those who had nothing left, and who could find employment, went to work. Many remained at Oregon City, where a proof of their unconquerable vigor of brain as well as muscle was afforded by the founding of a circulating library from the books which had been brought across the plains, an account of which has been given in a previous chapter.
Waldo drove his cattle up into the hills south-east of Salem which bear his name, and made a settlement without delay. Kaiser wintered on the west bank of the Willamette opposite the old mission; but in the spring selected a claim a mile and a half below Salem. The Fords and Nesmith, after remaining a short time at Oregon City, settled at that portion of the Yamhill district which constitutes the present county at Polk.[1] McClane settled in Salem and bought the mission mills at that place; Howell on a plain near Salem, which is now known as Howell's Prairie. The Applegates wintered at the old mission, Jesse Applegate being employed in surveying both at Salem and Oregon City. In the spring the three brothers opened farms in Yamhill district, near the present site of Dallas.[2] Athey
- ↑ The Fords were originally from North Carolina, where Nineveh Ford, author of the Road-makers, MS., was born July 15, 1815. They emigrated to Missouri in 1840, but taking the prevalent Oregon fever, joined Burnett's company.
- ↑ Some of the younger members of the Applegate family long resided in the Willamette Valley; but the three elder ones made their homes in southern Oregon; Jesse and Charles in the Umpqua Valley, where they settled in 1849, and Lindsey in the Rogue River Valley, to which he removed in 1859, and several of their children in the Klamath Valley. The Applegates were from Kentucky, where Jesse was born in 1811. The family removed to Missouri in 1822, where Jesse was a protégé and pupil of Edmund Bates, whose voice in congress was ever against the project of settling Oregon from the western states. There is a flattering and kindly tribute to Jesse Applegate in the Or. Pioneer Assoc., Trans., 1875, 61, by J. W. Nesmith, in which he says: 'No man did more upon the route to aid the destitute and encourage the weak.' 'As a frontiersman, in courage, sagacity, and natural intelligence he is the equal of Daniel Boone. In culture and experience, he is the superior of half the living statesmen of our land.' Id., 35-6; S. F. Post, Sept. 13, 1877; Ashland Tidings, June 27, 1879. Mrs Jesse Applegate's maiden name was Cynthia Parker, her father being at the time of her marriage a Mississippi flatboatman. He was four times married, and Cynthia was the daughter of his second wife, by whom he had eight children, all boys but this one. Mrs Parker's maiden name was Yount, of Pennsylvania Dutch descent, and Mrs Applegate was brought up by the Younts. One of this family came to California at a period earlier than the advent of Captain Sutter, and settled at Napa, where he had
