Page:The History of Oregon Bancroft 1888.djvu/741

 UMATILLA AND UNION". 723

with the country about, it enjoys a good trade. The population is about 1,000. Umatilla City, settled in 1862, was first called Cain s landing, then Columbia, and finally incorporated as Umatilla in 1864. It was the place of transfer for a large amount of merchandise and travel destined to the Boise 1 and Owyhee mines, as well as the most eastern mining districts of Oregon, and carried on an active business for a number of years. It became the county seat in 1865, by special election. The establishment of Pendleton in a more central location, and the withdrawal of trade consequent on the failure of the mines, deprived Umatilla of its population, which was re duced to 150, and caused the county seat to be removed to Pendleton. Weston, on Pine Creek, a branch of the Walla Walla River, was named after Weston, Missouri, and incorporated in 1878. It is purely an agricultural town, with three or four hundred inhabitants, beautifully situated, and pros perous. The minor towns and settlements are Meadowville, Milton, Heppner, Pilot Rock, Centreville, Midway, Lena, Butter Creek, Agency, Cayuse, Cold Spring, Echo, Hardmann, Hawthorne, Helix, Moorhouse, Pettysville, Purdy, and Snipe.

Union county, so named by unionists in politics, was created October 14, 1804, to meet the requirements of a rapidly accumulating mining population, La Grande, upon the petition of 500 citizens, being named in the act as the county seat until an election could be had. It occupies the extreme north east corner of the state, touching Washington and Idaho. Its area embraces 5,400 square miles, of which aboiit 95,000 acres are improved, the farms and buildings being valued atone and a half millions; the live-stock of the county at $1,029,000, and the farm products at $432, 000. The valuation of real and personal property for the tenth census was given at considerably over a million and a quarter. The population was about 7,000. The chief industries are stock-raising, sheep-farming, and dairying. Union City was founded in the autumn of 1862, by the immigration of that year, at the east end of Grand Ilond Valley, in a rich agricultural region. It w r as chosen for the county seat in 1873, by a vote of the people, and incorporated in 1878. Its popula tion is eight hundred, and rapidly increasing. D. S. Baker and A. H. Rey nolds of Walla Walla erected a flouring mill at Union in 1864, the first in Grand Rond Valley. La Grande was founded in October of 1861 by Daniel Chaplin, the first settler in the valley. It took its name from reminiscences of the French voyageurs, la grande valle e, a term often applied to the Grand Rond Valley. The town w r as made the temporary seat of Union county by act of the legislature in 1864, and incorporated in 1865. A land-office was established here in 1867, for the sale of state lands, Chaplin being appointed receiver. In 1872 this district was made identical with theU. S. land district of La Grande. La Grande is also the seat of the Blue Mountain University. The population is 600. Sparta, Oro Dell, Island City, Cove, and Summer- ville are the lesser towns of Grand Rond Valley; and Lostine, Joseph, and Alder of Wallowa Valley. Elk Flat, Keating, New Bridge, Pine Valley, Prairie creek, and Slater are the other settlements.

Among the residents of Union county who have furnished me a dictation is James Quincy Shirley, who was born in Hillborough, N. H., in 1829, and edu cated in New London. He came to California in 184-9, by sea, and mined at Beal s Bar on American River. He was in the neighborhood of Downieville 2 years, trading in cattle, which he bought cheap at the old missions, and sold high to the miners. He remained in the business in different parts of the state until 1862, when he started with a pack-train of goods for Idaho, but had everything taken from him by Indians, near Warner Lake, from which point he escaped on foot to Powder River with his party, and went to the Florence mines. From Idaho he went to Portland, and by the aid of a friend secured employment under the government, but left the place and cut and sold hay in Nevada the following year, getting $25 and $30 per ton at Aurora. In 1864 he again purchased cattle, at $2.50 per head, driving them to Montana, where they sold for 814. Horses for which he paid $14 sold for from $30 to $80. This being a good profit, he repeated the trade the following year, driving his \n