, justice and morality it rises above the base, the brute, the weakness of human na-ture, and mounts to the summit by slow and painful steps.
"By the things that are under feet;
By what we have mastered of good and gain;
And the vanquished ills that we hourly meet."
From the individual we turn to the state, from the unorganized mass to the concrete civic organization; and find under the new system of law making a reversal of the practice and experience of all American states since the formation of the federal union. Under the new system of law making provided by amendments to the state constitution, there are for the city of Portland, five separate, distinct and diverse law making powers.
- First: primarily, the electors of the city.
- Second: the common council of the city.
- Third: the port of Portland commission.
- Fourth: the legislature of the state.
- Fifth: the electors of the state.
All of these authorities have the power to levy taxes; one of the most important of sovereign powers. And each have also many other powers, and may have the power to extend their own authority. This is not settled, and the supreme court has apparently avoided an opinion on the point in cases which have come before it. A revision of the state constitution seems to be demanded to segregate and limit these authorities, and to harmonize and unify the local and municipal authorities with that of the state. And to the force or weakness of the above enactments is added the power of the electors to "recall" and remove from office any public official, or administrator of the law, no matter at what stage of his service, or in what measure he is endeavoring to carry out measures affecting the public welfare. How far such a "club" prevents the people from getting the services of the most capable and conscientious men, is an important question.
But it is not upon the technical statement of this new system or its administration, that we will dwell; but on its influence and possible results. It was the criticism of the historian Macaulay, that the Americans had set up a government that was all sail, and no ballast. And that as long as we had plenty of free land
to give away, all might go well ; but that as soon as the land was gone, and popula-
tion began to press upon production for ease and comfort, then the trouble would
come.
We are prone to think the ancients knew but little of value. !We throw aside the experience of older communities as worthless. The bible is voted a useless book. And proud of all the achievements of science put on all steam and sail, and breast the future with unconcern. But one thing — one unalterable unchanging truth, we forget — human nature does not change.
"Their climes they change, and not their minds, who sail across the sea." The conspiracies, fights and factions of ancient Greece and Rome are re- enacted in every modern nation.
"In yon field below, A thousand years of silenced factions sleep — The Forum, where the immortal accents glow. And still the eloquent air breathes — burns with Cicero."
The pendulum swings. From the Areopagus of Greece and the Forum of Rome to King John at Runnymede, was a thousand years. By slow and painful marches through every phase and graduation of power in the hands of the people, and to the hands of the King, Greece and Rome had fallen to rise no more ; and England had risen to the dignity of a nation that administered laws and justice through parliaments and courts.
The pendulum swings. From Runnymede to Philadelphia in 1776 was 560 years. By the invention of the magnetic compass, the art of printing, and the dis- covery of America, kings had been shorn of absolute power, parliaments had taken the place of mass meetings to make laws, and a new nation had been founded on the principle of representative government.
The pendulum swings. From the declaration of American independence to the settlement of the North American continent from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and the adoption of the principles of direct legislation by the people of Oregon, is 130 years ; and, the pendulum swings again — swings back 600 years to Gessler, Tell and the Swiss mountains ; back 2,000 years to the Caesars, to Pericles and law making, law executing by the decrees of the people in public mass meeting. No! not by the people in popular assemblies ; but by the people in divided, separated independent units and a secret ballot. Is this reform? Is this progress? Has all the experience of two thousand years, the statesmanship of Pericles, the wisdom of Cato, the learning of Bacon, the patriotism of Washington and the great heart of Lincoln — all, all gone for nothing? Is there no wisdom in counsel; no strength in combination? Is it now to be a factional scramble for place and power by antagonistic and diverse interests ; great capitalists, great corporations, multi-mil- lionaires, deft political schemers, all appealing to the ignorance, prejudices or self- interest of rival and incoherent bodies of unorganized voters?
Civil government is now on trial in Oregon, as never before, and the end is not yet.
CHAPTER XXXII.
1825 — 1910.
Vancouver — First JVhite Settlement in Old Oregon — The Governor of the Vast Wilderness — The Character of Old Vancouver — The Disputed Hudson's Bay Company Title — Modern Vancouver — Great Prospects in the Future — The Home of Great Enterprises.
(By A Citizen of Vancouver.)
The settlement at old Fort Vancouver was the first permanent settlement by- white men made in old Oregon. The establishment set up at Astoria by John Jacob Astor was never anything more than a fur trader's post. Even after aban- donment by Astor's men and taken by the British gun boat, and then still later oc- cupied by the Hudson's Bay Company, it was throughout only a temporary settlement to serve a passing exigency. If Astor had not been betrayed by his own men and the establishment captured by the British, there can be no doubt that Astor would have founded a city at Astoria that would have forestalled the building of a city at Portland.
