Portland, Oregon: Its History and Builders/Volume 3/John Tucker Scott
JOHN TUCKER SCOTT.
John Tucker Scott was the head and progenitor of that branch of the Scott family in Oregon that has figured prominently in the history of the state. He was born in Washington county, Kentucky, February 18, 1809, and died at Forest Grove, Oregon, September 1, 1880. His parents, James and Frances (Tucker) Scott, were Kentucky pioneers, having removed to that state from North Carolina in the early years of the nineteenth century. Their parents had been among the early settlers of North Carolina, hence the spirit of adventure, the restless spirit that urges men to be up and doing, which in our time and place is known as the pioneer spirit, was his heritage from at least two generations. He left the wilderness of Kentucky in which he was born when a youth of seventeen years. A physical giant, he contended with the forces of nature in his young manhood. Fatigue, sickness and discouragement were to him unknown. Of strong will and persistent purpose, he took no account of obstacles. His father became the first settler of Groveland township, Tazewell county, Illinois, where a man of sturdy integrity and much energy, of keen judgment and unflagging interest in public affairs, he soon became a leader in and authority upon all matters pertaining to the general welfare of the frontier community. His wife possessed boundless courage to which was added the gentle, womanly forces that make and adorn the home. Energetic and ambitious, she stood for the highest ideals in the development of the characters of her children.
Of the seven children born to James Scott and Frances Tucker, his wife, on the frontier of the middle west John Tucker Scott was the eldest and the only son with the exception of a brother who died in early manhood. He was married October 22, 1830, in a little two-room cabin, then the home of the Rev. Neill Johnson, in the wilderness and near the present site of the village of Fremont, Illinois, to Miss Anna Roleofson, whose parents were pioneers of Kentucky. In Henderson county, that state, Mrs. Scott was born July 22, 181 1. She was of German and Irish stock, her father, Lawrence Roleofson, being of German parentage, and her mother, Mary Smith, of Irish descent. Of strict integrity, deep piety and an absolute devotion to duty as they saw it, these immediate progenitors of the Scott family on the maternal side stood for the qualities that underlie the American home and, through the home, the American nation. Earnest, self-denying, enduring, absolutely uncomplaining, Mrs. Scott lived her short span of a little less than forty-one years, and died in the wilderness, a victim of untoward circumstances and inhospitable environment. Her death occurred June 20, 1852, on the old emigrant trail in Wyoming, about eighty miles north of Cheyenne. Taken ill at daybreak, with a malady known as "plains cholera," an ailment that would have readily been dispelled had proper remedies been available, she died at sunset on a June day, in a wilderness surpassingly beautiful but "lone as the sea 'round the northern pole." Her husband and nine children stood beside the grave into which her uncoffined body, tenderly wrapped in simple cerements, was lowered to rest. Her life was a sacrifice to the pioneer spirit that has been a blessing to civilization, though, alas, a sore trial to the women who were thus led into the wilderness. To her family she left the heritage of a saintly memory.
Of the nine children who started with John Tucker and Anna Scott to Oregon by the ox team route in 1852, three having previously died in infancy, the youngest, William Niell, died en route at the age of four years and, like his mother, was buried by the roadside in what is now Baker county, a few miles from Durkee. The remaining children with their father reached Oregon City late in October, 1852. They pushed on a few miles further up the valley and after sojourning a few weeks at the home of Neill Johnson, of French Prairie, passed on to La Fayette, Yamhill county, where the first home of the family in Oregon territory was set up.
Of the eight surviving children the eldest, Mary Frances, was married August 16, 1853, to Amos Cook, a pioneer of 1840, who died at the family home near La Fayette, Yamhill county, February 6, 1895. His widow is still a resident of Portland. They had six children: Lillian, the wife of W. P. Olds; Agnes, wife of Judge W. L. Bradshaw of The Dalles; Maude, wife of F. P. Young; Pearl, who resides with her mother; and two who died in infancy.
Abigail Jane Scott, the second daughter of John Tucker Scott, was married August 1, 1853, to Benjamin C. Duniway, who died August 4, 1895. They had six children: Clara, who became the wife of D. H. Stearns and died January 26, 1886; WilHs Scott, of Salem, Oregon; Hubert R., of New York; Wilkie C. and Ralph R., both of Portland; and Clyde Augustus, president of the University of Montana at Missoula.
