Portland's Lost Waterfront

Starting in the mid 1820s it had been Hudson’s Bay Company  (HBC) policy to create “fur deserts” in areas they didn’t want American trappers to venture. Since the lower Columbia River area was one of those “deserts” any poor critter with a pelt was hunted to near or total extinction. By the 1840s the HBC in Fort Vancouver, under the leadership of Dr. John McLoughlin, had gone into the provisioning business supplying outposts as far flung as the Russians in Alaska to the missionaries in Hawaii with articles grown on its farms. Dr. McLoughlin had a perfect solution for the transition from fur trapping to farming. Some miles south of the Willamette falls there was an area of meadowland the natives kept free from brush by seasonal burning. This was to make it easier to hunt game. By this time the native population had sadly declined, leaving this land ready to be turned into wheat fields.   Lt. George F. Emmons Dr. McLoughlin used HBC resources to set up a group ...