Europeans – albeit in American-form – have only been present in the Pacific Northwest for a little over 200 years.  The main push of emigrants did not start until the mid-1840’s.  Here our focus is on the mid-19th century Columbia River area views. A lot has changed since then. Some things remain timeless, however.  The natural beauty of the landscape a prime example.  Even here dramatic change does not go unnoticed.

VISUAL MEMORY

Photography did not take off in the Northwest until the latter part of the 19^th century.  A few early pioneers did freeze time such as at Fort Umpqua – Lieutenant Lorenzo Lorain and Dr Edward Vollum – in 1859.

BEFORE THE CAMERA

Most of the early memories of the countryside come from artists paintings and drawings.  In this case, I am focusing on the mid-19th century Columbia River, especially the Gorge where the river cuts dramatically through the Cascade Mountain range, the only river to do so. Amazing pictures providing evidence the Columbia River Gorge was just as amazing in the 1850’s as today.

The paintings and drawings also demonstrate why emigrants had to take to the water to finish their long trek tp Oregon. With today’s river-level freeway and railway it is easy to forget the freeway has only been present since 1954. The first highway – parts of it seen in the different sections of the Old Historic Columbia Highway – was not completed until 1922. Even this highway was far from the fast, relatively easy link between western Oregon and the east existing today. Any highway labelled “scenic” is bound to be slow and this narrow cliff-hugging two-laned road is no exception.

In particular, I will focus on two particular artists, both with connections to the U.S. Army, who have much of their works collected at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University. https://beinecke.library.yale.edu Many of the vantage points used by these and other artists can be replicated today to a get a then and now look at features of the Pacific Northwest. Some scenes, time has left little altered. In other cases, towns have grown up, though the general view remains recognizable after 140 years. Some of the natural features are gone – the Dalles, the Cascade Rapids. Other scenes capture historical moments lost to us today – the old forts, Cascade portage roads, the people.

PART-TIME ARTIST

Dr. Joseph Bullock Brown served as Army physician at Fort Dalles from 1857 until 1861.  In his spare time, he drew with several collected at Yale.  Brown moved to the East with the onset of the Civil War working his way from up to medical director of the Fourth Corps in the Army of the Potomac before moving west to serve in the Assistant Surgeon General’s Office in St. Louis and Louisville.  For service in the harbor of New York during a cholera epidemic, Brown was rewarded with a brevet to Brigadier general.  He continued his career after the war as medical director for the Department of the Platte coving most of the northern Great Plains region.

Brown’s drawings of the mid-19th century Columbia River area show some of the areas he served at – Fort Vancouver and Fort Dalles.  The drawings give a truer sense of what life was like for the soldiers and their families living at – or beyond – the edge of the “civilized” world of the time.

MILITARY SURVEYOR-ARTISTS

jAMES AMDISON ALDEN AND WILLIAM mCMURTRIE

The drawings augment those drawn by those of another military artist, James Madison Alden.  Alden served as survey artist at the age of 20 in the Navy for an 1854 Pacific Coast Survey expedition commanded by his uncle, James Alden aboard the steamship USS Active.  This was the first of several cruises and inland treks up and down the coast, from California to British Columbia including scenes from the Sierra Nevada of California like Yosemite Valley.

He was initially put together with a more senior artist, William Birch McMurtrie.  Some of McMurtrie’s work survives today – best seen in the Museum of Fine Arts Boston and his sketchbook is at the University of California, Berkeley.  At some sights, both men were directed to put down their images of the same scene. There pictures together give us an excellent idea of what the mid-19th century Columbia River region appeared as.

cascades portage

then and now

with the northwestern border survey

In 1860, Alden became the official artist for the Northwestern Border Survey.  With this duty, he painted and drew from the Puget Sound to the Continental Divide.  On his return from the north, he made his way down the Palouse River valley as winter came on.