It is true that the Hudson's Bay Company settlement was also temporary and intended only to accommodate the fur trade of that company. But the circum- stances of the settlement, meeting the oncoming tide of American immigration, forced a result that the British traders never expected or intended, and one that the directors in London greatly deplored. It attracted people to the old fort to trade for goods, to sell peltries and to support immigrants, and gather around it a nucleus of humanity that in the end located the city of Vancouver.
The site of Vancouver was located by Lieutenant Robert Broughton, of the British exploring ship, Chatham, commanded by Captain George Vancouver of the British navy, on October 26, 1792, fourteen days less than 300 years after Columbus discovered America. Vancouver had sailed into the mouth of the Columbia on the 19th of October, but did not think it was much of a river. But to satisfy his curiosity he put Broughton in a small boat with a half dozen sailors and sent them up the river. They were seven days in getting up to the site of this city, and so pleased with the location that they named it after their captain — and the name stuck.
According to Vancouver's report, Broughton, before leaving here, took pos- session of the river and surrounding country in his Britannic Majesty's name. This place remained a vast wilderness, inhabited only by Indians, until after the consolidation of the northwest and Hudson's Bay Fur Trading Companies.
Dr. John McLoughlin, who had been given the position of chief factor of forts in the west, while passing down the Columbia to take charge of Fort George, now Astoria at the mouth of the river, noticed an attractive little plain near Point Vancouver. Seeing the many advantages of this position, he determined to make it his headquarters, and therefore, in the latter part of 1825 he moved his headquarters from Fort George to Fort Vancouver. Because of its geographical location, it was a converging point of trappers, and because of its fertile surroundings, it was all that could be desired agriculturally. The fields were cultivated, and a grist mill and a saw mill were built. In a very few years, many bushels of grain, besides those used in supplying the other forts and set- tlers, were shipped to England. They also raised many cattle on the excellent pasture lands.
At first the fort was built about one mile from the river. Four years later another establishment which was simply a stockade, was built on lower ground near the river bank. It was made of posts about twenty feet long, which enclosed a rectangular space thirty-seven rods in length, by eighteen rods in width. It contained all the principal buildings including Dr. McLoughlin's residence. The servants of the company with their Indian families lived just outside, where, in course of time, a considerable village grew up.
Dr. John McLoughlin, who was virtually ruler of the northwest, was a man of great integrity and firmness of character, but very kind. Although his first consideration was always his duty to his company, it was impossible for him not to befriend the American settlers and explorers who often arrived, hungry, sick, and ragged after the hard overland trip. He also furnished them supplies on credit, which he himself was often forced to pay.
He and the other officers of the company made it a policy to keep the set- tlers south of the Columbia river, which they hoped to make the southern boun- dary of their territory, although the joint occupancy treaty of 1818 gave these settlers equal rights with the English.
Among the early comers whom he befriended, was Jedidiah S. Smith, one of the earliest rival fur traders, who arrived at Fort Vancouver after an overland journey from California to Oregon. He was the first to make this trip. He had been robbed of his furs by the Indians whom McLoughlin's men later captured. McLoughlin then bought the furs from Smith for twenty thousand dollars.
John C. Fremont, our pathfinder, says of McLoughlin : "He received me with that courtesy and hospitality for which he was noted ; and all the immigrants, arriving, had been furnished shelter so far as it could be afforded in buildings connected with the establishment."
Another pioneer trader was Nathaniel Wyeth, whose plans McLoughlin tried to frustrate, and whom he finally forced to sell his rival fur trading establish- ment located on a nearby island. Upon his arrival, however, he was entertained at the fort and he and McLoughlin became good friends.
Captain Charles Wilkes, while in the west, with a few companions, was wel- comed here and he greatly admired McLoughlin's rule over the Indians. It was while Wilkes was here it is alleged that he advised against a provisional government, for which the settlers were working.
Jason and Daniel Lee, with co-workers, the first missionaries in the Oregon country, had come across with Wyeth's party and arrived at Fort Vancouver on the 17th of September, 1834. Here was preached the first gospel sermon in old Oregon on the 26th of September, by Jason Lee, to a large audience, composed of Americans, Scotch Canadians and Indians.
The seventy-fifth anniversary of this first sermon was celebrated at Van- couver in 1909, with appropriate exercises, including the reading of the original diary of Jason Lee. The spot where the sermon was preached has been identified in the government pasture field, and the Vancouver History committee think it appropriate to mark ths spot with a permanent monument. This will be left to the Washington Historical Society. A fund, however, was started for the erection of a memorial in the city park.
Dr. Marcus Whitman and co-workers were also welcomed at this fort and furnished with supplies. Their wives remained here until the mission at Walla Walla was completed.
Social life at the fort was very pleasant. The officers were all men of good education and enjoyed good literature. In the spacious dining hall, meals, sump