Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/705

 charity of their hearts, and perhaps with a motive to popularize their institution, the trustees passed a resolution to establish a school for orphans in connection with the university; but this scheme being found to be impracticable, it was abandoned, and the money subscribed to the orphan school refunded.

Notwithstanding its ambitious title, the Monmouth school only served to divide the patronage which would have been a support for one only, and after ten years of unprofitable effort, it was resolved in convention by the Christian church to unite Bethel and Monmouth, under the name of Monmouth Christian College, which was done. The first session of this college is reckoned from October 1860 to June 1867. The necessity for an endowment led, in 1808, to the sale of forty scholarships at five hundred dollars each, by which assistance the institution became fairly prosperous. On the organization of the college, L. L. Rowland of Bethany college, Virginia, was made principal, with N. Hudson assistant. In 1869 a more complete organization took place, and T. F. Campbell, a native of Mississippi and graduate of Bethany college, Was placed at the head of the college as principal, being selected president the following year, a situation which he held for thirteen years with profit to the management. A substantial brick building was erected, a newspaper, the Monmouth Christian Messenger, published, and the catalogue showed 250 students. In 1882 Campbell resigned and returned to the east, leaving the college on as good a basis as any in the state, having graduated twenty-three students in the classical and forty-one in the scientific course. The college property is valued at twenty thousand dollars, and the endowment twenty-five thousand. The census of 1870 gives the number of Christian churches at twenty-six, and church edifices at sixteen. At a Christian cooperation convention held at Dallas in 1877, thirty-one societies were represented. Later a church was organized in Portland, and a building erected for religious services.

Baker City Academy, an incorporated institution, was opened in 1868, with F. H. Grubbe principal, assisted by his wife, Jason Lee s daughter. Grubbe subsequently took charge of The Dalles high school, his wife dying at that place in 1881. He "was succeeded in the Baker City academy by S. P. Barrett, and later by William Harrison. As the pioneer academy of eastern Oregon, it did a good work. The corner-stone of the Blue Mountain University at La Grande was laid in 1874. In 1878 it was in successful operation, with colleges of medicine, law, and theology promised at an early day. In addition to the preparatory and classical departments, there were two scientific courses of four years. The school was non-sectarian. G. E. Ackerman was first president. A good school was also established at Union, and the Independent Academy at The Dalles. The latter institution acquired possession of the stone building partially erected for a mint in 1869-70, but presented to the slate when the mint was abandoned, and by the state transferred to this school.

The First Unitarian Church of Portland, incorporated in 1865 by Thomas Frazier, E. D. Shattuck, and R. R. Thompson, was the first of that denomination in the state. Its first house of worship was located on the corner of Yamhill and Seventh streets, a plain building of wood, the lot costing 7,000, with free seats for 300 people. Its pastor, T. L. Eliot, drew to this modest temple goodly congregations; the society grew, and in 1878 was laid the corner-stone of the present church of Our Father, one of the most attractive edifices in the city, which was dedicated in 1879. Olympia Unitarian Advocate, Aug. 1878; Portland Oregonian, July 27, 1878, June 14, 1879. There is a small number of universalists in the state. They had a church at Coquille City, organized by Zenas Cook, missionary of this denomination. They erected a place of worship in 1878.

The Evangelical Lutherans organized a church at Portland in 1867, A. Myres, of the general synod, acting. A house of worship was erected in 1869, being the first lutheran church in Oregon. Through some mismanagement of the building committee, the church became involved in debt, and after several