Back in San Francisco, Alden continued back to the east coast serving out his assignment in Washington D.C.  He re-enlisted in the Navy in 1863, becoming secretary to Admiral David Porter.  He spent the next 28 years with Porter, never returning to the Northwest.  Alden lies with his wife, Frances, at Arlington National Cemetery.

wILLIAM HENRY TAPPAN AND GEORGE GIBBS

William Henry Tappan was an artist and engraver from Boston.  He spent six months with the Missouri Mounted Volunteers in Nebraska in 1848 illustrating and collecting from the countryside.  The following year, he came to Oregon as the artist-surveyor of the Regiment of Mounted Riflemen as they came out to the new territory in response to the Cayuse War.  One of his partners on the trip was George Gibbs, a lawyer and artist who would add many other titles to his CV as life went on – philologist, geologist, public official, etc.  Both Gibbs and Tappan would stay on in Oregon after they arrived.  We have them to thank for the engraving of the Wascopam Mission preceding the Army fort which came later.

Tappan became the postmaster for Oregon City while working also with the Bureau of Indian Affairs.  He helped lay out the town of St Helens with Henry M. Knighton.  Tappan moved on to Colorado in 1864 before returning to his native Manchester, New Hampshire where he would eventually die.

JOHN MIX STANLEY

John Mix Stanley was one of the artist-explorers who came west in the 1830-1840’s to paint both the landscapes and the Native Americans who lived in the west.  He first came west after spending some time painting in what became Oklahoma with the battalion of Stephen Kearny sent to help conquer California during the Mexican-American War.  He then moved north to Oregon eventually becoming acquainted with the Northern Pacific Railroad expedition led by Isaac Stevens.  His views along with Sohon, Gustavus (1825-1903) – HistoryLink.org helped illustrate Stevens’ report.  Much of Stanley’s work was destroyed in the 1865 Smithsonian fire.  A few surviving paintings of the mid-19th century Columbia River region survive though most of his work comes from the cumulative Steven’s report.

OTHERS BEFORE AND AFTERWARDS

THE SPY, HENRY WARRE

A couple of other artists whose work remains today would have to include the British spy Henry James Warre.  He moved through the Oregon Country in 1841.  Under the guise of a traveler, Warre made sketches of places where the British Army may have been called upon to fight a potential border war with the upstart American nation – 54 – 50 or Fight! in reverse.

One interesting picture from Warre was replicated of Astoria years later by Alden.  To Warre, Astoria was still Fort George, the name given to it when the British captured the little post during the War of 1812.  Warre went on to become a British general commanding troops in the Crimean War and retired as commander of the Army of Bengal in India. His views are on a slightly earlier mid-19th century Columbia River region than Alden.

PAUL KANE

Another artist, more well known in Canada, was Paul Kane.  He also spent time in the middle of the 1840’s at Hudson Bay’s Fort Vancouver.  Kane’s best-known work concerning the Northwest was his depiction of the 1847 eruption of Mt St Helens. A little fanciful with artistic license, he does accurately show the eruption emanating from a side vent of the mountain.

MOVING ON WITH carleton e. watkins and wILLIAM HENRY JACKSON

Carleton E. Watkins came from Oneota, New York. He was one of the first professional photographers on the West Coast. His photographs – most made into stereographs – were responsible for Yosemite being made into a national park by the U.S. Congress. He has left many historic pictures of the mid-19th century Columbia River from the period just after the Civil War.

Some of the scenes from earlier paintings show up in some of the Watkins’ photos and postcards from the latter part of the century.

William Henry Jackson started as a painter early on.  He became an accomplished photographer with time moving all over the West compiling a huge inventory of photos. His pictures were sold to the Detroit Photographic Company – later, the Detroit Publishing Company – where color was added to the pictures to turn them into postcards. Many include similar magnificent views to those of the mid-19th century Columbia River earlier painted by Alden and the others. The same views still recognizable before bigger changes came about in the middle of the 20^th century.

Jackson never gave up painting either. His 1930 painting of the Barlow Cutoff gives us a post-pioneer view of what that trail could have been like.