The Pioneer Road here detoured the Columbia River Rapids and Mount Hood to the Willamette Valley. The road at first followed an old Indian trail. The later name was Barlow Road. Travel was difficult. Wagons were snubbed to trees by ropes or held back by drags of cut trees. Early travelers named the hill from the resemblance of native leaves to laurel.
Oregon City - supply point for pioneer emigrants was first located as a claim by Dr. John McLoughlin in 1829. The first provisional legislature of the Oregon Country was held here in 1843 and land and tax laws formulated. Oregon City was the capital of the Oregon Territory from 1845-1852. The first Protestant church (Methodist) west of the Rocky Mountains was dedicated in 1844 and the first newspaper (Oregon Spectator) and the first Masonic Lodge were established in 1846.
Oregon City - once known as Willamette Falls - was early the site of an Indian salmon fishing village. The Falls furnished the power for a lumber mill which began operation in 1842, a flour mill in 1844, a woolen mill in 1864, and the first paper mill in the Pacific Northwest in 1867. The first long distance commercial electric power transmission in the United States was from Oregon City to Portland in 1889.
On Oct. 30th, 1792 off the point in the Columbia River where the Sandy empties its waters the boat crew from the H.M.S. Chatham (Vancouver’s Voyages) were the first white men to sight the snow clad peak which Lt. Wm. R. Broughton named Mt. Hood in honor of the British Navy. He called the stream Barings River. Later in november 1805 Lewis and Clark called it the Quicksand river. Still later by common use it became known as Sandy River.
The pass located east of here through the Cascade Range was once called Wiley Pass after Andrew Wiley. Wiley with other Willamette Valley pioneers explored it in 1859 while searching for a route to move their livestock to the grass lands of central Oregon for summer grazing. In 1864 the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Military Wagon Road Company was formed and submitted plans to the U.S. Government for a Military Road to be built along the route as far east as the mouth of the Malheur River.
Few Oregon communities have had a more colorful history than Scottsburg. It was named for Levi Scott, a pioneer of 1844, who homesteaded here and founded the town in 1850. There was a lower town at the head of tidewater on the Umpqua River which became the site of business houses and mills. A mile upstream was the upper town, the distributing and shipping point for the mining regions and communities of southern Oregon. As many as 500 pack animals could be seen loading here at one time.
Aircraft proved their military worth during World War I -- initially for observation purposes, and later for the support of ground troops and bombing. When the United States entered the war in 1917, air supremacy was hotly contested and airplane production was vital to the war effort. Early airplanes were constructed of linen stretched over a wood framework.
This highway is reverently dedicated to Oregon's sons. Members of the 41st division, both living and dead, who wore the Sunset emblem and offered their all in complete devotion to the cause of world peace.
One of the Oregon Country's most picturesque fur-traders, Thomas McKay, is buried near Scappoose. He was a daring leader, famous storyteller and could drive a nail with a rifle ball. A Canadian, he arrived with Astorians as a teenage boy; served with North West Company, became a clerk with the Hudson's Bay Company, established a grist mill at Champoeg. Alexander McKay, a victim of the Tonquin Massacre was his father and Dr. John McLaughlin was his stepfather. He ranged widely, built Fort Boise, Idaho, guided goldseekers to California.
Oregon's Historic Tillamook Forest Fire of 1933 spread over 240,000 acres of forest land, fires in 1939 and 1945 brought the total to 355,000 acres. Over 13 billion board feet of timber were killed.
