Page:The Pacific Monthly volume 17.djvu/746

 adjacent to the line—twenty sections to the mile—and was to become available as each twenty miles of railroad was accepted by commissioners appointed by the President.

Having thus secured aid from the National Government, a further appeal was made to the Oregon Legislature and with his usual success. The Oregon Central Railroad Company was duly designated by it as the one to receive the land grant, and further a bill was passed by which the State of Oregon was obligated to pay the interest at seven per cent for twenty years on one million dollars of the bonds of the company.

This action of the Legislature took place in October, 1866, and when the company was incorporated and organized, as was done the month following, Mr. Gaston was elected secretary and authorized to solicit subscriptions for stock. Funds to build the first twenty-five miles were soon pledged, and all preparations made that were necessary for the commencement of actual construction.

At this stage of the work, S. G. Elliot, the engineer who had made the survey from Marysville to Jacksonville, reappeared on the scene with a proposition from the promoters of the California and Oregon Railroad, to give to each and every one of the incorporators of the Oregon and California fifty thousand dollars in the stock of the California Company in consideration of their turning over to them all the rights, franchise, land grant and state aid of the Oregon and California Railroad Company, and to permit his people to build the line.

Mr. Gaston and his friends, who constituted a majority of the incorporators, opposed the proposition, and it appeared as though nothing would come of it. Elliot, however, by playing upon the self-interest of the different parties interested, succeeded in creating dissension and finally an open rupture. The Gaston-Barry survey favored the west side of the Willamette, while Elliot was able to persuade those living on the east side that the line should be built on their side of the river.

Gaston and his friends refused to recede and, as they were in the majority and held all the assets of the company, there was nothing left for the Elliot faction hut to accept defeat or to organize a new company. This they did and, with the evident intent of diverting the subsidies from the original company to their own, they organized a second "Oregon Central Railroad Company."

Both parties proceeded energetically with their plans, which included the defeat of the other, one result of the rivalry being the scaring of the parties who had subscribed to Gaston's project, resulting in withdrawal of their pledges, leaving him without the funds on which he had been counting to construct his first twenty-five miles, twenty miles being necessary before he could avail himself of the land grant from the Government, as well as the aid from the state.

Out of the duplication of the name grew the custom of designating them as the West Side and East Side Companies, respectively. By the commencement of the year 1868 both organizations had their lines located. The West Siders had pledges from the City of Portland, the Counties of Washington and Yamhill, and private parties, subscriptions and guarantees to the amount of $375,000, the City of Portland's being in the shape of interest on their bonds for twenty years.

The East Siders had also succeeded in raising a very considerable amount, largely by the sale of their securities in the East and in California. They issued announcements that they would inaugurate the work of construction on the line, Portland to California, at a point near East Portland, April 16, 186S, for which occasion they had arranged for an address by the Hon. W. W. Upton, a parade by the state militia, bands of music, etc., etc.

The West Siders, headed by Gaston, who, by the way, had been elected president of their company, were not to be outdone. Waiting until April 13, they put out posters inviting the public to attend the ceremonies to be held at "Carruthers' Addition," April 14, incident to the breaking ground for the ONLY BONA fide Oregon Central Railroad that was to be constructed, Portland to California. This came off with due eclat—and the West Siders threw the first shovelful of dirt for the first railroad in Oregon.

Two days later the East Siders carried out their program, their celebration being held on "Tebbit's Farm," near East Portland.

Construction work was now under way on both sides of the river, and it would be hard to decide which of the two companies found it most difficult to secure the necessary funds to carry it on.