CHAPTER VII
The Era of the Pioneers: their Ox-teams and their Flatboats
Events and Men who led the Way to the Pioneer Age—Kelley, Wyeth, and Bonneville—Ewing Young—Farnham, Shortess, and the "Oregon Dragoons"—The Wilkes Expedition—The Star of Oregon, and the Cattle Enterprise—Dr. John McLoughlin and the Americans—Dr. Marcus Whitman and his Winter Ride, and the Immigration of 1843—Retrospect of J. W. Nesmith—Features of the Journey across the Plains—Whitman's Services—Getting the Waggons across the Plains—Reaching the River and Building Boats—Delights and then Distress of the Descent of the River—Battle with the River—Condition in which they Reached Vancouver, and their Reception by Dr. McLoughlin—Subsequent Immigrations—The Barlow Road—The Donation Land Law—Quotation from Jesse Applegate.
THE pioneer era was ushered in by the coming to Oregon of fur-hunters, missionaries, and little bands of adventurers, who together composed the nucleus of that American community which formed the Provisional Government of 1843. There were certain individuals, too, whose agency in leading the way to the immigration movement was so unique as to deserve mention.
One of these was Hall J. Kelley of Boston. He was a native of New Hampshire and a Harvard graduate. As early as 1815, when seventeen years old, he conceived the idea of the colonisation of Americans in Oregon. He was a man of high scholarship, philan-
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