Margaret Anne, the third daughter, was married in April, 1854, to George W. Fearnside and died September 28, 1865, leaving five daughters, of whom the following survive: Mrs. A. B. Eastman, of Vancouver, Washington; Mrs. Charles Smith, of Los Angeles; and Mrs. E. M. Philebaum, of Sunnyside, Washington.
Harvey W. Scott, the oldest son, long editor of the Oregonian and one of the distinguished men of the northwest, is mentioned at length elsewhere in this volume.
Catharine Amanda, the fourth daughter, was born November 30, 1839, and was married June 23, 1857, to John R. Coburn.
Harriet Louisa Scott, the fifth daughter, was born March 9, 1841, and on the 25th of November, 1856, became the wife of William R. McCord. Of their six children four are living: Dora, the wife of L. R. Archer, of Aberdeen, Washington; Jessie, living with her mother in Portland; Myrtle, the wife of Philip Huf of Seattle; and James Sterling, of Portland. Her second husband was Isaac Palmer, who died in 1907.
John Henry Scott, born October 1, 1845, died May 1, 1863, a young man of great promise.
Sarah Maria Scott, born April 22, 1847, was married June 23, 1869, to J. M. Kelty, who died November 24, 190 1. Her four children are Paul R., Carl S., Mrs. Edith M. Alderman and Mrs. Emily Q. Riesland, all of Portland.
John R. Coburn, who, on the 23d of June, 1857, married Catharine Amanda, the fourth daughter of the Scott family, was born in Morgan county, Ohio, July 5, 1830, and when twenty-two years of age came to Oregon territory. For many years he was identified with steamboat building on the Willamette river above the falls, and in business circles as in private life was recognized as a man of industry and probity. He died at Canemah, the family home, July 15, 1868, leaving four daughters, only one of whom is now living, Ada, the wife of Albert Hawkins, of Clarke county, Washington. His other descendants are Dennis Coburn Pillsbury, a grandson, and Jean Catharine Slauson, a granddaughter.
When Catharine A. Coburn, in 1868, was left a widow with four young daughters, and confronted the necessity of earning a livelihood, she took up the work of teaching in a district school in Canemah, Clackamas county, where she remained until 1872. In March of the latter year, she removed to Forest Grove, where she was principal of the public school for two years, and in 1874 she came with her four young daughters to Portland, where her children became pupils in the public schools. Mrs. Coburn became associate editor on the New Northwest, a journal that espoused the cause the equal suffrage, and was owned by her sister, Mrs. Abigail Scott Duniway. She continued in this position for five years, when she became editor-in-chief of the Portland Daily Bee, a newspaper owned by D. H. Stearns. She occupied this position two years, leaving it in 1879 to become editor of the Portland Evening Telegram. After seven years in that connection she was transferred to the editorial staff of the Oregonian, where she still remains. Her life has been one of extraordinary industry and unconquerable energy. Its trials, hardships and sorrows have been many, but she has maintained throughout a cheerful, .determined spirit, and now at the age of three score and ten years writes daily with the vigor characteristic of her family.
Mrs. Coburn has lived in Portland continuosly since 1874. Besides her editorial work, from the proceeds of which she has maintained herself and brought up and educated four children and two grandchildren, she has been active from time to time in temperance, charitable and educational work. She was, in the time -when the Order of Good Templars was active in Oregon, grand secretary of the grand lodge of that order and conducted the large correspondence incident to that office. She served some years as lodge deputy in organizing and reorganizing lodges and held at various times the higher offices in the subordinate lodge, to which she belonged. She was one of the founders of the Portland Woman's Union, an organization that maintains a boarding home for working girls and women in Portland, and served for a time as its president. She was for 'many years a member of the board of managers of the Baby Home and for a time occupied a similar position toward the Florence Crittenton Home. She is a member of the Oregon Pioneer Society and has been for years, worked with the woman's auxiliary of that organization, and was active with the late Mrs. Card and others of the floral section of the State Horticultural Society in instituting the first chrysanthemum and rose shows in Portland. She is much interested in the public schools of the city, never fails to cast her vote at the annual school elections, and is president of the board of trustees of the Allen Preparatory School. Mrs. Coburn is one of a fast vanishing band who has seen Portland grow from the village and neighborhood stage to a prosperous and populous city, and it is not too much to say that she has enjoyed- every step of the progress she has witnessed, aiding it all along the line by her pen as well as by personal efforts.