Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 1.djvu/964

674 tannery in Oregon was located on the same stream higher up toward the Holmes' place. Bricks for Governor Abernethy's store, the hrst made in Oregon, were manufactured on Indian creek, on the corner of the present court house yard at 8th and Main. A log bridge across this creek was the first improvement on Main street. An early brewery on Indian creek tainted the air back of the Weinhard building, and a man by the name of Singer built a large grist mill near the head of the 7th street stairs, where at certain seasons the stream became a raging torrent.

Another canyon extended from the bluff at the Congregational church, to the river at nth streeth. Down this zigzag way Indians trooped to the slave market at the foot of nth street. Peter H. Hatch, an early contractor, blasted the bluff away, opening a road up the hill. The canyon was bridged with logs, as also was the Abernethy canyon at Green Point, where the governor's house was the first civilized structure visible to boats coming up the river. The next edifice seen was the Catholic church, on the spot where it still stands. Water street, that later caved away, was then the principal promenade of the city, looking down on the river panorama of Indian canoes, Hudson's bay bateaux, and now and then a stately ship from the ocean.

Back of the Methodist church to the present railroad track, a mosquito-haunted, skunk-cabbage swamp extended its malarial ooze. The bluff at 5th street was climbed by a ladder, a distance of eighty to a hundred feet, and the second bluff to Falls View, two hundred and fourteen feet up to the reservoir, also was scaled at certain points by ladders. At the present 7th street stairs an Indian trail wound up through the bushes along Indian creek, and at 8th and 9th streets an uncertain wagon road, later known as the "Baptist Slide," clung to the steep, slippery and dangerous edge until the beginning of the Singer Hill road was blasted out of the rocks along the side of the bluff. Not Edinburgh, nor cliffs along the Rhine have possibilities greater than these rocks of Oregon City. Draped with vines and greenery they yet may rival the best the world affords. The roads out of early Oregon City were still more unspeakable. Crude and inadequate ferries, with caving slippery banks, led into the village across the Clackamas, the Pudding and the Molalla. In later years these country roads have been improved, and in the town, thousands of dollars are being expended in filling canyons and extending modern streets and cement walks in every direction. 2em