Page:Oregon, her history, her great men, her literature.djvu/112

110 about 800 vigorous young trees. They arrived at the present site of Milwaukie, November 27th. Their trees consisted of different varieties of apple, pear, peach, plum, and cherry, and were in immediate demand; hence the nursery was permanently established in that locality, and gave to Oregon the name of the "Land of the Big Red Apples." So important, therefore, was the Traveling Nursery that Ralph C. Geer, who took much interest in the first fruit culture of Oregon, remarked: "Those two loads of trees brought more wealth to Oregon than any ship that ever entered the Columbia River." Such was the beginning of the first nursery on the Pacific Coast of America.

Territorial Courts. When the territorial government of Oregon was established by Act of Congress, August 14, 1648, it was provided by the same Act that the judicial power of the Territory shall be vested in a Supreme Court, District Courts, Probate Courts, and in Justices of the Peace; the Supreme Court to consist of a Chief Justice and two Associate Justices. The Chief Justice and Associate Justices were authorized to hold the district court. In its largest sense, this Territorial Court was a Federal Court; it was national in its significance, and it had jurisdiction not only of matters which would be cognizable in the courts were the Territory a state, but of all matters which were made cognizable in the Federal or United States courts.

The Oregon Coast Range Ablaze. Before white men lived at Coos Bay a great fire swept along the Coast Range, leaving black stumps and trunks of trees along the hills and mountains that had been templed with beautiful groves for ages. These mute reminders of the conflagration can be seen to this day. There have been many fires in the Coast Range, hence the date of the Great Fire has been somewhat in question. There is evidence that a conflagration in 1776