Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/698

 chiefly by their aid, and on the 15th of June, 1851, the First Congregational Church of Portland was organized, with ten members, and the church edifice dedicated. This building had a belfry and small spire, and cost $6,400, seating some 400 persons. See Lyman, in ''Cong. Asso. Or. Annual Meeting, 1876, 35, a quarter-centennial review, containing a complete history of the First Congregational Church of Portland; also Home Missionary'', xxiv. 137-8.

The membership of the other churches amounted to 50 at this time; 25 at Tualatin plains, 14 at Oregon City, three at Milwaukee, and eight at Calapooya, where a church was organized by H. H. Spalding; but congregations and Sunday-schools were sustained at a few other points.

In January 1852 the Oregon Association held its third annual meeting, five ministers being present. It was resolved that Atkinson should visit the eastern states to solicit aid for the educational work of the church, particularly of the Tualatin academy and Pacific university, and also that other parts of Oregon should be pointed out to the home missionary society as fields for missionaries. The result, in addition to the money raised, was the appointment of Thomas J. Condon and Obed Dickinson missionaries to Oregon, the former to St Helen, and the latter to Salem, where a church of four members had been organized. They arrived in March 1853, by the bark Trade Wind, from New York. Their advent led to the organization of two more of what may properly be styled pioneer churches.

Soon after the arrival of Dickinson, W. H. Willson of Salem offered two town lots. About half the sum required for a building was raised, while the church held its meetings in a school-house; but this being too small for the congregation, a building was purchased and fitted up for church services, in September 1854. It was not till 1863 that the present edifice, a modest frame structure, was completed and dedicated. Dickinson continued in the pastor ate till 1867, when he resigned, and was succeeded by P. S. Knight. Condon went first to St Helen, where the town proprietor had erected a school-house and church in one, surmounted by a belfry with a good bell, and a small spire. This building, which is still standing, was not consecrated to the use of any denomination, but was free to all, and so remained. In 1854 Condon was appointed to Forest Grove. They were not able to build here till August 1859, when a church was erected, costing some $9,000. ''Or. Statesman'', Aug. 30, 1859. Near the close of 1853 Milton B. Starr, who had preached for several years in the western states, came to Albany, Oregon, and organized a church. The following spring Lyman waft sent to Dallas to preach, and Portland was left without a pastor. In 1859 Condon organized a church at The Dalles, building in 1862. He remained at The Dalles for many years, leaving there finally to go to Forest Grove, where his attainments in natural science were in demand. On the opening of the state university he accepted a professor ship in that institution. Atkinson was settled as pastor of the church in Portland in 1863, where he continued-some ten years, when, his health failing, he went north to establish congregations. During his pastorate a new church edifice was erected on the ground selected in 1850; and more recently Ply mouth church on Fourteenth and E streets. The organized congregational churches reported down to 1878 were nine: Albany, Astoria, Dalles, Forest Grove, Hillsboro, Oregon City, Portland, East Portland, and Salem. Cong. Abgo. Minutes, 1878, 51. Plymouth church was a later organization.

Pacific university, founded by congregationalists, was non-sectarian. It had $50,000 in grounds and buildings, $4,000 in cabinet and apparatus, $83,000 in productive funds, and a library containing 5,000 volumes.

The first minister of the Presbyterian denomination in Oregon was Lewis Thompson, a native of Kentucky, and an alumnus of Princeton theological seminary, who came to the Pacific coast in 1846 and settled on the Clatsop plains. Wood's Pioneer Work, 27. There is a centennial history of the presbytery of Oregon, by Edward R. Geary, in ''Portland Pac. Christian Advocate'', July 27, 1876. On the 19th of September, 1846, Thompson preached a sermon at the house of W. H. Gray, albeit there were none to hear him except a ruling elder from Missouri, Alva Condit, his wife Ruth Condit, and Gray and