The Effects of the Railroads On Small Town Population Changes: Linn County, Oregon

Abstract

The Effects of the Railroads On Small Town Population Changes: Linn County, Oregon Donald G. Holtgbieve* Throughout the westward movement in the United States transportation was directly related to settlement. Most of the trans-Mississippi West experienced periods of rapid population growth as routes of transportation and communication were opened. The Willamette Valley was no exception. Presently incorporating nine counties and 2200 square miles, the valley has experienced a series of population redistributions associated with improvements in transportation facilities .1 Positive and negative effects of railroad transportation development on town populations in one representative county of the Willamette Valley are the subjects of this paper. Population losses are emphasized, since the results of population increases are known to most residents of the Pacific states. Comparatively little has been * Dr. Holtgrieve is now an Assistant Professor of Geography at California State University, Hayward 94542. The author was a graduate student at the University of Oregon when this paper was first presented at the annual meeting of the Association at Victoria in 1971. 1 The Willamette Valley referred to here is that part of Oregon between the Coast and Cascade mountain ranges and between the Columbia River and the vicinity of Cottage Grove, Oregon. This valley is adequately described in Samuel Dicken's Oregon Geography (Eugene, Oregon: University of Oregon Bookstore, 1965), pp. 136-143. A general history may be found in Robert Clark's History of the Willamette Valley, Vol. 1 (Chicago: S. J. Clarke Publishing Company, 1927 ) . 87 88ASSOCIATION OF PACIFIC COAST GEOGRAPHERS written about the causes of population loss.'2Theresulting ghost towns and, sometimes, cultural relics, are worthy of the interest and consideration of local historians, cultural geographers, and curious citizens. Early Settlement and Transportation Willamette Valley's first settlements appeared in the 1830's and 1840's near the present cities of Portland, Salem, Hillsboro, and Oregon City.3 Settlers dispersed gradually to the south into present Linn, Lane, and Benton counties. By 1850 the population of the valley was 12,000. Linn County's population was approximately 1,500 persons, most of whom were farmers.1 Because early settlement in Willamette Valley was widely dispersed and on a subsistence economy, early growth of towns was retarded . There was virtually no way of getting agricultural surpluses to a market. Early town founding was based mainly on optimism for the future improvements in transportation. Every one of more than one hundred town "founders" in the valley had visions of owning a site at the head of river navigation or at the terminus for a future railroad. A rage for laying out towns, which reached its height from 1850 to 1853, tended to retard the growth of any one of such towns.5 Linn County, created during this period, had similar growing pains. It boasted eight townsites by 1850, most of which were more observable on maps than on the landscape. However, with the discovery of gold in California a new market for Oregon food and lumber surpluses was created and an intensive phase of development was begun, centering on the Columbia 2 Works of this nature focusing on places other than tlie Pacific states include Ray M. Northam, "Declining Urban Centers in the United States: 19401960 ," Annals, Association of American Geographers, LIII (1963), pp. 50-59, and Neil Salisbury and Gerald Rushton, Growth and Decline of Iowa Villages: A Pilot Study (Iowa City, Iowa: State University of Iowa Press, 1963). 3 Clark, op. cit., p. 231. 4 Lloyd D. Black, "Middle Willamette Valley Population Growth," Oregon Historical Quarterly, XXXIII (March, 1942), p. 41, and Georgia Adams, "Two Isochronic Maps of Settlement in Oregon," Yearbook, Association of Pacific Coast Geographers, XVIII (1956), pp. 36-41. See also Clark, op. cit., p. 454. '- Hubert H. Bancroft, History of Oregon, Vol. 2 (San Francisco: The History Company, 1888), p. 251. YEARBOOK · VOLUME 35 · 197389 and Willamette rivers as the major means of transport.6 Although roads traversed most of the valley, they were almost impassable in the rain for half the year and chokingly dusty for the other half. Because locations of roads were changeable and almost always undependable , townsite founders stuck to the rivers.7 Most farmers located either toward the...