francescabellcoursenperritt.com

Category: Frances Perritt’s Kin

  • Albert Lonski Wartime

    My father, Albert Thomas Lonski, wore his dress uniform for this portrait photograph. This uniform, his dress uniform, included a forest green coat, trousers of the same color, a khaki shirt, and tie. The insignia on his hat and lapel was the Eagle, Globe and Anchor (EGA). This was Marine Corps symbol.  The next photo shows his Service ribbon bar at the top. This bar is divided into 3 parts. The Presidential Unit Citation on the left was awarded to all the men in his unit for heroism in action. His unit was Headquarters and Service company, !8th Marines. He was in the mapping section. In the center, the American Defense Service medal is represented. Military service members who served on active duty between 8 Sep 1939 and 6 Dec 1941 got this medal. In the right section is the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal. It went to those who served in that area from 1941 to 1945. Albert had 3 service stars on this right side of his service bar. These stars were often called battle stars because they meant that he participated in a named campaign.

    Albert’s sweetheart, Helen Wolfe, also served during WW2 in Normandy, France. Toward the end of her life she wrote her story of day  of Victory in Europe.

    She, an army nurse, was my mother. In this piece she reacts to the news the war has ended. She heard it as “La Guerre est finie.”

    “La Guerre est finie” boomed the French voice from the radio shattering the darkness.
    I stood alone and listened. I was caring for a large ward of wounded soldiers. It was midnight in France in 1945 (May 8). To all of us this meant we could go home again to our own families and our country.
    I asked myself should I wake my soldiers and tell them. I didn’t, saying to myself what if it is a false report as it might be? For days the two armies faced each other in the valley. This meant that the Germans had finally surrendered the command to the Americans. It was very dramatic standing in that darkened room hearing the war was at last over. The radio became lively with chatter spoken in excited German voices. I spoke a little (German) and could make out only a little bit. I did understand that Hitler married his sweetheart, Eva Braun, then both committed suicides. 
    I stood alone in the dark talking to myself with world shaking news leaking around me. Oh, why didn’t I wake up some of my soldiers? I didn’t.  I did go to my night supper where all on duty went for a meal. There I got to share and say, “La Guerre est finie”. Most of them had not heard.
    How different was the next night! I left the radio on for all the soldiers to hear a discussion about the GI bill. This bill would make a difference in the lives of these young men. They could go home, marry their sweethearts, have babies and go to school (with the help of this GI bill). It was a wonderful investment in people. Our government’s G I bill would make a difference to each of us and we were grateful and ready.
    The next week I received five proposals of marriage. These soldiers were ready to start a family and start living.
    I had a recent quarrel with my Albert, but he still held my heart. I accepted one of the offers, knowing I would not keep it. I, too, wanted to go to school.
    Instead, we married as soon as we saw one another.
    Eventually, we had two beautiful daughters (their oldest one being born almost exactly 9 months after they married). There was enough to do. We used the GI benefits and felt so rich with the 90 dollars the government gave us to live on. We soon had everything. We had two lovely children and enough to eat and La Guerre est finie, no more war.
    We lived in my mother’s old house in Oregon. Albert remade it into a beautiful palace covered with stones he carried from the rock quarry (also on his mother-in-law’s property).
    Our daughters grew daily. 
    Next part -Albert’s career
    After years (of higher education), Albert was tired of college. He contributed (his skills) to making airplanes. He helped develop the 747. We moved around the country a lot with him working for Boeing. He helped get the Saturn Booster in the air.
    It all ended (when Albert retired). We went back to our stone castle on the river. By that time we had four beautiful grandkids. What treasures they were and still are.
    Now our country is in a miserable war (Iraq War) which they cannot win. I hope these soldiers can come home and be ordinary people again. Then perhaps la Guerre est finie can happen.

    Albert Lonski Goes to War

    Early life

    Albert Thomas Lonski arrived in this world on February 6, 1922, In Bremerton, Washington, USA. This was the same year Hitler formed Jugenbund, predecessor to the Hitler Youth organization in Germany. Albert’s mother, Anna Luise Taubert, was born in central Germany. She came to North America as a young woman. Her brother, Walter Taubert, kept in contact with her and her family. He sent birthday cards to his nephew, Albert. Here is a photo of the postcard Albert received on January 21, 1933. Walter’s son, Helmut, who was Albert’s first cousin, wrote out the message. “Greetings to you, from your Helmet, Parents and Grandparents”. The grandparent would have been Luise’s mother who was also the grandmother of Albert.

    This same Helmut joined the German army when grown. He likely belonged to Hitler Youth as a teenager.

    When Albert was only 16, when he graduated from Franklin High School. Then in December of 1938, wanted to join the US Marine Corps. Young men were allowed to join at age 17 if they had written parental consent. It was likely Albert’s father, Thomas Lonski, who gave this consent. This must have been a difficult time in the Lonski household. Seventeen days after his 17th birthday on February 23,1939 Albert did join.

    In the Marine Reserves

    According to the Marine Muster Rolls from the National Archives, Albert drilled at the Canadian National Dock in Seattle. Dates included were March 1, 8, 15, 23, and 29.

    On December 20, 1939, he qualified as an Expert Rifleman.

    Albert’s unit, the second Division Combat Engineer Battalion, was activated on November 1, 1940, in San Diego, California. Albert stayed in Seattle, but drilled with his reserve unit at Aberdeen, Washington.

    Out of the Reserves into Training- Camp Elliott

    Pearl Harbor Attack occurred on December 7, 1941

    Albert went to Camp Elliott before the Pearl Harbor attack. He trained at this camp in San Diego and is here in April 1941.  Second Lieutenant, Ben Webtherwax, led class 2. Albert was a topographer. On the October muster roll he was also a topographer.

    Still at Fort Elliott in January 1942, Albert was then a private 1st class working in the mapping section.

    Camp Dunlap, Miland, California

    By July of 1942, Albert trained in a California desert camp, Camp Dunlap. Here he met Helen Wolfe, a nurse working at Brawley Hospital. Three liberty passes for Albert have the wrong birth date typed at the top. This made him seem two years older than he was. Helen was 24 when they met; Albert was 20. When Albert showed Helen his liberty pass, she thought he was 22. Of course, the truth came much later and she was mad.

    His October 1942 Muster Roll read,” Albert Lonski, computer, mapping section”.

    New Zealand

    In 1942 and 1943 New Zealanders in Wellington shared their space with 15,000 young American Marines. The U.S. Marine corps used Wellington, New Zealand as a base for training and staging during WW 2. It was also a place for soldiers to rest and recover from being in the field.

     Albert with the 2nd Marine Division arrived in January 1943. His unit was stationed at Camp McKay. Albert took photos. Few had written descriptions; many were stamped on the back with this mark.

    Here is a group photo of his unit in New Zealand. He is in front on the right. This is written on the back, “March 29, 1943, after 3 months.” Albert is in the front on the right.

    He photographed more than a few natives while in New Zealand.

    More photos

    In the Field

    His first stay here was brief. He left on December 12, 1942 aboard the USS Bellatrix. He wore the 3 stripes of a technical sergeant on his sleeve. The Marine Muster Rolls don’t say where he went, just that he went to sea and was in the field.

    Campaigns

    On September 8, 1942, headquarters changed Albert’s Division to the first H&S co., 18th Marine (engineer), 2nd Marine Division. H & S stood for Headquarters and Service.

    The engineers of the 18th took part in campaigns in Guadalcanal, Tarawa, Saipan, Tinian and Okinawa. According to his discharge papers, Albert “participated in action against the enemy”. He was at the Battle of Saipan of the Marianas Islands from 16 June 1944 to 9 July 1944”.

    Saipan

    Before Japan attacked the fleet at Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, crippling the fleet, Saipan was a farming community. After Japan took formal control of Saipan in 1919, large sugar cane plantations were planted there. Warm, humid air, year-round rain and much sun made the land lush with plants. The terrain was mountainous. Cliffs and gullies dotted the landscape. There were many dark caves and swarms of mosquitoes. Malaria was a problem.

    Months before the U.S. Army, Marines and Navy attacked on June 15, 1944, the Japanese had fortified the island with extra troops. Many of the civilians’ homes were confiscated for military housing. People were forced to live in caves.

    War raged in Saipan from June 15 to July 9, 1944. These are the dates on Albert’s separation papers that he fought there. About 3,426 Americans were killed. Japan lost 24,000 soldiers and 22,000 civilians were also lost. Many of these civilians committed suicide; some were shot by their own soldiers.

    Before this battle Albert had been temporarily attached to the 2nd Division Marine Fleet. He was then with the Amphibians Corps. The first day of the Battle of Saipan saw a fight between American amphibious tanks and Japanese tanks. At the end of the first day most of these vehicles had been damaged beyond repair. Most were put out of commission by soldiers in fox holes.

    Albert, a phototopographer in the mapping section and a technical sergeant, never mentioned his fighting days in Saipan. What he did talk about was his surveying and mapping of Saipan. A phototopographer surveys and maps a terrain based on territorial photographs. The navel construction battalions, the Seabees, built the Navel Advance Base, Kogman Point Airfield and Isley Field on Saipan. Airbases on these islands were critical to winning the war in the Pacific.

    There is a documentary online from Real Time History called Saipan 1944 Total War in the Pacific. Here is a link to Total War.

    Albert took photos.

    Going Home

    By September 1945, Albert back in the United States, was assigned to Camp Lejeune, North Carolina .Albert had been assigned to active duty on November 7, 1940. He received his Honorable Discharge Button at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina on September 20, 1945. The Marine Corps also gave him a travel allowance of 5 cents per mile to get home to Seattle, Washington.

    In Albert’s collection of photos from his service days, I found a photo that touched me. An Asian child, barefoot and beautiful, leans against a dead snag on a deserted beach. The sun is shining as shown by the sharp dark shadows behind the snag.

    I don’t know if the photo is posed or is something Albert just happened across.

    I do know I felt achingly sad, looking at it.

    What was Albert doing here? He had become an engineer. Engineers like to build things.

  • The Disappearing Printer

    Post for Week 39

    There was one member of Frances Perritt’s family who disappeared late in life. I couldn’t find his death record, his burial site, or the place he spent his final years until recently.

