The Waterways of the Pacific Northwest

Recently, as I have studied this subject its magnitude has grown more apparent. The space allotted my paper will permit little more than a historical sketch. It has been my life work to gather together the written and printed history of the Pacific Northwest, but I am not a professional writer of it.

For my purpose this caption refers to the Columbia River and its tributaries, and Puget Sound and the rivers emptying into it, including the Fraser, and their watersheds. The Columbia and Fraser are the only rivers that break through the great mountain ranges which parallel the shore of Washington and Oregon. With the Pacific Ocean only a few miles away, with its intricate network of great and lesser rivers, and its inland tidal waters whose aggregate littoral exceeds the distance between Cape Cod and Cape Flattery, it is remarkable how much of the exploration and industrial and commercial development of the Pacific Northwest has come from the East towards the West.

Alexander Mackenzie in 1793, when he discovered the upper reaches of the Great River; Lewis and Clark in 1805; Simon Fraser and John Stuart in 1805-6; Daniel W. Harmon in 1810; David Thompson in 1811, and a little later Wilson Price Hunt, and thereafter nearly all the leading men of the Northwest Company and the Hudson's Bay Company, braved the hardships and dangers of the trip over the Rocky Mountains and down the turbulent waters of the Columbia or the Fraser.

John McLoughlin, James Douglas and Peter Skene Ogden, Nathaniel J. Wyeth and the first missionaries, John C. Frémont, B. L. E. Bonneville, all led expeditions westward. Astoria was founded from the sea, and the expeditions of Astor's party to establish inland posts went up the river from the west, but they were all failures. For nearly seventy years the canoe and the bateau, the ox team or the horse team attached to the prairie schooner, were the instruments whereby the pioneers searched out the country and peopled its valleys and plains.

During the period between 1842 and 1855, old Oregon was mostly peopled by immigrants from the Mississippi valley, who came overland. After the completion of the railroad across the Isthmus in 1855, immigrants from near the Atlantic seaboard took steamer at New York City for Aspinwall, crossed the Isthmus by rail, thence to San Francisco by steamer and to Oregon and Washington by sailing craft or steamer. Troubles with Indians between the Missouri and Columbia, of frequence in the later 'fifties, followed closely by the great Civil War period, materially checked the influx of population overland. In fact, not until the completion of the Northern Pacific in 1883, and soon afterward of the Oregon Shortline, did the real development of Oregon and Washington begin.

In 1850 there were in old Oregon only 13,000 white settlers, 1049 of whom lived north of the Columbia River; in 1860 Oregon had 52,000, Washington, 11,500; in 1870, Oregon 91,000, Washington 24,000; in 1880, Oregon 175,000, Washington 75,000; in 1890, Oregon 314,000, Washington 349,000. The Northern Pacific Railroad had been completed in 1883, quickly followed by the Oregon Shortline, and Washington had gained nearly fivefold in a decade and had passed her older sister in population. In 1900 Oregon had 414,000, Washington 518,000; in 1910 Oregon had 673,000, with Washington 1,142,000, or a gain by the latter of more than 100 per cent in ten years. Oregon had an assessed valuation of 905 millions and Washington, 1025 millions. Neither had a bonded debt.

The Canadian Pacific, Great Northern, Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul, Northern Pacific, Oregon Shortline and Southern Pacific railroads had all reached Pacific coast terminals, and in consequence the great Northwest had gained remarkably in population, wealth and volume of trade and commerce.

In the Willamette valley the water power afforded by the streams of the Cascades and Coast ranges served to operate the early wood working and flouring mills, the woolen mills and small manufacturing plants, but on Puget Sound it was more economical to operate the saw-mills by steam where the ships could reach the docks easily and quickly.

Almost immediately after their arrival at Tumwater, the first American settlers began building a saw-mill and a grist-mill on the bank of the Des Chutes River. The irons were bought from the Hudson's Bay Company and the millstones were made from a large granite boulder near by. Both mills were run by water power. A few other small mills were constructed elsewhere on the Sound, but all were financial failures.

No large city has grown up in the Northwest on the site of the great water powers of the Columbia, Fraser, Willamette or smaller streams. Also, excepting Victoria and New Westminster, no large city has grown up on the site of the trading posts of the Hudson's Bay Company or the villages first started by the American settlers in the Willamette valley or on Puget Sound. Seattle, Portland, Spokane, Tacoma, and Vancouver in British Columbia, appeared on the map years after a dozen of their early rivals had been thriving little towns, and the most successful were founded by farmers from the Mississippi valley who, perhaps, had never seen a large city.

A regular transportation line was established on the Lower Columbia in 1843; and in 1845, deep sea vessels began to frequent the harbor of Victoria and the Columbia River. These included many war vessels of the United States and Great Britain. Steamship communication, more or less irregular, began between San Francisco and the Columbia River in 1850, and between the former city and Puget Sound about 1857, though the Otter and other steamers had made occasional trips on the latter route long before that time. Also, about 1850, steamers began to operate on the Lower Willamette and on the Columbia below the Cascades.

