RECOLLECTIONS OF BENJAMIN FRANKLIN BONNEY
By Fred Lockley
Recently while in Mulino I spent an afternoon with B. F. Bonney. "I was christened Benjamin Franklin," said Mr. Bonney. "My father, Jarvis Bonney, was born in New York City on Oct. 14, 1793. His people were from Scotland. My mother, whose maiden name was Jane Elkins, was also born in New York City on March 11, 1809.
"My mother was my father's second wife. He had five children by his first wife and nine children by his second wife. I am the second child of the second brood. I was born in Fulton Co., 111., on Nov. 28, 1838.
"My father was a millwright, carpenter, cabinet maker and cooper. When I was a boy flour sacks were not used, flour being shipped in barrels. My father ran a cooper shop and manufactured flour barrels near what is now called Smithfield, Ill.
"There was so much fever and ague in Illinois, father decided to move. He had heard of Oregon. The thing that decided him to come to Oregon was he had heard there were plenty of fish here. Father was a great fisherman, and while he caught pike and red horse there, he wanted to move to a country where he could catch trout and salmon.
"My father put in his spare time for some months making a strong sturdy wagon in which to cross the plains. My father's brother, Truman Bonney, after talking the matter over with my father, decided that he also would come to Oregon. He had a large family.
My father and mother, with their children, Edward, Harriet, Truman, Martha Jane, Emily, Ann and myself, started for the Willamette Valley on April 2, 1845. There were over 3000 people who started for Oregon in the spring of 1845.