    When I first met my husband’s family, including his great grandmother, Bessie Goughler, she spoke affectionately of all her three deceased husbands. George McClellan Goughler, the last of these three, was known to his grandchildren as Granddaddy Goughler. Bessie called him Mac, short for his middle name, McClellan.

    Bessie married George McClellan Goughler in October of 1918 in Portland, Oregon.

    Here is a copy of their return of marriage. Mac was about 11 years older than Bessie and he was 54 years at the time of their marriage. He was born in Pennsylvania on January 19, 1864.

    I calculated his birth date from census records and this entry from his step granddaughter’s diary. Her entry from January 19, 1835, reads:

    Tonight, Bill and Helen were over for dinner. It was Granddaddy’s and Helen’s birthday, so we celebrated.

    from Rose Coursen’s diary written while she was living with Mac and Bessie in 1935

    I found Helen Goughler birth certificate online. It was a typical adoptee certificate with the adoption parents listed as as parents. Helen birth date was January 10, 1906 which matches the newspaper story to follow.

    McClellan, The Printer

    Before both of his marriages, Mac was a member of the International Typographical Union. Mac Goughler ran to be elected to the executive committee for this organization. This was reported by the Oregonian newspaper on 29 March 1893.

    Mac Goughlers name came up in another article, dated September 1, 1913. This article in the Portland Labor Press told stories about early members of this union and mentioned Mac.

    It said that he was a job man and joked about his name. Here is the quote from the article. ”Mac Goughler’s ire was aroused because everybody persisted in calling him ‘MacGoogeler’ which was not his name by any means.”

    Today, to google something means to look online for information about it. In the story, Mac’s friends were using a corrupted form of the word “goggle”. To goggle meant to stare with a wide-eyed look.

    Mac did wear glasses.

    Holly Press

    McClellan Goughler and Chris Hansen were owners of Holly Press. Their print shop was located at 66 1/2 1st in Portland, Oregon.

    Here are two photos of this print shop, Holly Press.

    Holly Press
    Holly Press

    First Marriage

    Mac married Daisy in Yamhill County, Oregon on July 4, 1984. They remained childless until Friday night, January 19, 1906. This is what happened as told by the Morning Oregonian a few days later.

    Will Adopt the Baby

    Mr. and Mrs. McClellan Goughler, living at 794 Clackamas Street, will keep the baby girl, which was left at their home Friday night, and have named the waif Helen. At 9:30 o’clock that night the doorbell rang, and on answering it, Mrs. Goughler (Daisy) found on the doorstep a baby, that at once won a place in her heart and home. There was nothing about the infant that might lead to the identity of the parents. It was wrapped up in an old blanket. The baby is about 19 days old, and is a healthy child, and Mr. Goughler is as willing as his wife to give it a home, as they have no children of their own. They have accepted the baby girl as a gift from the mother whoever she may be.

    City News in Brief, Morning Oregonian (Portland Oregon)Wednesday 24 Jan 1906, p.9

    Mac and Daisy Split

    In 1913 and 1914 Daisy Goughler showed up in the society pages of Portland, Oregon newspapers multiple times. She attended and hosted events as Mrs. McClellan Goughler or Mrs. M. Goughler. Occasionally her husband, Mac attended with her. In 1916 society news of her decreased dramatically. It looked like trouble for the Goughlers. But Daisy was still listed as McClellan Goughler’s wife in the Portland City Directory for 1916. They live at 415 12th Street.

    In 1917 Mac and Daisy separated. Mac moved to the Lenox Hotel. He is listed in the Portland City Directory as being a resident of that building.  In 1918, Mrs. Daisy Goughler is living at a new street address- 389 Main Street, Portland, Oregon.

    By 1920 Daisy Goughler had moved to Seattle, Washington. She worked for a corset company. On the 1920 census for Seattle, King County, Washington, Daisy Goughler is divorced and boarding with Jack and Emily Holmes.

    In 1920 this date, their adopted daughter, Helen Goughler lived with Mac and Bessie.

    The Studebaker

    The same year that Mac and Daisy separated, Mac bought a 1917 Touring Studebaker. He registered the car with the Oregon Motor Vehicle Department. His license number was 10087.

    Here is a photo of this car with Bessie and Mac taken a few years later.

    Mac’s Years with Bessie

    Here is a photo of Bessie and Mac before they married. They are at Multnomah Fall with some of Bessie’s siblings.

    Back, George Reynolds, Louis Reynolds, Frances Reynolds Cooke and Louis Cooke, Front, Mac and Bessie Goughler, Mary Lydia (Mamie) Reynolds

    Their Residences

    The census records showing Bessie and George McClellan Goughler as a couple include those from 1920, 1930, 1940 and 1950.

    In October of 1918 George McClellan Goughler and Bessie Reynolds Cabell Curtiss married and set up housekeeping together. They first lived at Bessie’s place, 410 Harrison Street in Portland. They were still there when the 1920 Census was recorded in Multnomah County, Portland, Oregon.

    According to the 1920 census for this area, Rodolph W. Cabell, Bessie’s son, and Helen C. Goughler, Mac’s daughter, lived with them. Mac worked at his company, Holly Press which he owned with Chris Hansen. This record recorded Mac’s name as George M. Goughler.

    By 1930, they had moved to the house on 47th Street North. Mac’s daughter, Helen, still lived with them. The 24-year-old Helen taught music. This record values their home at $6,000.00. Here Mac gives his occupation as a printer of posters.

    House on 47th Street

    By 1940, Mac is no longer working outside the home. He and Bessie still live on 47th Street. Their house is listed as 3415 NE 47th. Mac’s name is recorded as George M. Goughler.

    In 1850, this couple still live at the 3415 NE 47th Street house. By this time Mac was 87 years and Bessie was 75 years. They had been together 32 years.

    The Aging of the house on 47th Street

    Here are two more photos of their Portland home taken another angle.

    house after remodel
    about 1936 showing Mac, Bessie and Betty Coursen, Bessie’s granddaughter

    Looking for Where Mac Died

    The 1950 census record is the last record I have of Mac in Portland.

    Looking for Where Mac Died

    I did find George McClellan Goughler burial site but not where I expected. It was more than 10 years after I started looking. Death records for Washington, Oregon and California yielded nothing. He was not buried in the River View Cemetery where his wife, Bessie, was buried. He was not listed in the Social Security index. I searched area newspapers for his obituary.

    For a long time, I felt like Mac had disappeared from Portland and Oregon altogether. But George McClellan Goughler had an uncommon name. I tried a global search on Find a Grave. I typed in only his name. A George M. Goughler came up. This George was buried in Evergreen Cemetery of Colorado Springs, El Pasco County, Colorado. A search of this city’s cemetery record showed the middle name as McClellan. A large sign for section 242 held many names. The burial date for George M. Goughler was given as September 10, 1952.

     As a result of all this looking, I found an institution in Colorado Springs that cared for old sick printers. George was a member of the International Typographical Union. He qualified for health care at the Union Printers Home.

    George McClellan Goughler was the type of man an unwed mother would give her baby to raise. I feel sad that were no obituaries for him at the time of his death. So here I am, sharing Mac’s memories 88 years after his burial.

  • Images

    I recently looked through my old treasures from the Ferguson family. I thought I should photograph these four big portraits. These people are related.

    In 2010 after the death of Aunt Betty Coursen Miller (gg granddaughter of Daniel Ferguson), Betty’s children give me family photos from the Ferguson Reynolds side. These photos are large, measuring 16″ by 20″. The images are on cardstock, yellowing, crumbly, and labeled as follows:

    Two photos had writing on the back on the back in what looks like Bessie Reynolds Cabell’s writing. One reads “Margaret St. John Ferguson.” This label gives information about who had the photos copied. It says, “Mrs. J. B. Cabell Baker City, Oregon, crayon, 3-18-02, April del W. Bowston.” April del W. Bowston was the artist who enhanced this portrait with crayon. Mrs. J. B. Cabell (Bessie Reynolds) was the granddaughter of Daniel Ferguson.

    The second photo has, “Edwin Wesley Reynolds married Margaret St. John Ferguson” written on the back. These first two photos made by photographing smaller photos of Margaret and Edwin. These smaller photos were taken in Baker City at Parker’s Studio around 1901. I have 4 /2” by 6 1/2″ photos of both identified as Edwin and Margaret Reynolds. Margaret’s age at Baker City sitting for the original photo was fifty-four.

    The third portrait was a drawing of Daniel Ferguson. It had a masking tape label saying, “Daniel H Ferguson married Jeannette Keller.” It was the one in the most deteriorating condition. It looks like a drawing.

    The fourth portrait shows a young woman about 18-years-old. She wore a white dress and has a mysterious smile . She looks very much like a younger version of Margaret. But the label on this lovely young lady photo reads, “Jeanette Keeler , wife of Daniel Ferguson.

    If this photo was taken of a 18-year-old Jeannette, the year would have been 1834.

    In the end, I decided this, too ,was a photo of Margaret Ferguson.

    None the less, these are some of my favorite photographs.Also they are an useful introduction to the next part of the Daniel Ferguson family story.

    Margaret’s Education

    Chances are greater than not that Margaret learned to draw quite young. 

    When Margaret was a young girl in the 1850s, opportunities for girls and young women were meager. Fewer opportunities exist in Oregon Territory. But in Oregon City just across the Willamette River starting in 1853, there was Clackamas County Female Seminary. Reading, writing and simple math, French, drawing and monochromatics were taught to the girls.   Monochromatics is drawing using shades and tints of one color. To attend this school for an 11-week quarter it cost six dollars. For an extra two dollars, the drawing lessons were offered.

    Some of Margaret’s art has been saved by the family. The drawing of her father, Daniel Ferguson, was probably Margaret’s work. Another piece, a mother and child drawing in the monochromatic style has Margaret name at the bottom of the piece.

    Here it is.

    Margaret signed this as Maggie Reynolds

    In 1857 the school faced financial ruin and was closed for a year. It reopened in 1858 under new management.

