Page:History of Oregon Newspapers.pdf/74

Rh over the editorial pencil and shears in the middle sixties, was to find the paper already possessed of a sound tradition on which he could build. Among the articles carried by the paper in the economic field during these typical four years were the following:
 * 1) A warning against a rush to the gold-fields;
 * 2) A suggestion that Oregon farmers take up fruit-growing;
 * 3) An analysis of the prevailing "hard times;"
 * 4) Another warning against gold mania;
 * 5) A complaint against the high price of apples;
 * 6) Half a dozen articles designed to promote the construction of a telegraph line along the Pacific coast, ultimately to connect with the East;
 * 7) Other promotive articles on a carriage factory, wheat- growing, the Pacific railway, fruit-growing, agriculture, wharves, aids to navigation, and a continuous demand for better mail service.

The Oregonian's series of articles urging against a mad rush to the gold fields recently opened to the north and south of Oregon may not have done much to stem the drift out of the young com monwealth to the mines, but they were good enough to have helped. Here is another of the series, such "straight talk" that it is worth attention here. January 12, 1853, Mr. Dryer's Oregonian said:

Gold Mines.—People are returning daily from the mines with accounts of a scarcity of provisions, high water, and other impediments in the way of successful mining operations during the winter.

A word to the wise, etc. Let every man who can cultivate an acre of land, stay away from the gold mines and do so; he will then make more money with less labor, than ninety-nine out of a hundred who go to the mines. Those who cultivate the earth can count with a reasonable certainty upon a harvest proportionate to the amount of labor performed. ..

Secure your claim—clear, plough, plant, and cultivate the soil, and you are sure of making your "pile" in a short time. What more do you want? Remember that at least about twenty thousand persons are now about starting over land for Oregon. Look at the price of provisions, the quantity you can raise, the sure market at your door, and stay from the gold mines.

A similar exhortation, entitled "Gold Mania," appeared in the Oregonian's issue of July 22, 1854.

William Allen White's famous editorial "What's the Matter with Kansas?" had a pioneer forerunner in T. J. Dryer's editorial in the Oregonian July 1, 1854, on "Hard Times," though the Kansas classic is couched in more effective rhetoric. There were no William