Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/499

Rh  J. S. Ruckle and Henry Olmstead purchased it to complete their line to The Dalles. At this stage of progress a company was formed by Ainsworth, Ruckle, and Bradford & Co., their common property being the Carrie A. Ladd, Señorita, Belle, Mountain Buck, another small steamer running to The Dalles, and five miles of horse-railroad on the north side of the river. The company styled itself the Union Transportation Company, and soon purchased the Independence and Wasco, owned by Alexander Ankeny, and the James P. Flint and Fashion, owned by J. O. Van Bergen.

As there was no law in Oregon at this time under which corporations could be established, the above-named company obtained from the legislature of Washington an act incorporating it under the name of the Oregon Steam Navigation Company. When the Oregon legislature passed a general incorporation act granting the same privileges enjoyed under the Washington law, the company was incorporated under it, and paid taxes in Oregon. In 1861 the railroad portage on the south side of the Cascades was completed, and the following year the O. S. N. Co. purchased it, laying down iron rails and putting on a locomotive built at the Vulcan foundery of S. F. The first train run over the road was on April 20, 1863, and the same day the railroad portage from The Dalles to Celilo was opened. Meantime the O. S. N. Co. had consolidated with Thompson and Coe above The Dalles in 1861, and now became a powerful monopoly, controlling the navigation of the Columbia above the Willamette. Their charges for passage and freight were always as high as they would stand, this being the principle on which charges were regulated, rather than the cost of transportation.

In 1863 the People's Transportation Company built the E. D. Baker to run to the Cascades; another, the Iris, between the Cascades and The Dalles; and a third, the Cayuse, above The Dalles. They lost the contract for carrying the government freight, and the O. S. N. Co. so reduced their rates as to leave the opposition small profits in competition. A compromise was effected by purchasing the property of the people's line above the Cascades, paying for the Cayuse and Iris in three boats running between Portland and Oregon City, and $10,000; the O. S. N. Co. to have the exclusive navigation of the Columbia and the people's line to confine their business to the Willamette, above Portland. In 1865 all the boats on the lower Columbia were purchased. In 1879 the O. S. N. Co. sold its interests, which had greatly multiplied and increased, to the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company, a corporation which included river, ocean, and railroad transportation, and which represented many millions of capital. Ainsworth formerly commanded a Mississippi River steamboat. Ruckle came to Oregon in 1855, and became captain of Van Bergen's boat, the Fashion. Then he built a boat for himself, the Mountain Buck, and then the railroad portage. He was a successful projector, and made money in various ways. In 1864–5 he assisted George Thomas and others to construct a stage road over the Blue Mountains; and also engaged in quartz mining, developing the famous Rockfellow lode between Powder and Burnt rivers, which was later the Virtue mine. S. G. Reed came from Massachusetts to Oregon about 1851. He was keeping a small store at Rainier in 1853, but soon removed to Portland, where he became a member of the O. S. N. Co. in a few years. He has given much attention to the raising of fine-blooded stock on his farm in Washington county. Parker's Puget Sound, MS., 1; Dalles Inland Empire, Dec. 28, 1878. John H. Wolf commanded The Cascades; John Babbage the Julia and the Emma Hayward; J. McNulty the Hassaloe and Mountain Queen. Thomas J. Stump could run The Dalles and the Cascades at a certain stage of water with a steamboat. Other steamboat men were Samuel D. Holmes, Sebastian Miller, Leonard The Dalles for the country beyond. Walla Walla had grown to be a thriving town and an outfitting station for miners, where horses, cattle, saddles,