    Not long after this Daniel moved his family away from Oregon. Here is an ad placed by W. Blain in the Oregon Argus. It announced that the property on the hill above Linn City was for sale. This revealed that the Fergusons were still in Linn City in June of 1858. The whole family was there when the Oregon territorial census was taken in 1856 and 1857. Daniel, Jeannette, Elbert, James and Margaret left friends, neighbors. They also left a breath-taking view of Mount Hood when they left Linn City. They left for a home on the Columbia River in Washington Territory where the Cascade Rapids impeded river boat travel. And the 12-year-old Margaret probably had to give up drawing lessons.

    View of west side of Mount Hood

    They moved into a new house in Cascade City while still owning a house in Portland.

    Cascade City

    The next year the Fergusons moved to Cascade City also known as “Lower Cascades”. Cascade City developed around the army Fort Cascades. this fort was located on the north side of the Columbia River near today’s North Bonneville. In the 1860s, Cascade City was the largest town in Washington Territory and an important steamboat stop. Daniel’s neighbors, the Bradford brothers, owned dock and portage here. They took advantage of the passengers and cargo that had to bypass the river at Cascade City.

    The 1860 U.S. census listed 142 towns’ people in Cascade City. Also, there were 52 personnel at the garrison at Fort Cascades. At the beginning of the Civil War,this fort was abandoned by the army Then the town took over the fort.

    The Fergusons were listed in this census for Washington Territory, Skamania County and the town of the Cascades. They lived in dwelling number 602. Their surname was spelled incorrectly and written as “Fergerson”. Daniel H. Fergerson, a 46-year-old male headed this household. He was said to be a hotel keeper from New York. His family, Jeannette, aged 46, Elbert, aged 17, James, aged 15, and Margaret, aged 13, were listed next. Also, living at dwelling 602 were Thomas Pike, age 30, a ship carpenter, Albert Perval, age.

    A 21-year-old clerk named E. W. Reynolds lived close to the Fergusons in dwelling 600.

    Image of 1860 census, The Cascades, Dwelling 600 and dwelling 602

    The Teenage Margaret

    The house, mentioned in the 1860 census record as dwelling 602, was a second home for the Fergusons. They still owned a home in Portland, Oregon. This new home, like their other homes, fronted a major waterway used for shipping and travel in Oregon.

    Travel between their Portland home and their Cascades home was easy considering the times. If a person climbed aboard the Carrie Ladd of Captain Ainsworth’s fleet, the trip took a little over seven hours. It took five hours forty minutes to go down the Columbia to Vancouver, then 90 minutes inland to Portland.

    The Columbia River also marked the boundary between Oregon State and Washington Territory. The Fergusons lived on the Washington Territory side of the Columbia River.

     Living in Cascade City was more of a do-it-yourself affair than living in Portland and the Fergusons had hungry boarders. Margaret and her mother cooked on a cast iron stove. So, there was wood to chop, a fire to build and feed. Then, when cooking Margaret needed to monitor the fire to keep the temperature ideal.  To make a chicken dish, the chicken had to be caught, killed and plucked first. There was no refrigeration, so the roast chicken would have to be eaten soon after being cooked. William Moffitt was the area’s butcher, so there was beef.

    A root cellar kept vegetables like potatoes, carrots, parsnips, and turnips.  More perishable fruits and vegetables would be canned in mason jars. The climate being hot and dry during the canning season made this work hotter. The climate in the winter was cold and wet.                                                                                                                       

    Schools didn’t exist in Skamania County until Felix Iman and John Nelson built a log cabin schoolhouse in Stevenson. Stevenson, about two miles from Cascade City, still exists. The town was destroyed by flooding in June of 1894.  See more about Cascade City.

    Shortly after this census was recorded, circumstances in the Ferguson family changed. This left mother, Jeannette and daughter, Margaret with the work of running their hotel.

    Elbert, sick with tuberculosis died December 9, 1863. The family buried him in Portland, Oregon at Lone Fir Cemetery. In the 1860s, tuberculosis was the leading cause of death in Washington County, Oregon.

    James Ferguson went to Portland to clerk for the Harker brothers in 1861. The Harker Brothers, wholesale and retail dealers, sold clothing and dry goods. Their building was located at 53 Front Street, corner of Oak in Portland. James worked there for four years.

    Daniel built businesses in Washington Territory selling goods to miners in this big territory. He also mined for gold himself.

    So, at home in Cascade City, Margaret and Jeannette kept the home fires burning.

    Margaret’s Romance

    The clerk, living in B. F. Bradford’s house or dwelling 600 on the 1860 census record, noticed Margaret and she noticed him.

    The family believes Edwin came west in 1849. When Maggie met him, he was working on a steamer on the Columbia River.

    Edwin Wesley Reynolds married Margaret Ferguson on March 2, 1864. They were married at their Portland house with Jeannette and her brother James Ferguson as witnesses. The Ferguson Family Bible says:

    Edwin W Reynolds and Margaret were married in Portland, Oregon the year AD 1864 by the Rev Mr. Cornelius, a Baptist minister. 

    The young couple are listed in the 1870 census record for Baker City, Oregon.

    They lived in dwelling no. 4. Ed W. Reynolds, age 32, occupation, retail grocer had $2000 in real estate and $2000 in personal property. He was born in New York. Margaret Ferguson, age 22, occupation, keeping house, born in New York was listed next. The three children, all born in Oregon were George P., age 5, Addie J., age 4, and Frances G., age 3, were listed next. Lastly, Jeannette Ferguson, aged 53, born in Connecticut was listed.

    James Ferguson lived next door. He was in business with Margaret’s husband, Edwin Reynolds. Here is a copy of this record.

    1870 Baker City Census showing The Fergusons and the Reynolds

    So, now the Ferguson family is based in Baker City, Oregon except for Daniel. He was gold mining in Cerro Gordo located in California.

  • Too Much Fire in the Box

    I have been writing a series of blogs about Daniel Ferguson and his family. Even week 7, Fanny’s Letter, touched on this family.

    My series started with week 28, Traveling by Mailboat. Then came week 43(urban) with City Girl. The city girl was Daniel’s wife, Jeannette Keeler Ferguson. After that for week 41(water), I wrote Water and Steamboats. This time I am working on week 42(fire). My title is “Too Much Fire in the Box”. It details the Gazelle’s explosion. This happened on the Gazelle’s first regularly scheduled run on the upper Willamette River in Oregon Territory.

    Questions

    I struggled with a few questions while researching this important event in Daniel Ferguson’s life. Why isn’t Daniel mentioned in the aftermath of the explosion? Why did Gazelle’s two boilers explode? Why did the explosions happen simultaneously?

    The Superintendent Question

    If Daniel owned the Willamette Falls Company, he would call himself anything he wanted in reference to his company. He preferred superintendent. He called himself that up until the first regular run of the steamboat. In news items and government documents, Daniel is listed as the superintendent of the Willamette Falls Company. Here is a copy of an index card I found at Oregon State Archives in Salem, Oregon. I have copies of the two documents noted on this card. Here is his closing sentence and signature on the petition to amend act of incorporation.

    Daniel Ferguson, “Petition to amend act of incorporation of the Willamette Falls, Canal, Milling and Transportation Company,” Oregon Territory, Washington County, Dec. 31, 1853, Territorial and Provisional Government Papers, Oregon State Achieves, microfilm no. 5710, accessed: April 2019 (http:sos.oregon.gov/archives/records

    The document titled house bill #43 was approved on January 15, 1853. Daniel Ferguson, C.W. B(unreadable)ley and Colin C Baker are named as associates in this incorporation venture.

    Sometime in March of 1853, David Paige came into the business. This man surely was the one Daniel sold and conveyed the Willamette Falls Company to on March 19, 1853. David Paige was not a ship builder, but his company, Paige, Bacon & Co. financed two steamboats for river transportation here. This company’s intent was to control transportation in Willamette Valley. Canemah, located above the falls on the upper Willamette River, was the building site. The second steamboat Paige’s company built, the Gazelle, was finished in March of 1854. Their first boat had burned on October 6, 1853, at Oregon City.

    Here is a copy of another index card I found at Oregon State Archives in Salem, Oregon. This one tells a little about David Paige.

    Even after Paige bought the company Daniel did not leave. Daniel remained as superintendent .David would be the chief superintendent.

    On December 31, 1853, Daniel sent a petition to the Oregon legislature to amend incorporation of the Willamette Falls Company. He asked for 6 months more time. This document mentioned Paige’s lost steamboat. The calamity Daniel speaks of was the loss of this boat by fire. He writes:

    In support of the extension of time, say for six months, your petitioner would only urge this (because of) the magnitude of this undertaking and the happening of the calamity which no reasonable foresight could have avoided. It’s a pledge of future fidelity, in their public engagement to execute the work; your petitioner points to the acts and labors of the company during this past summer and hopes they may be regarded as an ample guaranty. Their improvement can be completed in six months and will be.

    Daniel Ferguson, “Petition to amend act of incorporation of the Willamette Falls, Canal, Milling and Transportation Company,” Oregon Territory, Washington County, Dec. 31, 1853, Territorial and Provisional Government Papers, Oregon State Achieves, microfilm no. 5710, accessed: April 2019 (http:sos.oregon.gov/archives/records

    More About the Gazelle

    The Gazelle, a twin engine side wheeler, had 2 high- pressure boilers. These were tube type boilers. The engines, being built back East, needed to be shipped around the horn to the west coast. About the time these engines were built, the Steamboat Act of 1852 was passed. This act required boilers to be tested and fitted with pressure relief valves. Since there was a report saying the chief engineer tied the pressure valves down, the Gazelle had pressure valves.

    The First Regular Trip of the Gazelle

    It happened on the day of the Gazelle’s first regular run at 6:30 a.m. on April 8, 1854. The Gazelle was loaded with 60 people and tied up at the dock at Canemah. The engineer, Moses Tonie tied the safety valve of the steam engine down to make the departure fast. Tonie noticed something was wrong and made his own exit. A minute later both engines exploded. Of the 60 on board 20 people died at once and four more died later. Moses Tonie was later charged with gross and culpable negligence. He allowed too much steam in the boilers. The water levels got too low.

    Here is a newspaper clipping from the Daily Placer Times.This California newspaper copied an Oregon Spectator article from April 8, 1854. News from Oregon came by steamer.

