Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 16.djvu/252



232 LESLIE M. SCOTT

Surveys had begun in April, 1872, under George Mercer (Ore- gonian April 12, 1872, page 2), and were continued by James Kinney (Oregonian, Sept. 14, 1874, page 1). The survey crossed the Coast Mountains in 1875 (Oregonian, May 22). The estimate of construction cost was $4,285.11 a mile (Ore- gonian, July 19, 1875, page 1).

Oregon at this time was in the first period of railroad de- velopment. Ben Holladay had opened the Oregon and Cali- fornia Railroad to Salem, Sept. 28, 1870; to Albany Dec. 8, 1870; to Eugene, Oct. 9, 1871 ; to Roseburg Nov. 2, 1872. He had opened the Oregon Central to Hillsboro December 18, 1871, and to St. Joseph, near McMinnville, Nov. 8, 1872. Henry Villard had come to Oregon as successor to Holladay in 1874-76, and in 1879 was projecting the line of the O. R. & N. along Columbia River eastward, extension of the Rose- burg railroad to Ashland and California and extension of the St. Joseph railroad to McMinnville (opened September, 1879), and to Corvallis (opened Jan. 28, 1880). The narrow gauge railroad, promoted by Joseph Gaston, who had begun con- struction in 1878 in Yamhill County, was beginning the career which was to reach north to Portland and south to Coburg, with expectancy of connection with the Central Pacific. Many residents of Benton County, spurred by these railroad schemes, thought their short and best route to tidewater was via Ya- quina Bay. Colonel Hogg, in their view, was their Holladay and their Villard, as a railroad builder.

Hogg's second company made little progress. Capital was lacking and in order to secure it he looked to Eastern invest- ors and incorporated a more pretentious company, Oregon Pacific Railroad, September 15, 1880, with Wallis Nash, Sol King, Thomas E. Cauthorn, Zephin Job, fellow incorporators. This company was to be the financing guardian of the Wil- lamette Valley and Coast Railroad Company, which it under- took to carry forward on a larger scale and to connect with the Union Pacific. Hogg was President of the new Company ; William A. Hoag, First Vice-President; Wallis Nash, Second