Why Wallowa?

The Erasmus Miller Owen Family, part 13

Today we are going to backtrack a bit and wrap up the Oregon chapter in Erasmus Miller Owen's life.  For about three years, he lived and preached in the remote Blue Mountain region of Wallowa County.  But when I sat down to add that information to his timeline, I had three questions: when exactly did he arrive, when exactly did he leave, and what prompted him to go there in the first place?  

When I first heard the story that he was up in Washington, I had a hard time believing it.  I mean, he was an old man . . . . and he'd spent his whole adult life in Texas . . . . and Washington was so far away . . . . why would he do that?  Then, when I found Conrad's letter in the Goldthwaite Eagle, which said that he found his father and two sisters in Oregon, I was actually surprised that he was up in the northwest region after all.  Knowing that two of Erasmus' daughters had gone there too, I assumed that he had been living with one of them, and so when they decided to move he just up and went with them.  That actually seems kind of silly now that I think about it, because he still had ten other children in Texas that he could have moved in with if he had preferred to stay.  Well, we now know that he most likely was NOT living with one of those two daughter before they all left, or at least he did not need to be living with one of his children, because he had been pastoring a church in the town of Emma up until 1905.  

So why did he go?  

Well, family lore states that Erasmus Miller Owen had been a Methodist circuit riding preacher on the Texas frontier for many years before becoming a Baptist.  After his conversion, ordination as a Baptist minister, and move to Brown County, he became active with the Pecan Valley Baptist Association, which was founding new churches left and right.  The association also founded Howard Payne College, with a primary focus of training new ministers.  Later, during the five years prior to his move to Oregon, he pastored a church in the town of Emma, which had only been in existence for ten years.  Emma sat in Crosby County; I did a quick gathering of statistics from the census records and found that in 1900, the county had 126 families and only one minister listed.  By 1910, the population had grown to 284 families, but there was still only one minister recorded.  (I thought there must be some mistake, but I read a history of Crosby County and it only listed two churches in the county in 1900, and only four by 1910, but two of those didn't seem to have a permanent pastor yet, so I guess the census wasn't off by much!)  Anyway, it appears that Crosby County held a steadily growing frontier population with not enough churches to serve it.  It seems to me that Erasmus Miller Owen felt a calling to spread the Gospel as far and wide as possible, and to reach those who lived in remote areas.  

But why Wallowa?  Well, Wallowa County, Oregon would have been one of those places.  The county was created out of a neighboring county in 1887.  The first white settlers had barely arrived sixteen years prior to that date.  The land is mountainous and forested, and therefore has a lot of remote areas.  The train came late, not until around 1908, and to many portions it never came at all, so much of the population remained isolated.  And as for that population, look at the census data:

In 1890, the county's population was only 3,661.  By 1900 it had jumped to 5,538, an increase of 51%.  By 1910, the population was 8,364, once again a 51% increase.  So.  The area was ✔remote . . . ✔frontier . . . ✔rapidly growing population.  Sounds like just the place Erasmus would want to be.

Of course, I don't think he was the one to up and suggest the move.  I think his passion for spreading the gospel was just the reason he decided to go along with his daughters' families.  

I wondered why his daughters decided to "homestead" there (to use the words from Conrad's letter), when there was still plenty of new land available in Texas and other southwestern territory.  Well, I'm sure his two sons-in-law were looking at the same Wallowa County characteristics when they decided to make the move.  Since the railroad had made it to that area by 1900, the railroad companies were advertising like crazy to entice new settlers into Oregon.  Most of the newcomers arrived seeking opportunities in ranching, mining, or working in the timber industry.

In my attempt to discover when and why Erasmus' daughters' families decided to make the move, I looked into the old newspapers.  Letitia's husband, B. F. Mallory, was apparently some kind of hustler (as in "an aggressively enterprising person; a go-getter"), and I'm not the only one to draw that conclusion:

The Pecos Valley Argus
6 February 1892

The Pecos Valley Argus
27 February 1892

It turns out that B. F. Mallory was something of a real-estate investor/get-rich-quick schemer (and I don't mean that in a bad way).  My research has shown me that there was an enterprising spirit among many men in Texas at the time, and those like my 2nd great-grandfather, W. C. Cheatham, and my 2nd great-granduncle, B. F. Mallory, were jumping from one money-making endeavor to another throughout the last two decades of the century.  