    “Terrible Accident,” Weekly Oregonian, (Portland, Oregon), April 15, 1854, p.2, col. 2, digital images, GenealogyBank.com,  (http://www.genealogybank.com, accessed: May 4, 2019)

    The Oregon Spectator printed this on April 8, 1854 describing the reaction of the Oregon city town’s people. It reads:

    This distressing disaster has thrown a deep shade of gloom over the whole community. Stores, shops, iron works, mills are closed for the afternoon–business generally is closed. In Canemah, a feeling of intense grief is manifested by nearly everyone to be seen. Col. White, Mr. Post, Jho. P. Brooks and others, generously open their places of business and spare rooms for the benefit of the wounded, and for the dead bodies, until they are recognized and cared for by the respective friends.

    The coroner’s report blamed Moses Tonie for the accident. Tonie did not testify. He ran from the exploding boat and then fled to Washington territory. He wasn’t seen again.

    This unhappy event ended Willamette Falls Company’s brief steamboat operations on the Willamette River.

  • The Traveling Baby Grand

    Starr Minum Grand, The Indianapolis Star, 16 Dec 1906 p. 52

    I wrote this post for week 34 of the 52 Ancestors in 52 weeks for 2025. The ad at the beginning of this post shows the Minum grand piano built by the Starr Piano Company. I found this ad in the Indianapolis Star, dated December 16, 1906. I saw and heard this piano at my husband’s grandmother’s beach house in 1968. It, along with the human piano player, produced a lovely mellow clear sound as indicated in the ad.

    Lifting the keyboard cover, I found this on the underside of the keyboard cover.

    Raymond’s Early Life

    Raymond Coursen, the first husband of Frances Cabell Coursen Perritt played this model and played it well. The baby grand didn’t come into Raymond’s and Frances’s lives until they had settled on Maui on the Hawaiian Islands.

    Raymond made piano music and sang long before he married Frances. This wasn’t even the first piano in Raymond’s life. A clipping, saved by Frances described Raymond as 7-year-old boy at a big recital with a black eye. He sang in his young soprano voice a solo- “Sleep, Little Tulip”.

    Edgar Coursen, his father, taught him to play the piano while he was a boy. Soon his legs were long enough to reach the petals. So then his father taught him how to play the organ. His mother Annie Griffin Coursen was the singer in the family. She sang opera on stage.

    Off To College

    Raymond entered Oregon Agricultural College (OAC) in 1912. He was a natural choice for a piano accompanist. He joined the Glee and Mandolin club at OAC. He performed piano solos at this club’s concerts as well as being the accompanist for the group.

    A Year in the Hawaiian Islands

    His expressive playing led to a job in his junior year.  In 1914, the Liberty theater of Honolulu hired Raymond to play the organ at their theater in Honolulu, Hawaii. The photo below shows the theater organ at the bottom middle. The films shown during this era were silent, so Raymond supplied sound by playing the organ. The Liberty theater also held live performances on stage. Raymond is playing on a grand piano in the back on the right.

    After playing for 8 months in the theater in Honolulu, he went on tour. He joined the Bervani Grand Opera Company. During the next month he did a tour of the islands. At the end of the tour, he went back to playing at the Liberty Theater.

    Back To Portland, Oregon

    Returning to Oregon but not to OAC, Raymond found a girl. He married Frances Cabell on September 16, 1916. Then he introduced his bribe to the Hawaiian Islands. They moved to Maui where Kula Sanitarium hired him as superintendent of outside work. After three years at the sanitarium, he was hired by the Hilo Sugar Company to work on their Wainaku farm. This farm was also on Maui. Both daughters were born on Maui Island- Rose in May of 1917 and Betty (Elizabeth) in December of 1918.

    The Baby Grand Piano

    The Coursens purchased their baby grand piano from the Starr Piano Company while they were in the islands. Since the Minum grand model was built in Richmond, Indiana, their piano’s first trip involved a long ocean voyage. But the Starr Piano Company shipped their products. From Richmond, Indiana to Maui it is about 4,300 miles. This trip was not the last ocean voyage the Coursen’s baby grand piano made.

    Return to the Mainland

    In the summer of 1923, the Raymond Coursen family returned the mainland of United States. They arrived aboard the SS Enterprise at the port of San Francisco on August 25, 1923. Among the items shipped for Raymond was his baby grand piano. The American and Foreign Marine Insurance Company insured this piano for 700 dollars. The piano was to travel from Hilo to Seattle, Washington, then on to Portland. I assume the insurance was for damage at sea. From there the piano went to 658 Lovejoy St., Portland, Oregon where Raymond’s Mother and father lived. The young Coursen family visited with the elder Coursen family for a while.

    To Bend Oregon

    Four years later, the family moved to a ranch in the Tumalo project, located near Bend, Oregon.

    Edgar Coursen visited them there sometime in 1927 and writes to Frances in September of 1927.

    “There is one thing sure and that the kiddies (Rose and Betty) are getting a good, rugged, healthy start in life that will stay with them for good. And I want to congratulate you Frances on the beautiful way that the children are being brought up.”

    In another letter Grandfather Coursen asks after the horses, cows, dog, cats and chickens at their Tumalo home. Apparently, Edgar Coursen regarded this venture as wilderness farming. But they did have the baby grand piano to play in Tumalo. Raymond taught both girls to play.

    In July, 1928, Raymond started working for the Brooks-Scanlon Lumber Company of Bend. He worked there until his death in 1933. In Bend, the Coursens lived first at 125 Revene Avenue and then at 316 Delaware Street. Raymond studied small engines on the job and by correspondence. On September 14, 1932 he was proclaimed proficient in these topics. He had studied machines, electricity and refrigeration.He was awarded certification stating this from the International Correspondence Schools in Scranton, Pennsylvania. 

    A Sad Event

    About one year later Raymond died in Portland, Oregon after surgery for bladder tumors. He had a severe reaction to the nupercaine spinal anesthesia used during the surgery. Raymond died 22 June 1933. He was sorely missed by his family and Bend friends. Frances and the girls moved to Portland later that summer.

    The baby grand was moved back to Portland. This time Frances and the girls moved in with her mother, Bessie Goughler, and Bessie Husband Mac. Bessie and Mac’s house at 3415 N.E. 47th Ave. was big enough to house them all, even the piano.

    Frances worked and saved until she became a home owner herself. She bought a house at 6305 Brazee Street in Rose City.They moved in on January 18, 1936. Their piano moved with them. But this wasn’t the piano last home.

    The daughters married in 1940. Rose married Howard Foster on June 30 1940. Betty married Bud Robert “Bud” Miller on August 30, 1940.

    Frances Marries Again

    Frances married Hayes Marion Perritt on April 12 1942. They bought property on the Oregon coast near Lincoln City. This place was so remote that electrical and telephone service was not available.

    It must have been a struggle to move the baby grand piano up the steep gravel and grass road. But it happened. Frances played the piano at night by lantern light. The piano sat in the Perritt’s beach house for more than 40 years.

    When this couple separated, Frances moved to a small apartment in Beaverton, Oregon. It filled half the largest room. Visitors squeezed around it. Frances died on May 20, 1994.

    The piano went to a grandson’s home and is still there. It had been new more than 100 years ago.

    Here is a photo.

  • Water and Steamboats

    Part 3 of the Daniel Ferguson Story

    Frances Perritt, my husband grandmother, saved a clipping of her grandmother’s obituary. Her Grandmother, Margaret St John Ferguson Reynolds, was Daniel’s daughter. The part in the obituary about Daniel reads:

    Her father Daniel H Ferguson was a mill man and steamboat owner. In the early days and at one time he owned the dam where Oregon City locks are now located.

    The obituary of Louis P. Reynolds reads that “he was the grandson of the late Daniel H. Ferguson who was one of the principal owners of the Willamette Falls Canal and Milling Co. of Oregon City, in 1852 to 1853.”

    In my search for the owner of Willamette Falls Canal and Milling Co., I found several articles about Robert Moore saying he was the owner of this company. Then after much searching, I found a newspaper article In the Oregon Argus, dated August 21, 1858. This article explained the ownership of this company. But first a little background would be appropriate.

    Before Daniel bringing his family to Willamette Valley, he prospected for gold on the Yuba River in northern California. He and his brother, Thomas, had other business besides gold mining. One was investing in fast growing towns. Thomas wrote in a letter to his wife in Florida in April of 1850. He said “I have invested in Lindd <sic> City (Linn City, Oregon) one thousand dollars.”

    Daniel and Thomas were in business together. They referred to themselves as Ferguson & Ferguson or the Ferguson Brothers.

    So, Daniel had some dealings with Linn City a couple of years before his arrival in Oregon.

    The Main Water Ways of Oregon

    Before railroads came to the Willamette Valley, travel by steamboat was the main way to get between Astoria and Marysville. Shipping on the upper and lower Willamette was a profitable enterprise.

    Two river dominated Daniel’s life after he moved with his family to Oregon—the Columbia and the Willamette. The Columbia River separated Washington Territory from Oregon Territory when Washington Territory was established on March 2, 1853.

    The Willamette River flows through the Willamette Valley north from Eugene. The upper tributaries of the Willamette originate in the mountains outside Eugene.  On its way north to the Columbia River this river flows through the many Oregon towns. Some of these towns along the upper Willamette are Eugene, Corvallis, Albany, Salem, Newburg, Wilsonville, Oregon City, and Portland. It empties into the Columbia River at Kelley Point, Portland, Oregon. It is the 13th largest river by volume in the United States. The Willamette Falls is located between West Linn and Oregon city. It is the second largest waterfall by volume of water in the U.S.

    This large waterfall was an obstacle to steamboat travel on the Willamette River between the upper and lower river.

    Photograph of Willamette Falls in Oregon City, Oregon, from California Historic Society and USC

    Grass crops like wheat and rye did well in the upper Willamette Valley. The excess crops needed to be transported down the Willamette to Portland and beyond.

    Ideally transporting these excess crops on the river would solve the problem. The typical steamship was large and deep keeled. It couldn’t maneuver in the shallow water of the upper river beyond Oregon City. The Lot Whitcomb, built in Milwaukie, Oregon in 1850, ran on the lower Willamette. She traveled between Milwaukie and Astoria. Daniel planned to enter this new industry with boats designed for the shallower upper river waters. Getting the right design of steamboat was not the only problem.

