Page:The Columbia River - Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery Its Commerce.djvu/427

Rh A more living monument to the missionary is found in Whitman College. This institution, planned on the model of Amherst, Yale, and Williams, though co-educational, was founded by Rev. Cushing Eells in 1859 as an academy. It was not till 1883 that college work was undertaken. During that period the self-denying missionary and his family supported the infant institution by selling the products of their farm and devoting to it all except what was absolutely necessary for their own support. During years of slow, patient growth under very discouraging conditions, Whitman College has made friends East and West, and within the last few years it has become equipped with buildings and general facilities of high grade. An effort is now in progress, apparently sure of fulfilment, to raise two million dollars for buildings and general endowment. Walla Walla is becoming peculiarly known as the educational centre and the home city of the Inland Empire.

From Walla Walla we take a flying trip through the continued wheat belt on the Umatilla and its branches in Northern Oregon, a region similar to that around Walla Walla, rich and fruitful. Of this part of Oregon, Pendleton on the Umatilla is the metropolis. The Umatilla Indian Reservation, one of the most important in the history of this country, adjoins it. One of the most interesting persons in North-west history, now deceased, lived at Pendleton many years, Dr. William C. McKay, the son of Thomas McKay, and grandson of Alexander McKay, the last named being that one of the Astor company who lost his life on the Tonquin. Dr. William McKay was a three-quarter-blood Indian, but he was well educated and