After Vancouver's day little is reported of the Puget Sound region for about thirty years. As early as 1827 the schooners Vancouver and Cadboro, owned and operated by the Hudson's Bay Company, are known to have sailed from the Columbia River to Puget Sound and engaged in traffic with the natives as far north as Sitka. In 1836 the Steamer Beaver arrived in the Columbia River from England, but in a short time she left the Columbia and began running up and down the coast in and out of the rivers, bays, and inlets between Puget Sound and Alaska, carrying grain and other food stuffs northward and bringing back furs and skins and at times towing sailing vessels to and fro.

During all the early years, down the waters of the Willamette and Columbia came considerable wheat and other grains, but freight rates were so high that little profit was realized by the grower and the acreage in consequence increased but slowly. The lumber exports of the Columbia River region also were large. On Puget Sound, until metal supplanted wood in shipbuilding, numerous cargoes of ships' spars went to the Atlantic seaboard and to Europe, but sawed lumber and piles, with shingles and lath to complete the stowage, were the chief articles of export. Good coal was mined on Vancouver Island earlier than on the American side of Puget Sound, but no considerable shipments abroad began until after 1870. For more than thirty years thereafter the coal mining industry of the Puget Sound country ranked closely after the lumber business and a large fleet of seagoing vessels was constantly employed in the trade. During recent years the use of oil in competition with coal for fuel has curtailed greatly the output of the northern coal mines.

It is more than 1650 miles from the mouth of the Columbia to the uppermost point of navigation, but rapids and falls occur at frequent intervals. Until quite recently no continuous navigation of more than three hundred and fifty miles was practicable. Traffic between Portland and Lewiston, Idaho, required the operation of three separate steamers on as many stretches of the stream and still another on the upper Willamette. This made necessary artificial methods of getting freight and passengers around the breaks in the river, and it was not long before an absolute monopoly was held by one company on the Columbia and by another on the upper Willamette, though attempts at independent operation of boats on the latter were frequent. To-day, a steamer can run from Lewiston to Astoria, or, if of light enough draught, to Eugene on the Willamette.

In 1850 a wooden tramroad was built on the north side and later another on the south side around the cascades of the Columbia. Late in the 50's the Oregon Steam Navigation Company gained control of them and installed a steam railroad on the north side.

About 1860 that company began the construction of a railroad from The Dalles to Celilo, which commenced operations in 1862, during a period of intense mining activity in Idaho, Eastern Oregon and Northern Washington. Thereafter it practically owned the Columbia above the Cascades. The history of its operations and exactions and of the colossal fortunes it piled up for its stockholders reads like fiction.

The first actual improvement of a waterway that I remember was at Oregon City. In 1860, at the west side of the Willamette River, the local transportation company constructed basins above and below the falls, so that a long warehouse covered both landing places, making it a comparatively easy matter to transfer freight up and down, while passengers walked. About 1870, the company replaced this system by a short canal with locks.

For a great many years the United States has made liberal appropriations to be used in overcoming the difficulties of navigation of the Columbia River and its main tributaries. Under date of August 6, 1915, Major Arthur Williams, United States Engineer of the First Oregon district, furnished the following list of original expenditures:

Snake River, in Oregon, Washington and Idaho, including $85,000 appropriated by the state of Washington, $338,786.43; Columbia River and tributaries above Celilo Falls to the mouth of Snake River, Oregon and Washington, including $25,000 from the state of Washington, $494,600.84; Columbia River at The Dalles, Oregon and Washington (Dalles-Celilo Canal), $4,685,855.79; canal at the Cascades of the Columbia River, Oregon and Washington, $3,912,473.33; Columbia River between Vancouver, Washington, and the mouth of the Willamette River, $97,532.16; Oregon Slough (North Portland Harbor), Oregon, $34,437.60. In addition to the foregoing $390,921.58 have been expended in operation and maintenance.

In a letter of recent date from Chas. L. Potter, Lieutenant Colonel, Corps of United States Engineers, are tabulated the amounts heretofore expended in the second district on all river and harbor improvements to June 30, 1915, as follows:

Willamette River above Portland, and Yamhill River, Oregon, $857,671.92; operating and care of lock and dam in Yamhill River, Oregon, $43,426.95; Willamette River at Willamette Falls, Oregon, $83,441.71; operating and care of canal and locks in Willamette River, near Oregon City, Oregon, $344.22; Columbia and Lower Willamette rivers below Portland, Oregon, $3,577,958.35; mouth of Columbia River, Oregon and Washington, $13,156,162.52; Clatskanie River, Oregon, $18,867.34; Cowlitz River, Washington, $102,208.63; Lewis River, Washington, $39,587.19; Cowlitz and Lewis rivers, Washington, and Clatskanie River, Oregon, dredge and snagboat, $36,138.04; Grays River, Washington, $3,857.23.