    The other problem was getting the goods from the upper river to the lower river.  There was a 35 feet drop over Willamette Falls at Oregon City. A portage road around the falls existed at this time.

    Robert Moore’s Linn City

    Donation Land Claim Map 1852 Linn City and Oregon City from West Linn Historical Society

    Robert Moore’s Linn City (West Linn) was situated on the west bank of the Willamette River. Oregon City on the east side was directly across the river. In 1846, Linn City consisted of about 15 houses occupied by mechanics employed by Moore. They worked in his flour and lumber mills. His employees also ran a ferry which crossed the river to Oregon City. Moore also owned Willamette Falls, Canal, Milling and Transportation Company and a newspaper, The Spectator.

    Daniel Ferguson in Linn City

    When the Ferguson family came to Portland, they soon acquired a home there. Their house stood on 2nd Street, one door down north of Mill Street. It was close to the Willamette River. Soon after they were settled in Portland, Daniel started traveling upriver to Linn City. By 1853 Daniel even had living quarters on the hillside overlooking Linn City. Robert Moore lived nearby. By the time, this man was tremendously overweight, unhealthy and had debts.

    In December 1852, Robert Moore transferred the title and the land of this company to Daniel. Robert gained some capital and a promissory note. Daniel acquired a ten-year mortgage. Daniel was now the owner of the Willamette Falls, Canal, Milling and Transportation Company. He also owned the land where the Oregon City Locks are now located. Daniel’s ownership of these properties lasted only a few months.

     In January, 1853, he asked the provincial government of the Oregon territory for permission to incorporate this business. Then in March of that year he transferred the title and the debt to this new corporation. People referred to this company as the Willamette Falls Company, the Willamette Falls Canal Company, D. Ferguson Company and Messrs., Ferguson and Company.

    Daniel’s Building Projects at Canemah

    In June of 1853 Daniel ran this ad in The Weekly Oregonian.

    Wanted Immediately

    Twelve good drillers and blasters; Fifty good common labors, person used to quarrying and working rock; Six good carpenters, such as are used to working timber; Three good hands used to boating and rafting timber; Also One good blacksmith, one that is competent to do all kinds of black smith work.

    Constant employment and good wages will be given to such by applying to the office of the Willamette Falls Canal Company.

    Daniel H. Ferguson         Superintendent

    “Wanted Immediately,” Weekly Oregonian (Portland, Oregon) 2 July 1853, p.3; digital images, GenealogyBank (http//:www.genealogybank.com

    Daniel wanted to build a breakwater. His men would dig a basin big enough to accommodate a steamboat while loading and unloading cargo. This work would be carried out at Canemah. Canemah was at the southern end of portage around Willamette Falls. It was used by native Americans as a takeout place for canoes before carrying the canoes around the falls. Here boat traffic from the upper Willamette River stopped. People and goods were unloaded and taken around the falls to Oregon City around the falls. Then they were loaded into another boat.

    Before Daniel left Canemah he and his men had built a sawmill, gristmill a warehouse, and a wharf.

    In August of 1853 Daniel Ferguson is praised by the editor of the Oregon Spectator. The article reads.

    At Canemah, within the past twelve months…Our neighbor too, Linn City is not behind in enterprise and good works. Under the energetic management of D. Ferguson and Company, a fine breakwater and dam are rapidly advancing to completion. Mills and warehouses are now framed and soon to be erected, all calculated to give unsurpassed facilities for transportation of merchandise above and below the falls together with magnificent water power which could drive all the mills of Lowell and Rochester combined. The work is built so far as we can judge, in the most durable and permanent manner, with great strength and on a judicious plan. Nature has done wonders for the locality, and Messrs., Ferguson and Co. are most ably seconding her labors.

    “Improvement,” Oregon Spectator, (Oregon City, Oregon) 26 August 1853, p.2 col 2; digital images; Historic Oregon Newspapers,(http://oregonnews.edu

    In the January 7th 1854, the editor of the Spectator again praises Daniel’s work in Linn City. The editor describes the breakwater Daniel is having built. The editor also describes a device Daniel is having built that will make unloading and loading the boats much easier.

    …The plan is admirable, and no giant power of water could have been more completely controlled and managed. The breakwater is some thirty rods cast from, and running parallel with the west bluff of the river, and continues near one-fourth of a mile up the river from the perpendicular falls, so that by a connection of the west bluff with the breakwater by a dam passing along near the brink of the precipice, the various designs and objects in view of water into are fully accomplished, viz: the reception of water into the harbor for the admission of steamers, and for the purpose of driving their and extensive saw and flouring mills and enable them  to exchange the lading from boats above and below the falls, loaded with the various products of the upper country, and those below laden with  goods, can come together and have their freight discharged by a timber built into cribs, which  are piled with stone and sufficiently covered with plank. The works are placed upon the solid rock and are as lasting and durable as the very hills. Ferguson and Co. are much applauded for the undertaking of that which seemed almost impossible…

    “For the Spectator,” Oregon Spectator, (Oregon City, Oregon) 7 January 1854, p.2 col 3; digital images; Historic Oregon Newspapers,(http://oregonnews.edu

    The Steamboats

    In 1851, the only way boating on the upper Willamette was by canoe. The trip to Salem and Marysville (Corvallis) was long, tiring and not practical for transporting goods.

    In 1853, four steamboats operated out of Canemah. They were the Oregon, the Wallamet, the Portland and the Belle. Daniel’s Willamette Falls Company, owned the Belle and the Oregon. In April 1854 ,Daniel planned to launch another steamboat that was being built at Canemah. This steamboat, the Gazelle, would run on the upper river between Marysville and Canemah.

    The Belle, which was already in service ran on the lower river. With the launch of the Gazelle the company would have three steamboats on the Willamette River.

    On March 4, 1854, Daniel puts this ad in the Weekly Oregonian.

    Notice to the Public

    The Willamette Falls Co. is now ready to receive and forward all kinds of merchandise, through their new warehouse, up and down the river. The steamer Belle, Capt. Wells, is running from Portland to the falls in connection with the steamer Oregon from our new warehouse to the head of navigation on the upper Willamette.

    The new steamer Gazelle, under the command of Capt. R. Hereford, will be ready to run in a few days.

    Charge for passing freight over the fall is $1 per ton.

    Passengers will be conveyed to and from Oregon City at all times with dispatch.

    D. H. FERGUSON, Superintendent

    Notice to the Public,” Weekly Oregonian, (Portland, Oregon) 4March 1854, p.5 Col. 1, digital images, GenealogyBank.com,  (http://www.genealogybank.com

    On March 11, 1854, Daniel puts this ad in the Weekly Oregonian.

    On March 18, 1854 the Gazelle made her first run on the upper Willamette with Capt. Robert Hereford at the helm.  A local newspaper had this to say about the run.

    The fine weather and good music tended not a little to enhance the pleasure of the ladies and gentlemen on board, and all were highly entertained and pleased. Her tables are laden with Oregon’s choicest productions, together with a select variety of imported fruit, etc. Who wishes for better accommodations, even in this Tyee day of Oregon refinement?

    “Gazelle (sidewheeler,1854)”, Wikipedia, Sept. 1, 2011, (http://en.wikipedia.org:

    In this description of the Gazelle’s first trip on the upper Willamette, the editor uses the term “Typee day. The term, “Typee day”, comes from a novel by Herman Melville called Typee and published in 1846. It means a relaxed and unhurried day. This is a high point in Daniel’s life’s work and is about to change. It would be a long time before Daniel had a Typee day again.

  • A City Girl

    Week 43 Urban, Part 2 of the Daniel H. Ferguson Story

    Jeannette Keeler was a city girl. She was born on July 16, 1816, to Abraham Keller and Sarah Dann Keeler. Their town, Danbury, Connecticut, was a growing town of 3.5 thousand people and a thriving industry. The people of Danbury made hats.

    I found a small item from Jeannette’s life in the scrapbook I inherited from my husband’s grandmother, Frances Perritt. Jeannette was my husband’s 3rd great grandmother. This item was a small white card rimmed in black and inscribed, Mrs. D. H. Ferguson. Calling cards or visiting cards, popular across America throughout the 1800s. Ladies carried in small purses when making their social calls to family and friends. They left cards at each house they visited. They usually left three cards- one for the master and two for the mistress. The host often displayed these cards on a small table in the front hall. The card of the most high-ranking caller was on top. A black-edged card meant the caller was in mourning.

    Jeannette Keeler married Daniel Howes Ferguson on June 21, 1838, in Danbury, Fairfield, Connecticut. The wedding was a home wedding. J. G. Collum officiated. The young couple settled in Norwalk- a settlement on the northern shore of Long Island Sound. Their five children were all born here in Norwalk, Fairfield County, Connecticut. Their youngest two, both James and Margaret, told census takers they were born in New York. By this they meant the New York metropolitan area which included the city and suburbs of New York City. Long Island where Norwalk, Connecticut is located is in this metropolitan area as well as parts of New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

    Margaret and Daniel were the parents of five children born in Norwalk. The Ferguson Family Bible lists births of him, his wife, and children.

    Daniel H. Ferguson was born March 18, 1816.

    Jennette Keeler was born July (illegible),1816.

    Elbreannah Ferguson was born May 2, 1839.

    Frances Anne Ferguson was born April 17, 1841.

    Elbert Frances Ferguson was born May 21, 1843.

    James F. Ferguson Aug. 16, 1845.

    Margaret St. John Ferguson Oct. 24, 1847

    In the summer of 1842, Jeannette Ferguson had black-edged cards printed. The cards said Mrs. D.H. Ferguson. She had much to mourn. On June 16, 1842, her first child, a daughter, Elbreannah died. Less than a month later, July 8, 1842, Frances Anne died. Jeannette and Daniel buried their girls in Danbury at the Wooster Street Cemetery in the graveyard behind the jail.

    Shortly after their last child, Margaret St. John, was born the Fergusons moved from Norwalk to Danbury. The people of Danbury still made hats.

