Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 11.djvu/8

2 created. There have been numerous Acts passed changing, mostly in small ways, the boundary lines of counties. To set forth all these changes would make this address too long. I must leave these matters to the future historians of the several counties.

To a better understanding of these counties, and, for the reason that most of the earlier counties were large and later counties were created out of pre-existing counties, I have arranged these counties chronologically, instead of alphabetically.

An examination of the map will show that many of the counties in Oregon, particularly west of the Cascade Mountains, are very irregular in shape. This is due to the fact that their boundaries were made according to physical conditions,—the situation of mountains, rivers, and streams, which make, what may be called, natural boundaries. In addition, when the population of Oregon was small, the size of the counties was of little moment, for the white population was mostly in small settlements west of the Cascade Mountains. When Wasco County, comprising all of Eastern Oregon, was created in 1854, its population was small and mostly living near the Columbia River, a part of its northern boundary.

There were no official surveys of land in Oregon by the United States Government prior to the passage of the Oregon donation land law of September 27, 1850. In the Act establishing the Territory of Oregon, approved August 14, 1848, all laws of the Oregon Provisional Government were recognized excepting only laws relating to the disposition of land in Oregon. Under the Oregon donation land law claims settled on prior to its passage were, in effect, recognized and patents, in course of time, were issued to lawful claimants, and they were granted patents without regard to township or section lines, after governmental surveys had been made. The surveys of the Willamette Meridian and of the Base Line were