Walla Walla University - Mountain Ash Yearbook (College Place, WA)

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Back when America was a little-known obstacle blocking the traders ships from east- ern wealth, the Pacific Northwest corner of our country gathered fame as Captains Juan de Fuca, Francis Drake, Bruno Heceta, and others told of finding the fabled Northwest Passage. Their descriptions of fir-clothed granite mountains rising out of the sea, rushing rivers, and prolific fauna and flora heightened interest in this evergreen land of mist and mystery. Though hopeful explorers shattered the dream of a sea-to-sea passage on Columbia Riverts rocks and Puget Sound,s maze of two hundred islands, passages of a different sort opened inviting entryways to lure seekers of adventure, beauty, wealth, and service. Spaniards, Russians, Englishmen, and Frenchmen came. Some came at adventure,s beckoning to explore the 2,800 miles of tidal shore line that twists and tucks itself into fir- and fern-lined coves, harbors, bays, and islands along Washingtods 180-mile coast line. Some early visitors may have come to revel in natural beauties. They gazed at Mt. Rainierts 14,408 feet of g1acier-crowned splen- dor and its surroundings. This 0Mountain that was God,, to nature-worshipping Indians stands as king of the Cascades with six ten- thousand-foot mountains as courtiers bedecked with royal green foliage. With the change of seasons, light green, saffron, crimson, or wine alter the solid forest green robes of the moun- tains; but the only variety in their white hats comes when a glacier advances or recedes a bit, or a feather-white cloud is added to the cap. The two thousand mirror lakes reflect the millinerts and tailorts latest efforts. Looking south from Tillamook Head one views Canon Beach along Oregonts picturexque coast line. just a few miles from here is the Salt Cairn which marks the end of Lewis and Clark: trail acroxs the Pacific Northwest.

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INTRODUCTI N EDUCATION'S m .. u nun

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INTRODUCTION continued Most newcomers to the Northwest, how- ever, came seeking the way to wealth. None realized that the year would come when four million tourists would spend 330 million dol- lars sight-seeing and playing in Washington. Trapping, fishing, logging and farming beckoned as sure roads to financial security. Lewis and Clarkls report of their epic trans- continental journey in 1805 told of many martens, beavers, foxes, otters, mink, and muskrats. Consequently, trapping and fur trading enticed the John Jacob Astors to the territory. The Hudson Bay Company and the American F ur Company gave immediate com- petition. Lumbering offered rich promise, too, and for over half a century was the largest single source of income in the state. Loggers with axes, cross-cut saws, and strong backs tackled giant forests in the spirit of their ficti- tious hero, Paul Bunyan. Fishing and marketing the canned sal- mon, tuna, and halibut was an early money- maker and still produces over 40 million dol- lars a year in income. The coast harbored these three avenues to wealth, so the rich farmland east of Rain- ieris Cascade Range was rather neglected until 1859 when gold was discovered in what is now the Orofino and Salmon River country of Idaho. Supplies for the gold fields came around the Horn, up from California, up the Columbia River to the point where the Walla Walla River joins it, and then overland to Walla Walla. The town, formerly called Step- toeville after the fort around which it was built, was renamed in 1859. Citizens of this booming little town were quite accustomed to seeing heavily laden camels leaving their city, called 8many watersll in Indian, heading across the brown hills to the gold fields. Though the yellow fever of gold was al- ways the most alluring, it was not the most lasting. About this time farmers in the Inland Empire began raising large quantities of gold- en wheat. In 1872 Dr. Dorsey S. Baker began building a thirty-mile railroad to the Columbia River where as many as five steamboats might be docked waiting to carry wheat to the world market. For years Walla Walla wheat was the standard by which wheat prices were quoted in Liverpool and elsewhere. With gold and wheat pouring through it, W alla Walla grew to be the largest city of the entire territory and maintained its position al- most to the time when the Klondike gold rush did for Seattle what the Idaho gold rush had done for Walla Walla. Let us look now at some of those pioneers who came to find a passageway to service. They are not only the best remembered, but were also among the first to enter the Inland Empire. Shearwatcr and 37-foot Chris Craft cabin. cruimrs rvham Bowmank Bay in Puget Sound at WWC's field xtation located the scenic, treacherous Deception Pam. The biology dellarlmcnfx 26-foot awaiting use by budding biologists at Rosario Beach just a mile from