Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 12.djvu/129

 EXCERPTS AND NOTES. 121 "The fact that this tree, after eighty years of bearing, should bear fruit each year, is regarded as of the utmost importance to the apple-raising industry in the Northwest. "This tree is located in the southwest corner of the reserva- tion, in front of the chief commissary's office. So little was thought of the scrubby-looking relic of bygone days that it was used to anchor a guy wire to. This has been removed. "The tree is sixteen inches in diameter and about twenty feet high." (NOTE. Mrs. Narcissa Prentiss Whitman, one of the two first American women to cross the plains to Oregon, arrived at the Hudson's Bay Company's Fort Vancouver on September 12, 1836, and her husband, Dr. Marcus Whitman, and her traveling com- panionsRev. Henry H. Spalding, Mrs. Eliza Hart Spalding and William H. Gray were entertained by Dr. John McLpughlin, Chief Factor of the Hudson's Bay Company. Mrs. Whitman, in her diary under the date above mentioned, made the following entry: "What a delightful place this is; what a contrast to the rough, barren sand plains through which we have so recently passed. Here we find fruit of every description apples, peaches, grapes, pears, plums, and fig trees in abundance; also cucumbers, melons, beans, peas, beets, cabbage, tomatoes, and every kind of vegetable, too numerous to be mentioned. Every part is very neat and taste- fully arranged, with fine walks, lined on each side with strawberry vines. At the opposite end of the garden is a good summer house covered with grape vines. Here I must mention the origin of these grapes and apples. A gentleman, twelve years ago, while at a party in London, put the seeds of the grapes and apples which he ate into his vest pocket; soon afterwards he took a voyage to this country and left them here, and now they are greatly multiplied." George H. Himes.) Two EMINENT OREGONIANS DIE. General Owen Summers, who died on January 21, will have a prominent and honored place in Oregon's military annals. When a mere youth he joined the northern army as a cavalry- man from Illinois. He was lieutenant-colonel of the First In- fantry, Oregon National Guard, at the opening of the War with Spain. He was made colonel of the Oregon regiment when it volunteered to go into the field and served with such distinction throughout the campaign in the Philippines as to win the recognition of the president and promotion to the rank of brigadier-general.