    Danbury was the “town to be in” if you were in the hatting business in 1840. In 1820 there were twenty-eight hat factories in Danbury. The raw materials needed to make beaver skin top hats grew in the woods and rivers nearby. The beavers lived in the streams. Woodmen cut trees for wood. Workers used water power from the rivers to drive the machinery. Making beaver fur into hats requires heat, moisture and pressure to felt the fur. Then hatters shaped the felt into hats. By 1831 the number of people involved in the hatting business surpassed the number in all the other Danbury businesses put together. By mid-1840s the hatting business became mechanized. Hatter manufactured more hats in Danbury than anywhere in the United States. Danbury was known as Hat City.

    While Daniel sought gold in California, Daniel’s family lived with Jeannette’s younger sister, Marietta Keeler Hyatt, her husband, Alfred Hyatt. Alfred, head of his household, was a hatter. Marietta and Alfred had two boys, Edward and Wallace. The 1850 federal census lists these eight people living in one housing unit, dwelling number 642. Alfred Hyatt is listed as head of family 754 and Jeannette (Jeannette), age 32 is head of family 755. Her three children are- Elbert, age 8, James, age 5 and Maryetta (Margaret), age 3. James and Elbert attend school.

    Here is a photo copy of this 1850 record from Danbury

    Daniel Ferguson Make an Entrance

    Jeannette worried that Daniel had not arrived home by Christmas as planned, but he did get there before 1850 ended.

    He arrived in Norwalk harbor aboard the SS Ohio with Captain Schenck at the helm. Daniel had hoped to reach home before Christmas; the Ohio had just departed from Havana on December 18th on time. Shortly out of the Havana harbor one of her engines blew out so she returned to Havana for repairs. She resumed her trip on the 19th making good headway until the 22nd of December when a gale hit. Having only partial power she sat out this storm; then shortly after getting underway she sprung a leak. Passengers and crew alike bailed water out a little faster than it came in. The Ohio reached the wharf at Norwalk on December 26, 1850.

    To Oregon

    Did Jeannette want to travel thousands of miles to the west coast? It would be a hard trip with three children. Her youngest, Margaret, was only four. But Daniel did convince his wife to go west with him.

    The next time Daniel traveled his family came with him. His family included Daniel himself, Jeannette, Elbert, James and Margaret. They traveled the same route as Daniel had. This time Daniel was a rich man and who bought the nicer lodgings in comfortable ship quarters. There were goodbyes to be said, items to buy and letters to write. The boys finished a term at school. Also, they needed to consider the best season to cross the Isthmus of Panama. Cholera, although always a risk, was at epidemic proportions in the rainy season. On the first leg of their journey, they traveled by boat from New York to Chagres. The second leg across the Isthmus started at Chagres where they boarded flat-bottomed boats. Men pushed the boats up the Chagres River with poles to Gorgona. After Gorgona they rode mules to Panama City. Alligators, monkeys, parrots, and mosquitoes buzzed, hummed, screamed, and showed their teeth. Yellow fever, cholera, and malaria still sickened travelers. They were brave to come, and they survived the crossing of the Isthmus. The trip from Panama City to San Francisco was tame compared to crossing the Isthmus. But it was long and usually took two months by boat. When they reached San Francisco, they visited places and people Daniel knew. They arrived in Portland, Oregon sometime in 1852. They finished the ocean voyage part of their trip at Astoria as their destination was Portland, Oregon, USA. The Columbia River enters the sea at Astoria; canoes and small river steamboats took travelers on to Portland. In that year according to Claude-Alain Saby, Portland’s population was about 4000 people. 

    Elbert Ferguson, who about 10 when the family arrived, died on December 9, 1863. Quite a while before this event, the Fergusons had established friends and a residence in Portland on 2nd Street. Here is a copy of the newspaper notice.

    Daniel, being restless and enterprising, would convince Jeannette to go with him many more times. In the end she outlived him. Here is her obituary.

    This obituary, published in The Morning Oregonian on April 20, 1984, has some mistakes. Bible records put Jeannette birth in July of 1816. The family came to Portland, Oregon and built a house before moving to Oregon City. Daniel lived in Oregon City alone in 1853. He is recorded in both the 1853 Oregon Territorial census and the 1857 census. The 1853 census recorded him as living alone in Oregon City. In the 1857 record, he is shown with his family. So Jeannette was living in Oregon City by 1858. It looks like whoever wrote the obituary switched the 1853 and 1858 dates.

    Why Jeannette moved to Oregon City

    Soon after the Fergusons set up housekeeping in Portland, Daniel started traveling to Oregon City. Oregon City is located 12 miles up the river from Portland. Two steamboats took passengers between Oregon City and Portland. One, the Portland, was a side wheeler. The other, the Multnomah, was a stern wheeler. The Multnomah ran every day except Sunday. The Portland ran a couple times a week. On July 2, 1857 the Multnomah fell over the falls at Oregon City putting her out of the picture.

    Jeannette wanted to see her husband more than twice a week. She and the children moved to Oregon City as shown in the 1857 Oregon Territorial census.

    Another Piece of this Story to Come

    The next piece is about Daniel’s project in Oregon City and a fatal fire. Another piece of Daniel Ferguson life is included in Traveling by Mail Boat.

  • Traveling by Mailboat

    The Ferguson Brothers Go West

    for week 28-travel

    Daniel Howes Ferguson, my husband’s 3rd great grandfather traveled to San Francisco, California in 1849. Part of this trip he was with his brother, Thomas Jefferson Ferguson.

    When I think of this trip, the nursery rhyme, “To Market, to Market”, comes to mind.

    To market, to market to buy a fat pig:
    Home again, home again, jiggety-jig.
    To market, to market to buy a fat hog.
    Home again, home again, jiggety-jog.

    In this nursery rhyme the travelers rode in a cart or buggy pulled by a horse. The Ferguson brothers traveled by ship. Daniel left in the spring of 1849 from Norwalk Harbor, New York City. Thomas left from Key West, Florida. They met in Panama City and traveled together from there.

    Letters exchanged between Thomas and his wife, Rosalinda, describe the doings of these two industrious and lucky gold miners. Mary Haffenreffer transcribed most of these letters and published them along with her research into the Ferguson family in the Florida Keys Sea Heritage Journal, fall 2012 and winter 2013. She also sent me copies of the original letters.

    The Fergusons traveled on a mail boat steamship. The Falcon was the one Thomas rode. This small steamship with Captain Thomson at the helm, was one of the three ships carrying U.S. mail as well as passengers on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus of Panama. The Falcon’s first trip between New York City and Charges, Panama happened in December of 1848 and took 26 days. The Falcon left New York City on December 1 and arrived in Charges on December 27. The route was New York to Savannah to Charleston to Havana to New Orleans to Chargres. It included mail pick-ups and drop-offs as well as passenger pick-ups.

    Here are maps showing the route.

    Around the time Thomas left Key West Florida for Havana, Cuba, he received this letter from his brother William E. Ferguson. It reads:

    Brother Thomas,

    I have thought it advisable to write you to give you the particulars brought by the Steamer Northerner from Chagres.

    I was conversing with a passenger who went from New York in company with fifteen others. They thought to get passage from Chagres but they found no opportunity to get from there. There is onboard three who bought steerage tickets in New York for $100.00 for each. One sold at Chagres for $450.00, one for$500.00 and the other for $700.00, and they state that there is 2500 persons on the Isthmus now waiting for a passage to San Francisco. My informant states that they think that there is a poor chance of the steamers returning from San Francisco and there is no sailing vessels at Panama. He states that he is going to New York to procure tickets if possible to go through, if not to write them to return to New York and proceed around the hook. I would advise you to go by land some route through Mexico if possible. I think we will get from here next week. They are getting every ready as soon as possible.

    Remember me to all friends.

    W.E. Ferguson

    Letters to Rosalinda

    Charleston April 5th, 1849

    The first letter Thomas wrote to his wife Rosalinda Corcoran Ferguson reflects what his brother William said.

    Havana, April the 8th, 1849

    I arrived here at 9 o’clock the next morning after I left home. I learn here that there are two thousand passengers at Panama waiting for passage. I think of altering my route to Vera Cruz and go through Mexico.

    The trouble with going through Mexico was that the United States had just won a war with Mexico, known as The Mexican War in the States and The American Intervention War in Mexico.  Mexico lost on third of its territory by the “Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo”. Traveling from Vera Cruz through Mexico, those Americans who chose to that way were likely meet angry Mexican citizens who would have no interest in aiding them and might even rob and kill them.

    In his next letter also written from Havana to his wife, he had changed his mind about traveling through Mexico.    He now planned to sail to Chagres on the steamer Falcon.

    Panama April the 22th, 1849

    Dear Wife,

    I write you once more from this place though I expected to leave here before this but receiving information from Vera Cruz not very favorable of the route through Mexico, I have altered my mind and shall go the way of Panama…  I expect I shall find my brother Daniel there if he has not got passage away which is doubtful. The steamer Falcon will be here on the 25th going to Chagres… Write me whether you heard anything more from Albert before he left Charleston.

                                     Thomas J. Ferguson

    On April 25, 1849, Thomas Ferguson left Havana on the Falcon heading to Chagres. He arrived in Panama City on the Pacific side of the Isthmus on May 9, 1849. Thomas didn’t mention how he got across the Isthmus after he landed at the mouth of the Chagres River.

    Up the Chagres River and on to Panama City

    The 60 miles between the mouth of the Chagres River and Panama City is challenging for most. It involved first chugging up the Chagres River in a small steamboat for 12 miles. Then the river became very shallow. Travelers boarded flat bottomed canoes called bungas which were poled or dragged by men. Clouds of mosquitoes, stifling heat and big alligators added to the atmosphere.  The passengers rode mules for the last 24 miles because the waterway ended at the very small village of Gorgona. Besides the discomfort caused by heat, reptiles, insects there were illnesses. People often caught cholera, malaria and yellow fever on this route.

    Daniel had a similar though longer journey as he had traveled from Norwalk Harbor. He arrived in Panama City before his brother Thomas.