Mallory definitely had a head for business.  We find him and his family in New Mexico between 1889 and 1892, buying land and lots, building boarding houses and stores, and traveling back and forth to Texas to conduct business ventures there.  I found one article about a shipment of horses to Louisiana, and there are mentions of him doing business in Brown County, Taylor County, Fisher County, and Dickens County, Texas.  Then, on the 1900 census, Letitia and their kids were in Texas, but her husband was in . . . a mining camp near Waha, Idaho!  And, it just so happens that he had a claim on the Snake River, which creates the border between Idaho and Wallowa County, Oregon.  

Way back at the beginning of my Owen research, I found a member story on Ancestry that said that the way Benjamin Mallory got his cabin in Oregon was something like he came upon it when three other miners were already living there.  He moved in with them and made himself so obnoxious that they finally left and he had it to himself.  I can't find the story now (of course I can't!), but it implies that he was in Oregon prior to his family's arrival.  

But when was that, exactly?  And did Erasmus Miller Owen make the move at the same time?  I looked up the Bureau of Land Management land grant records to see what the date on their homestead records were, and I discovered that Benjamin F. Mallory didn't receive his land patent until 1913.  (I don't know how to find the applications, just the final patent document.  If anyone out there knows how to look those up, shoot me an email and let me know!)  There was no listing for Erasmus' other son-in-law, Orlena's husband Philemon Frank Harris, in the land grant records at all.  I know that Orlena was the other sister who moved to Oregon, though, because of this:

Delayed Birth Certificate of Charles Simpson Harris
Wallowa County, Oregon

This shows us that Orlena and her husband Frank were living in Oregon by September of 1905.  I'm sure they were there several months prior to that, though, because who is going to move to a new home - scratch that - a new home that is more than 1,500 miles away, when they are heavily pregnant?  

I found this newspaper article just yesterday:

The Goldthwaite Eagle
12 November 1904

See?  They were already planning their move by the end of 1904.

But what about Letitia?  The story about the cabin implies that her husband got settled in Oregon before she and the younger children moved.  I didn't find any articles about him in the Oregon newspapers until something like 1909, but I did find this mention of their oldest son:

The Morning Oregonian
12 October 1904

This article tells of the death of Benjamin and Letitia Owen Mallory's eldest son.  I believe the reference to him coming from the East is referring to the fact that he had been in Idaho with his father.  But whether B. F. Mallory moved to Grouse at the same time, or whether he came because of his son's death, I can't say.  Either way, it looks like it was sometime in 1904 when the first of Letitia's family moved to Wallowa County.  As for Letitia herself, well, she had a son born in 1902 in Texas.  And then came her daughter "Dot":

Birth Certificate of Dorothy Amanda "Dot" Mallory

She was born in April of 1905 in Wallowa County.  The document says she was born in Bartlett, but that is right there in the vicinity of Grouse.  So now we know that Letitia was also in Oregon by the beginning of 1905.  But look what I just found - literally five minutes ago:

Obituary of Louis Orlando "Buck" Mallory
The Lewiston Tribune
8 July 1966

Very interesting.  This article is about Letitia's son, Louis Orlando.  It says that his family moved to Idaho in 1903 before heading over to Wallowa County a year later.  Now, I have seen a lot of mistaken information in obituaries, but this information was probably given by his wife, who wasn't all that old and had grown up and lived in the same area as the rest of Louis' family.  So I feel pretty confident that we can say that Letitia left Texas in 1903, and was in Wallow County by 1904, perhaps arriving at the same time as her son, Perry Oscar.  (Maybe that log cabin story was referring to B. F. Mallory's arrival in Idaho, not Oregon!)

So now we know that Erasmus Miller Owen almost certainly did NOT travel to Oregon with one of his daughters, but went either on his own, or with his son Erasmus (Uncle Ras) later.  I am almost certain that he decided to make the move because his daughters expressed that there was a need for preachers in Wallowa County.  I have a tab sitting open on my computer right now with a few search results for E. M. Owen in Texas during the years prior to his move; I haven't had time to look at them yet, but they might help us answer that question.  Unfortunately, those will have to wait until next week.  For now, I'll leave you with some photos of Wallowa County.  (But first, a map!)

Map of the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company
and the Southern Pacific Company. (1906)

This map was actually an advertisement; at the top it said, "THE NORTHWEST PRESENTS THE GREATEST OPPORTUNITIES FOR SETTLERS OF ANY PORTION OF 'UNCLE SAM'S' DOMAIN."  The bottom said, "FOR GRAINS, GRASSES, FRUIT, LIVESTOCK AND MINERALS THE TERRITORY EMBRACED IN THIS MAP IS UNEQUALED."

(The large river on the right is the Snake River, which forms the boundary between Idaho and Oregon.)

