Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 19.djvu/35

 UMPQUA ACADEMY 25 Here also the ambitious young lawyer, Rufus Mallory, who became the brilliant congressman from Oregon in 1886, plead his first cases and became thrilled with his own ambitions and where his success became a certainty because of his own deter- minations. This region was then in Umpqua County. The history of its formation and boundary as well as the organization of Douglas County was in the plans of this article and would be except for its length, probably already too long. Yet it ap- pears to one so closely connected with the events of which he writes, to be naturally connected, for did not Umpqua Academy, helped on by these very men, send out from its walls the men and women whose footsteps became the bright pathways that threaded all the Southern Oregon country and whose splendid characters became a part of the warp and woof of our commonwealth? The building of the O. & C. R. R. to Roseburg in 1872 diverted from the Umpqua River, once the second in import- ance in the state, the trade of the territory it served. The floods had also played havoc with the town. Under the newer conditions Mr. Cyrus Hidden became the only merchant at Scottsburg. He long survived, an honored citizen and trusted friend. His successor in business, John Hedden, a son, is a prince of the realm. But he deserves no credit for it it could not have been otherwise, for he was a student of old Umpqua. It is easily discernible and realized also by the writer that he has backed into the latter part of his narrative. It seemed the most gentle way to lead many into an acquaintance with the early history of this interesting section and its important events. There is another story that far antedates anything thus far cited, in this sketch. It was of a time when the Castilian was monarch along the Pacific. The story, years ago printed in Southern Oregon papers, says, substantially that in 1732 a disabled Spanish vessel entered the Umpqua, drifted to a point near Scottsburg. From the forests the crew cut trees and