Page:History of Oregon Literature.djvu/429

 most of the little boys felt that there was more prestige in attending Willamette University. He was importunate in presenting the superior advantages of going there, and it was finally arranged, just before he became homeless. "By dent of much maneuvering I managed to remain in school until the spring of 1865, eighteen months, when I was compelled to abandon further efforts in that direction and go to work for a living—at fourteen years of age."

He was employed for year by a cousin in the Waldo Hills, his wages being his clothes and his keep. He hired out to another cousin for four months for a horse. He then left for the Grand Ronde Valley to join his father, who had married again and was going into the nursery business. The 15-year-old boy took with him "an enormous trunk full of fruit seeds and roots."

He lived in the Grand Ronde Valley for ten and a half years, from Christmas, 1866, to May, 1877. Two years after his arrival, at the age of 17, he wrote his first article—anonymously, secretly and in a sudden desire for literary expression that had no premonitions. At La Grande had been started, in the spring of 1868, the Blue Mountain Times, the first newspaper in Eastern Oregon. Young T. T. Geer, already an ardent Republican, was disappointed that it did not pitch into the Democrats enough. To supply the need and show up the opposition with force and logic was the motivation of his first literary venture, carried out, as has been indicated, with great secretiveness. His father and stepmother were to be gone on a visit for the entire day. Let him tell the rest of the story:

While they were getting ready for the trip it suddenly occurred to me that, since I was to be alone several hours, I would employ the time in writing my communication.... As soon as I was left alone, therefore, securing the family pen and pad of paper, I sat down and began the work. It proved very agreeable.... Having completed my broadside, I read it over, pronounced it good and put it away, for not for the world would I have had my father know what I had done. I didn't know what degree of excellence was required in a newspaper communication and, therefore, had some mis-