Page:Centennial History of Oregon 1811-1912, Volume 1.djvu/501



on the ten dolhu- coin. This coinage i-aised the price of gold dust from twelve to sixteen dollars an ounce, and saved a vast amount of money to the honest miners. Engravings of the "Beaver Money," as this last coinage was called, are shown on another page.

The general effect of the wealth of gold brought back from California was beneficial to Oregon ; yet in all too many instances it proved the ruin of many men whose sudden rise to riches induced habits of profligacy and dissipation from wiiich they never recovered. Many men brought back as much as thirty or forty thousand dollars washed out of the California streams within a year or two ; and then threw it all away on idle dissipation, and had to start in again at the bottom of the ladder encumbei-cd with bad habits and remorseful regrets.

CONDITIONS OF THE COUNTRY IN 1848

Sixty-four years ago the great mass of the people of Oregon was located in the Willamette Valley. At that time Eastern Oregon was yet practically in pos- session of the Indians. The great donation claims of 640 acres each, had sub- stantially taken up all the open lands in Western Oregon. At that time the country and the farmers were every thing, and the towns amounted to little in wealth, population or political influence. The Methodist Mission people had been concentrated at Salem, and that village had become the centre of religious, if not political influence, and was then aspiring to become the seat of the pro- posed Territorial Government.

The farmers resided distant from each other and remote from the towns, and the social life was scarcely apparent. And yet all were bound together by a common tie and unwavering interest in a single hope and purpose. That was the universal desire of a Ten-itorial Government by the United States, and the passage of an act of congress recognizing and legalizing their donation land claims. And many a good Methodist could have paraphrased the old hymn to read:

' ' On Jordan 's stormy banks I stand And cast a wishful eye

To Willamette's fair and happy land Where my possessions lie. ' '

They little dreamed that so much wealth, prosperity and progress was so near at hand.

They had labored long and painfully to reach this promised laud; they had saved, and pinched and suffered to the extremity to make ends meet, and hoping and trusting the great government at the great city of Washington would hear and heed their far cry from the wilderness of Oregon for recognition and pro- tection. Their prayers and petitions had been heard ; but they knew it not. U. S. Government protection, and great wealth in gold had both been vouchsafed by a Providence the Oregonians did not hear of for six months after the fact. Con- gress passed the Act organizing Oregon Territory on Sunday morning. August 13, 1848, and Gov. Lane did not reach Oregon with his commission until March 2, 1849. Gold was discovered in California on January 19, 1848, but the Oregonians did not hear the great news until the July following; and before t