Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/289

Rh usual luck and labor of other emigrants, and reached the Portland townsite late in 1845; and soon after, as has been stated, claimed the King Donation Claim, west of the city, and started the first tannery north of California and west of the Rocky mountains. He died in May, 1862, and is buried in Lone Fir cemetery on the east side of the river.

Of General Stephen Coffin much can be said in his praise, as a public spirited man, and a most energetic and successful builder of the city of Portland. General Coffin was born at Bangor, Maine, in 1807, moved west to the state of Ohio early in life, and crossed the plains and reached Oregon City in October, 1847. Here he went to work with the industry and energy that characterized his whole life, and at the end of two years he had accumulated enough to enable him to purchase a half interest in the Portland townsite claim, as has already been stated. When the tug of war came up with the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, Coffin was in the forefront of the battle. His whole being rebelled at anything like injustice. It was said of him, that when the immigrants reached Oregon, of which party he was a member, some of those already here attempted to extort unreasonable prices for food and accommodations, and Coffin rebelled. To assuage his wrath, he was told that his treatment was the usual custom, and that when he got settled in the country, he could recoup his losses by fleecing other immigrants in like manner. This only made matters worse, and the newcomer so bitterly denounced such conduct as to make I enemies that never forgave him. But he was not the man to shape his conduct to placate enemies or please wrongdoers. Fearless and courageous, he I pushed his way over all opposition, serving the public faithfully in every act of his life, and often at the sacrifice of personal interest. He was liberal to the public, and his friends, to a fault. He is .the only man that ever gave grounds for the public schools of the city; he gave the first bell to a church in the city, which still sends out its call from the old Taylor street church every Sunday morning, inviting in the faithful. He organized the company to build the wagon road to Washington county; he organized the Peoples Transportation Company to reduce freight charges on the Willamette and Columbia rivers; he helped start the Oregon Central Railroad, and many other enterprises. (For further notice see biographical sketches.)

The third man to join the Portland Townsite Company was William W. Chapman, Esq., who for distinguished services in the Oregon Indian wars, was commissioned a Colonel of the Volunteers, and ever afterwards retained that title. Colonel Chapman, was born in old Virginia, early in 1800. His father was a brick mason, and contractor, and built the first brick building in Washington city. By dint of great personal efforts and private study, he picked up an education, studied law and attained a good position in the practice of the law in Virginia. But thinking the new western states ofifered the best opportunities for advancement, removed to Iowa, while that region was yet a part of Michigan. There he was appointed United States district attorney, and when I Iowa was set off as a separate territory, Chapman was elected the first delegate to congress from Iowa. He made a fine impression in congress in his efforts to reclaim to Iowa a strip of territory, in dispute with Missouri, and in which he was entirely successful, giving him great credit in the new state. He was a member of the convention to form a constitution for Iowa, and was the father of the measure to transfer the gifts of public lands to the states for internal improvements from such purpose to the endowment of public schools, and which after that became the settled policy of the United States. And while in congress, he was to a great extent the author of the legislation to provide the right to preempt public lands, which then led to the homestead act, which has made millions of people happy and independent. Colonel Chapman came to Oregon in 1847, settling first at Corvallis, and later at Salem. He was often at Oregon City on legal business, and there made the acquaintance of Coffin, and Lownsdale, and got into the Portland Townsite Company. He held