A little more than thirty-one years have passed away since the first discovery of gold on Griffin’s Gulch an event which led to the first permanent settlement in Eastern Oregon southwest of the blue mountains. Many of the pioneers of thirty years ago are still living, but their number is growing less year after year, …
Baker City In the month of August 1864, R. A. Pierce laid claim to the SE ¼ of Sec. 17, Tp. 9. S. 40, east of the Willamette meridian, and proceeded in 1865 to get a title to the same from the state. He built a house west of where the court house now stands, …
The first service of the Episcopal Church held in Baker City was by the Rt. Rev. R. W. Morris, D.D., June 5, 1870. The bishop found two communicants, in the city, Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Henderson. Finding that there was a sentiment favorable to the enterprise of building a church a subscription paper was circulated …
St. Stephens Episcopal Church, Baker County, Oregon Read More »
Ministers of various denominations visited Baker County and held meetings at different places, but no one was a resident minister within the county prior to 1868. The Rev. Ellsworth, of La Grande, came to Powder River Valley frequently in 1864-5, and later Elder Newton of the Methodist church, south, held meetings, frequently at Auburn and …
Sydney Abell, Justice of the Peace opened the first legally constituted court in Baker County, October 29th 1862. The first case was that of the people vs. D. Scott, action to bind defendant to keep the peace, entered on complaint of Thomas Ricketts. The prosecuting witness failed to appear and the case was dismissed. Of …
People who come to the Pacific States in palace cars, making the trip in four or five days, can have but a faint conception of the toils and hardships endured by those who crossed the plains with teams before the advent of railroads. Experience would also be necessary, perhaps, to enable one to fully appreciate …
Incidents in Pioneer Days in Baker County, Oregon Read More »
Most of the miners about Auburn, and throughout the country also, during the first years of the development of the mining business, were Californians, and that there was a difference betwixt them and Oregonians at that time, was apparent to any one who met a considerable number of persons from each of the two states. …
Joseph Benoit and Charles Van Clay discovered gold in Rye Valley in the spring of 1863 and laid a claim on the waters of Dixie creek and begun digging a ditch. They went over to Mormon Basin and offered Mr. Ingraham an interest in their discovery which he declined, thinking he had a better prospect …
There is a settled farming community near the Northern line of Baker County approximately 20 miles northeast of Baker, an early pioneer cemetery is located in this area about one-quarter mile off State Highway 203 and about two or three miles south of Medical Springs. It is on the right-hand side of the highway going …
A cemetery was started in Wingville in 1878 after a diphtheria epidemic made a cemetery a necessity. The Wingville Grange No. 150 purchased ten acres from Thomas Bailey and his wife for a two dollar gold piece on 8 April 1878. On 8 December 1883 the trustees of the Wingville Grange 150 for fifty dollars …
One of the richest sections of Oregon is what is known as the Panhandle. Extending from the Blue Mountains west of North Powder to the Wallows county line, beyond Cornucopia. And whilst this fertile and productive area belongs to Union county, it should be a part of Baker County, as Baker City is its natural …
One of the worthy pioneers of this County, a man of ability and executive force and unswerving integrity, the subject of this sketch is now one of the leading citizens of Nyssa, and a prominent man in Malheur County. He lives one mile northwest from the town of Nyssa, having a ‘farm of one hundred …
Hon. Ransom Beers is one of the oldest pioneers of this section and a man of enterprise and energy, having wrought in all the arduous and trying occupations of the frontier life, being eminently successful in them all, as well as having done much here for the up building of the County, while his life …
The subject of this article is one of the venerable and capable men of the vicinity of Nyssa, being also a veritable pioneer of the pioneers, of the west having labored with great energy in many portions of the same, and has endured the privations, hardships and suffering incident to this kind of life. Henry …
Among those granted representation in this volume, none is more worthy of notice, than the subject of this sketch. As a public spirited citizen he enjoys the confidence of the people and has become well and popularly known, not only throughout Malheur and adjoining counties, but throughout the whole state. On October 3. 1864, near …
This well known and representative farmer and stockman is a substantial and enterprising citizen of Malheur County, dwelling near Ontario, five and one-half miles southwest, where he has a fine farm of one hundred and eighty acres, well tilled and improved with buildings, orchards, and so forth in addition to which he owns one hundred …
This substantial and capable gentleman is one of the real builders of the county of Harney, and it is quite proper that he should be accorded representation in its history, being a man greatly respected and worthy of the high esteem given to him. He was born in the city of New York, on May …
One half mile southeast from Harney is one of the finest small grain farms in the county. It consists of eighty acres of choice land and is well under cultivation. The improvements are of a quality and kind quite fitting such an estate and its owner is the subject of this article. Mr. Martin was …
HON. JAMES WILLIS NESMITH. – Oregon has given a few men to the nation; and the luster of their memory still shines in the galaxy of her heroes. Colonel Baker, one of the most brilliant men ever at Washington, District of Columbia, has coupled with his title that of senator from Oregon. Yet he was …
HON. JAMES HARVEY SLATER. – Mr. Slater has ever borne a conspicuous part in the public affairs of Oregon; and no one has preserved a more honorable name. His mental qualities are solid rather than brilliant, and his operations weighty rather than keen. He is a man whose integrity has never been impeached; and he …