    Letters to Rosalinda

    Panama May the 11th, 1849

    Dear Wife,

    I arrived here day before yesterday and shall leave day after tomorrow morning on the ship Norman in company with my brother Daniel, Stafford and Saywood and the rest of the Key West party who I have found here all well, all excited to get away to the Land of Promise. Daniel tells me he had a talk with fifteen young men who arrived here a few days ago on the steamer Oregon from California on their way home. They said they got as much gold as they wanted and were going home to enjoy it. They had got seven bushels of pure gold with them that they had dug themselves in the space of six months. Daniel says they told him to keep cool, that there was enough gold there for all…I have got my passage in a first rate ship by Daniel’s having a pass engaged for his brother-in-law who hasn’t got here yet.

                                                         Thomas J. Ferguson

    San Francisco- July 31st, 1849

    Dear Wife,

    I arrived here on the 15th of this month having sixty three days passage from Panama, rather a tedious  passage but well and hearty, the weather at sea was calm and sea very Smooth. On my arrival here Daniel and I took a small job which we done in a week for which we got five hundred dollars. Since then we have built us a boat to go up to the mines and intend to leave tomorrow. I was offered sixteen dollars a day the day I got here and refuse good jobs now to go up to the mines so you may judge what I think of the prospect. The gold stories we heard about California before I left home was no humbug. I have seen lots of the gold here, one lump weighing fourteen and half pounds. I don’t know as I shall find any of those big lumps but I am bound to have gold of some sort; there is plenty of it here and no mistake. This place is very healthy though cold. I have wore flannel shirt and drawer with my thick buckskin pantaloons ever since I have been here and then been cold with a severe wind from the sea like our Northers in Key West but back from the coast it is warm.  I eat apples, Pears and blackberries here. Some things here sell high, others very low .Clothing is cheaper than it is in the States,  flour $10, pork $25, beef $5,of the best salt, fresh beef from 12 to 18 cents a lb., potatoes $10 for a hundred lbs., onions seventy five cents a pound, cheese fifty, saleratus (baking powder)$2.50, butter $1.50, cheese fifty cents. This town is overrun with goods, the streets and yards full, lying about open, nobody steals. There ain’t a quarter stores enough to hold them. …

                                                                 Thomas J. Ferguson

    By October they were on the Yuba River prospecting and had made a claim. The Yuba River, located in the Sierra Nevada’s in northern California, is a major tributary to the Feather River.

    Uba (Yuba) River Calif. Oct 21st 1849

    Dear Wife,

    … I will now give you a statement of my success. After arriving here I spent a month in hunting, or prospecting as they call it here, up and down the river for a good place to locate. I at length found one which prove to be good on which my brother and myself built two machines for washing out gold and a water wheel to lift up water out of the holes we dig which works them all effectually so much so that we have made over five thousand dollars in the last three weeks…

    By a great odd we have got the richest spot I have ever seen on the river. It is a small bar on the side of the river in the form of a triangle about fifty yards on each side with rocks ten feet high on two sides and the river on the other. We have the whole of it to ourselves and nobody troubles us…

    I am faring very well here. We have got plenty of pork, dried beef, ham, flour, hard bread, beans, cornmeal, coffee, sugar, molasses, dried peaches and cherries. We get fresh beef every few days so we fare pretty well. I made some molasses cake this morning which went very well. It wasn’t quite as good as you used to make but it done very well.

    Albert is not here. We are looking for him every day. I have wrote letters directing him where to find us.                                                                            Thomas J. Ferguson

    Selling Goods to Other Miners

    Daniel’s and Thomas businesses have grown. They are buying more goods for sale to their fellow miners on the Yuba River. He writes to Rosalinda about this.

    San Francisco Feb 28th, 1850

    I am here now buying goods to take to the mines. Since I was here and wrote you, last, Daniel has been down and taken up $3000 worth of goods. Immediately on his return I came down again. We are selling a great many goods, as soon as I return now we shall start another store at Eliza Town on the Feather River at the head of Steam navigation. We purchased a lot there a few days since for which we paid six hundred dollars. We have been offered six hundred for one half of it. We also have another lot in the town given to us by the Proprietor of the town in consideration of our being the first who landed goods there from a steamboat… We have our own teams to haul our goods, eight mules and six horses, which we bought last winter when they were cheap. Now they are worth from two to three hundred dollars apiece.

    By March of 1850 Daniel and Thomas established two more stores and are buying a stock of goods large enough to have freight bills over twenty five hundred dollars. Daniel has taken charge of the mining and trading operations in Yuba while Thomas travels up and down the river to buys goods.

    In his April letter to Key West, Thomas said he had been to San Francisco three times buying about four thousand dollars’ worth of goods each time. Daniel worked on some damming projects to turn the river. Thomas also mentions three towns they had invested in, Elisa, Fredonia, and Lindd City. Could this be Linn City of Oregon, the town on the Willamette River where Daniel worked and lived when he brought his family west?

    Thinking of Home and Family

    Daniel and Thomas thoughts turned to home and family. In April Thomas writes, “I am beginning to like this country quite well. You needn’t think strange if I should be home this fall for you and Daniel’s wife and bring you out to this country.” Rosalinda answered this proposal in her May letter. She writes: “If you think that the place will suit me and the children I am willing to go any place under the globe to you. I’ve become acquainted with a fine Irish woman. She is willing to work and would be glad of the offer to go with me to California.

    In November of 1850 Daniel and Thomas were preparing to go home. They gave their wives December 15th as the date they would start back. Daniel and Thomas Ferguson had taken ample gold out of their mine. They also had sold many items to their fellow miners. Thomas and Daniel planned to return via Havana together. From there, Thomas would ship to Key West and Daniel to New York.

    The Ferguson brothers had done well.  A newspaper article from San Francisco states: “Thomas J. and Daniel H. Ferguson, from Danbury, Ct., have obtained $150,000 in gold dust by mining operations upon the Yuba River, during the past summer.” Using an inflation calculator this would be about $4,829,000 in 2018.

    Going back to the nursery rhyme “To Market”, the Ferguson brothers had certainly brought home the bacon. Their families would live high on the hog.

  • More Places

    week 27 Family Business

    Edward Griffin’ s Work

    Dr. Edward Henry Griffin, my husband’s 2nd great grandfather and the first dentist in Portland, traveled for his work. He also posted ads in local newspapers.

    On October 10, 1850, Dr. Edward H. Griffin posted this ad in the Oregon Spectator. This paper was the first newspaper printed west of the Rocky Mountains. The ad ran from October 1850 to July 1851. A transcript of this ad reads:

    Dental Surgeon

    Dr. E. H. Griffin offers his professional services to the citizens of Oregon City and vicinity. Careful attention will be given to all operations in his department of surgery. Cleaning, filling and extracting performed in such a manner as to give satisfaction, Also, teeth inserted on gold plate in the most substantial and tasteful manner.

    Office at Main-street House   Oregon City, October 10, 1850

    House in Portland- Office in Oregon City

    The 12 miles between his house in east Portland and his office in Oregon City could be done by horse. Edward was a good rider. But the trip by horse would have taken about two and one-half hours or more. In 1850 a steamboat, the Lot Whitcomb, ran from Astoria to Oregon City. Its top speed was 12 mph. This would have made it possible for Edward to get to work faster.

    Emily Helps Out

    An 1852 advertisement from the Weekly Oregonian gave the impression that Edward had an assistant. Edward used anesthesia in some of his procedures. Nitrous oxide or ether was available in the 1840s. He offered lady patients an assistant from his family to help them when they under anesthesia. In 1852, his family of two were himself and Emily, his wife.

    A transcript of this ad reads:

    Dentistry

    Dr. E. H. Griffin, Surgeon Dentist, offers his professional services to the inhabitants of Portland and vicinity. FILLING, CLEANING, and EXTRACTING, executed in the most desirable manner. ARTIFICIAL TEETH inserted on gold plate and made useful for eating. PIVOT TEETH inserted with wooden pivots, or with gold and wood combined. All Operations Warranted. Office or at his residence

    N. B. Ladies from the county, can be provided for in my family, while being operated for.

    Nov 22                                                                                                                        E.H. Griffin

    Emily Griffin Talks about Her Husband’s Dentistry

    Emily in an interview with Fred Lockley dated March 2, 1914. This interview was printed in the Oregon Journal, a Portland newspaper. Emily told of Edward’ s practice in Oregon City before a second dentist came to Portland, a Dr. Cardwell. Emily said:

    My husband charged $5 for pulling a tooth, $300 for a half set of false teeth, and $500 for a double set. In those days they did not have rubber plates on which to attach the teeth. They were fastened to gold plates. Dr. Griffin bought a rolling mill. I used to help him roll out the $50 gold slugs. We rolled them until they were as thin as a calling card. From three sheets of gold, he made the plates for the sets of artificial teeth.

    antique rolling mill

    Edward sporadically paid Emily for her part in the dentistry business. Here is what Emily said about that.

    In the early fifties (1850s) money was plentiful. Oftentimes my husband would throw a half dozen $50 gold slugs in my lap and say. “I had a good day today. There is your share.”

    Homestead in Linn County

    While still working as a dentist, Edward and Emily homesteaded land in Linn County, Oregon. He planted an orchard and raised Spanish cattle. This was between October 1852 and October 1860. Four of their children were born here on the homestead-Edward S., Hallock Augustus, Alice Mabel and Wilbur. Annie F., Hiram Edward, Charlotte and Ferdinand were born in Albany.

    Edward still did dentistry. Here is a schedule found in the Weekly Oregonian in 1857. A transcript reads:

    Dr. E.H. Griffin offers his professional services to the inhabitants of Portland and vicinity,

    Office, first door above 1, Snow & Co., upstairs. Will continue his operations through the month of December.

    Will operate in Oregon City from the 1st to the 12th of January

    In Salem, from the 15th of January to the 1st of February

    At Albany from the 24th of February to the 10th of March and from thence to Portland, where he designs locating permanently.

    N.B.—Advice given in all departments of his profession gratis.

    Nov. 27th, 1857

    In 1860, Edward was at his residence at Robert’s Bridge. Here is an ad giving details.

    Dr E. H. Griffin may be found at his residence, in Linn County, on Calapooia Creek, near Roberts Bridge until about the 1st of May.

