Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 18.djvu/295



The charge against the pioneer spirit, of which a good deal has been heard lately, is that it is an influence unfavorable to a highly organized and cooperative industrial development. This theory is based upon the extreme individualism of pioneer life—its lack of cooperative dependence, its freedom from systematic labors and its perfect personal liberty. The demonstration of it, we think, is found in the tardiness of the Willamette Valley in the matter of industrial progress. Other countries, less favorably situated for agricultural and other forms of organized industry, take on new ways and get ahead rapidly in population and wealth, while the Willamette Valley moves along in the old grooves, being today in essentials largely what it was thirty years ago, namely, a pioneer country. Those who have imagined that, in noting this condition and in setting forth the reasons for it as above. The Oregonian is broadly condemning the valley population and indulging a wicked venom of malice and contempt, but poorly conceive either facts or motives. In its whole spirit and character The Oregonian is, itself, of the pioneer world. Its roots lie deep in the pioneer life. In these facts, perhaps, and in the understanding and sympathy which they imply, lie the secret of its continued acceptance and support by a people not at all times in accord with its judgments.

It cannot, we think, be denied that the pioneer spirit makes a slow country in a material sense; but there are other interests in community life far above increase of commodities and multiplication of towns; and it is in its relation to these higher interests that the pioneer spirit is seen in its best character. If it be asked what has the pioneer spirit done for Oregon, it is only necessary to point to the conditions which differentiate Oregon from the other Pacific states. At the very threshold of our organic social life, while the criminal element and the vigilance committee in turn controlled the affairs of neighboring communities, there was created for Oregon, by the