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OREGON EMIGRATING COMPANIES 211

future with anything but assurance, Burnett took up his resi- dence in Weston, Platte County, Missouri, in the fall of 1842, and here set to work to organize a wagon company to join him in emigrating to Oregon. He spent the fall and winter lecturing in the neighboring counties, where his eloquence and enthusiasm met with gratifying response in the shape of hun- dreds of recruits, who pledged themselves to join him with their families and goods the next spring and to proceed to Oregon. 24 They kept their pledge, becoming the nucleus of the great Oregon Company of 1843. The society, even where there was no immediate intention of emigrating, served to keep up interest in the idea and to urge on people's attention the opportunities to be enjoyed by those who should actually emigrate later. At this stage there was, of course, no attempt at final organization. This was postponed until the emigrants reached the frontier. Only a simple constitution and by-laws were adopted and perhaps committees appointed to secure further information, to make preparations for an actual start, and to draft a constitution to govern them en route. 2 *

2. MEMBERSHIP.

Active membership with full rights in the company emi- grating was as a rule confined to males over sixteen years of

24 Peter H. Burnett, Recollections and Opinions of an Old Pioneer, reprinted in Oreg. Hist. Quart., IV, 64 f, and Minto, Antecedents, Oreg. Hist. Quart., V, 43. Burnett's adddress was popularly known as "Platte Purchase by Pete Burnett," Ibid., p. 40. The Peoria company of 1839 was formed as the direct result of a lecture given in that town the previous year by Rev. Jason Lee, one of the original band of Oregon missionaries. Robert Shortess, First Emigrants to Oregon, O. P. A. Transactions, 1896, p. 93.

25 The following is from the report of a committee to draft a constitution for the Savannah Oregon Emigrating Company, printed in the Western Journal, March 15, 1845, and reprinted in Oreg. Hist. Quart., IV, 278, f, "Whereas, in order the better to prepare the way for and to accomplish our journey to Oregon with greater harmony, it was deemed advisable to adopt certain rules and reputa- tions; and whereas, the undersigned, having been appointed a committee to draft and prepare said rules and regulations, and having given the subject that atten- tion which its importance demands, beg leave respectfully to report the following as the result of their deliberations, viz." At a meeting of the citizens of Clear Creek precinct, Johnson County, Iowa, March 3, 1843, "for the purpose of taking into consideration the propriety of organizing a company to emigrate to Oregon, and devise rules by which said company shall be governed," it was resolved that "a committee of seven be appointed by the meeting to draft a constitution and report at the next meeting." The report of the constitution committee was unanimously adopted a fortnight later. Iowa Journ. Hist, and Pol. X, 416 ff, 423 f.