(I didn't put the map key up, but the portion of the railroad line that has the little lines all along the edges was the proposed future route.  The train didn't even make it as far as the town of Wallowa - sorry, no star, but it is between Enterprise and Elgin - until 1908.  Take note of the fact that, heading north, there was a road from Wallowa north toward Troy and Grouse, but it didn't go through.  It looks like one would have had to travel from Enterprise to Wallowa, curve back east and then up to Flora, and then cross the river before continuing to the area.)

Some modern photos of Enterprise:

Enterprise Oregon, looking toward the Wallowa Mountains
photo credit

Within the town of Enterprise
photo credit

And one from c. 1910, just after Erasmus Miller Owen left the area:

Early Enterprise, Oregon
photo credit

These next photos shows the area around Joseph, which was just five miles south of Enterprise.  Joseph was where Orlena and her family had settled and where Uncle Ras spent some time visiting and preaching:

Joseph, Oregon
photo credit

Wallowa Lake, south of Joseph
photo credit

Mt. Howard, just south of Joseph

And now some historical photos of the area:

Joseph, Oregon

Main Street in Joseph c. 1910

Skating on Wallowa Lake

And now, heading north from Enterprise to the Grouse Flat/Bartlett area on the Washington border:

Near Troy, Oregon heading north to Grouse Flat
photo credit

Grouse Flat, Oregon

Does anyone remember the newspaper articles saying that Erasmus Miller Owen spent the night at Sled Springs on his way back from visiting his daughter?  It turns out that Sled Springs wasn't a town - it was a stage stop with a barn and "hotel":

Sled Springs Stage Stop
(Wallowa County History Center)

Wallowa County Stage 
photo credit

This photo shows the first train and last stage between the towns of Wallowa and Elgin.  As far as I could tell from my research, the train never did reach Grouse Flat.  But yikes!  This stage looks even smaller than the other one!  And it is hard to tell, but the sides of the stage coach were just made out of canvas.  Can you imagine how cold it would have been in the winter?  Conrad made the trip in January!!  

But look at how many horses were used to make the trip from Elgin to Joseph:

Stage from Elgin to Joseph
(Wallowa County History Center)

It was only ten miles more, but it must have been a much harder ride. 

Oh, and I forgot to mention before, that I also found a story on Ancestry saying that Letitia and Ben Mallory travelled to Oregon in a covered wagon.  Since the railroad went all the way there from Texas by 1900, I find that highly doubtful, but they would have had to travel from Idaho to Wallowa County by wagon (or take a very out-of-the-way train ride and then a wagon from La Grande to Grouse Flat), so maybe that is where the story originated.

Okay, just a few more, so you can really get a sense of how our family lived way back when:

Homestead on the Snake River
photo credit

It is possible that Ben and Letitia lived someplace like this in Idaho and even in Oregon. (Conrad did write in his letter that their cabin was "backed up under a large hill" and overlooking a river!)  

Ferry on Grande Ronde River near Troy, Oregon

Conrad's letter also said that from the Mallory homestead you could see the Salmon River "over the bench."  According to Wikipedia, " a bench or benchland is a long, relatively narrow strip of relatively level or gently inclined land that is bounded by distinctly steeper slopes above and below it."  If you look on a map, you can see that the Wenaha River meets the Grande Ronde River at Troy (I forget which flows into which) which flows up past the Grouse area.  I did some digging, and it turns out that the Wenaha used to be called the Little Salmon River.  Anyway, this photo looks like it was taken c. 1900-1912, and it is possible that Erasmus and his family had to use this very same ferry when they went back and forth between Grouse and Enterprise.

This next photo shows some men hauling a load of logs:

Hauling a Load of Logs near Summerville
photo credit

It's easy to see how one of those could kill a man, huh?  Notice how these ones are being hauled on sleds, not wheeled wagons.  I read somewhere that sleds were used by farmers to take goods to market up until the 1920s.  (Although what goods anyone is taking to market during winter I don't know!)

Switching gears a bit, here is the town of Astoria, where Conrad was living while the rest of his family was in Wallowa County, and where Erasmus Miller Owen filled in as pastor for him while he was off doing the revival stuff in 1907:

Astoria, Oregon - c. 1908
photo credit

Well if that wasn't a change of pace!  Goodbye stagecoach, hello trolley! 

And here is St. Johns, Oregon, where Conrad and his father and brother had moved by the end of 1909: 

St. Johns, Oregon - c. 1908

And that's it for this week.  I hope you enjoyed the little glimpse into that period of our family's lives.

                                                                                                                                                - Therese