Page:The Columbia River - Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery Its Commerce.djvu/199



HE pioneer era was ushered in by the coming to Oregon of fur-hunters, missionaries, and little bands of adventurers, who together composed the nucleus of that American community which formed the Provisional Government of 1843. There were certain individuals, too, whose agency in leading the way to the immigration movement was so unique as to deserve mention.

One of these was Hall J. Kelley of Boston. He was a native of New Hampshire and a Harvard graduate. As early as 1815, when seventeen years old, he conceived the idea of the colonisation of Americans in Oregon. He was a man of high scholarship, philan-