    Albany, April 9, 1860

    In Albany from 1860 to 1883

    In 1860 Emily thought it was time for the older children to go to school. The Griffins moved to Albany, Linn, Oregon. Edward practiced dentistry in Albany for twenty-three years.

    According to the Albany City Directory for 1878 dentistry was not the only thing Edward did.

    In 1866, he was elected to the office of city recorder. That year he also gave $200 towards building the Albany Collegiate Institute.

    His dental office listing read,” Griffin, E.H., 65 West First, upstairs.”

    His residence listing read,” Griffin, E. H., Dentist, residence, SW corner, Seventh and Walnut.”

    In 1870 this family of Albany included Edward, dentist, Emily, keeping house, Hallock, 10, at school, Alice, 13, at school, Annie, 8, Hiram, 4, Lottie (Charlotte), 2. Edward and Emily had lost two children right after their move to Albany-their oldest Edward S. and their infant son, Wilbur.

    In 1874 they had another child. This one they called Ferdinand Corbett.

    More Griffin Dentists

    When Emily and Edward were first married, Emily was Edward’s assistant. Now Edward tried this with two of his children. One child eventually became a dentist and other married a noted Portland organist and became a singer.

    In 1876 he ran this ad.

    H. A. Griffin, known to his family as Hallock, didn’t stay as Edward’s assistant. In 1876, he started running cattle in Klickitat, Washington Territory.

    The 1880 census for Albany recorded eighteen-year-old Annie Griffin, Edward’s daughter, as “learning dentistry”. She married Edgar Coursen in Portland, Oregon on 11 April 1883 and continued a singing career.

    Hallock ended up being a dentist after 10 years of cattle ranching. First, he married and started a family in Klickitat. He settled in Fresno, California. He became a dentist, first graduating from the San Francisco College of Science. The San Francisco Examiner carried an article, “Healing from Science”. It listed Hallock Augustus Griffin among those receiving their Doctor of Science degree in 1895.

    Emily and Edward live in Separate Locations

    Edward moved to Arlington, Oregon in the fall of 1883. He stayed there about 20 years. An article in the Condon Globe, dated 28 Oct 1892, places him there. It says.

    Dr. E. H. Griffin, Arlington’s popular dentist, gave us a pleasant call a few days ago as he passed through town…The doctor is one of the most honorable and sociable old gentlemen in the world, and has remarkable vitality for his age, 73 years.

    Emily also moved in 1883. She moved to San Francisco with Hiram, Charlotte and Ferdinand.

    But Ferdinand also lived with his father. In 1887, according to the Washington Territory census record there were Griffins living in Klickitat. This census listed Hallock Griffin now married to Annie and their children-Clifford, 9, Mable, 7 and Eddie, 5.

    Next listed are E.H. Griffin, dentist, 68, and F. (Ferdinand) Griffin, 13.

    Edward is presumed to be still working in Arlington. There was a steamboat route from Klickitat to Arlington.

    Edward Griffin as an Elderly Man

    In 1903, at the age of 84, Dr. Edward Griffin moved to St. Leonard, New Brunswick, Canada. This family story comes from a reliable source. His son-in-law, Edgar Coursen, gave a summary of Edward’s life in 1930. This summary by Fred Lockley was printed in the Oregon Journal on December 4,1930. This summary can be found near the beginning of my first blog about Edward Griffin called “A Matter of Place”.

    After returning from Canada, Edward spent some time with his family in California. On the 1910 Federal census for Berkeley, Alameda, California, both Edward and Emily Griffin were living with William and Charlotte Coleman. Edward and Emily are listed as father-in-law and mother-in-law to William Coleman.

    Edward died a year later September 1, 1911.

    I copied the details from a ledger titled” Records of Deaths, Portland “.  It was in volume 8 on page 152. I found this book in the record room of the Oregon State Archives in Salem, Oregon.

       The entry reads:

    Griffin, Edw, H., male, 91 years, 9 months, 21 days, nativity: New York, place of death: 658 Lovejoy, occupation: dentist, cause of death: hypostatic pneumonia, doctor: P.E. Hale, place of interment: crematorium, undertaker: E. Holmen

    The address, 658 Lovejoy, was the home of his son-in-law, Edgar Coursen and his daughter, Annie Griffin Coursen.

    Here is his obituary published in the Oregonian on September 6, 1911. Like most obituaries it has some false information.

  • A Matter of Place

    week 28 -Wedding Bells

    Edward Henry Griffin wasn’t looking for love when he left his home in Cuba, New York. He was only twenty when he arrived in Clinton, Illinois. He wanted a career. He trained to be a dentist in Galena. Then he went west. First to the gold field of California, then to Portland, Oregon.

    When Fred Lockley interviewed Edgar Coursen in 1930, Lockley wanted information about Oregon pioneers for a series of newspaper articles. Edgar’s father-in-law, Edward Henry Griffin, came to Oregon in 1850 as a practicing dentist. He was the first dentist in Portland, Oregon.

    A news item about firsts in Oregon reads,

    “The first dentist in Portland was E.H. Griffin. He offered his services to a suffering public on November 22, 1851.”

    Here is a part of the interview conducted by Fred Lockley.

    Ed Lockley, Oregon Journal, 4 Dec 1930

    Lockley captured the industry of Edward Henry Griffin but not the passion. Coursen recalled the facts of Edward’s moves quite well.

    Galena, Illinois

    Edward did arrive in Galena about when his father-in-law said. He had letters remaining at the Galena Post Office on January 5, 1846 and March 5, 1846. Here are copies of the Lists of Letters for those dates.

    Semi-Weekly Galena Jeffersonian 5 Jan 1946

    Training

    Semi-Weekly Galena Jeffersonian 5 Mar 1946

    In 1845, when Edward first arrived in Galena there were no dental schools in Illinois. The first dental school in the United States was built in Baltimore, Maryland in 1840. It was the Baltimore School of Dental Surgery.

    It is reasonable to conclude that Edward learned dentistry through an apprenticeship with an established dentist here. This was the usual way of learning this profession in the United States during the 1840s. He made his living expenses doing work he knew. He gave music lessons while training to be a dentist.

    Gold in California

    Listed as an Oregon Territory pioneer in 1850, Edward came west on the Oregon Trail. He took a California cut off and ended his trip at Fort Sutter, California. Before there was Sacramento there was a fort owned by John Sutter. Gold discovery near here in 1848 triggered the California Gold Rush. John Sutter sold his property to Alden Bally in late 1849.

    The area around this Fort became a busy hub for river traffic and trade. This area would become known as Old Sacramento. Dr. Edward Griffin arrived here in 1849. No doubt, Edward considered mining for gold himself. He practiced dentistry here for about a year. Then he chose to go to Oregon.

    From Fort Sutter Edward traveled to San Francisco. From here he sailed along Pacific Ocean coast to his next destination . He boarded the Ann Smith in late August. Sixteen days later on the 2nd day of September of 1850 arrived in Astoria, Oregon. Another passenger had a role to play in the next year of Edward’s life. J. H. Wilbur was also a passenger on this voyage. Here is a newspaper item detailing this trip.

    item from Oregon Spectator 2 Sep 1850, p.3. col.1

    Emily Roberts

    Emily Roberts Griffin described the first time she saw Edward Griffin in a February 27, 1914 interview with Fred Lockley. These interviews were published in the Oregon Journal, a Portland newspaper.

    I met my fate two days after arriving in Portland. We put up our tent on the riverbank at what is now the foot of Pine Street. We decided to camp there till father was able to find a house. The second morning I was sitting in the tent doing some work while mother was working over our camp stove. I heard voices and looking out I saw a very handsome young man with a silk hat and Prince Albert coat. He had a large white water pitcher in his hand. He was explaining to mother that he had just come down to the river to get a pitcher of water. He said his name was Edward Griffen and had a room at DeWitt’s City Hotel nearby. He explained while he ordinarily got his water at the hotel, he believed the river water was colder and better. I noticed him shift his position until he could look into the tent and see me. I wondered if his explanation was the real reason why he had come down to our camp. After I married him, I discovered that my intuition had been correct. He had caught a glimpse of me the day before and wanted a nearer view of his future wife.

    After Edward’s first view of Emily Roberts, the romance in the man got the better of him. He, being not only a dentist with prospects but a music teacher, went to woo her. He used what he knew. He offered singing lessons and a group to sing with.

    Emily had a second interview with Lockley on February 28, 1914. This is what Emily had to say about her second meeting with Edward..

    Shortly after we moved into the hotel and while I was singing one evening. Mother who was a master hand with the violin, was playing the accompaniment. Dr. Edward H. Griffin, who had a room at De Witt’s City Hotel, passed and heard the music. He stopped and listened until we were through. Next day he came to mother and said I had a wonderful voice. But it needed training. He said he had decided to start a singing school, and he would like to enroll me for his first pupil. Mother was willing. He was young and handsome and a good singer. So, I was willing.

    The singing school was started in the schoolhouse. We soon had a fine crowd of young folks. There was A. B. Hallock and Squire Davis and his wife and Warren and Tom, Davis and the two Davis girls, Sarah and Mary, and George I. Story, who still lives in Portland. He married Sarah Davis.

    Edward’s singing school turned into a choir. This was the first church choir west of the Rocky Mountains.  This choir sang for the Taylor Street Church, built on Third and Taylor Streets. Edward helped James H. Wilbur build this church.

    On December 4, 1925, The Morning Oregonian published an article on page 49. The title was “Covered Wagons Brought Many Settlers Here In 1850”. It listed the pioneers who came to Oregon Territory in 1850. A photo of this first church choir illustrated this article.

    Portland, 1850, Emily Roberts Griffin, 2nd from left, front, Edward Griffin, back, far right

    Wedding Bells

    On October 26, 1851, James H. Wilbur performed the marriage ceremony for Edward Henry Griffin and Emily Roberts. Rev. Thomas H. Pearne assisted. Only a few weddings in the village of Portland occurred before this one.  This wedding was the second in the Taylor Street Church.

    This Methodist church “stood in the middle between 2nd and 3rd, Facing north… back to the woods. The only way to reach it was by walking on single narrow planks strung lengthwise.”

    Early image of Taylor Street Church from the Oregon Historical Society Research Library