Harney County
Chapter III
Towns of Harney County
BURNS.
While the thriving little city of Burns has been a town for
but little more than a decade and a half, he who would trace its history from
the first must go back to the year 1878. Not long after the Indian war of that
date had been brought to a close a man named Jonas, so an old settler informs
us, bought a quantity of merchandise and put up a small store on the spot
afterward occupied by the City hotel, of Burns. The Fitz Gerald Brothers, of
Lakeview, brought in and installed in the same building a couple of barrels of
whisky, which found a ready sale among the thirsty cowboys and cattlemen. In the
spring of 1879 so much of Mr. Jonas's stock as remained on his shelves was
purchased by William Curry and removed to a place called Egan. During 1881 P.M.
Curry dispensed whisky for twenty-five cents a drink in a small log cabin about
two miles from the present Burns, and his place became a sort of rendezvous and
headquarters of the cattlemen who spent the winter in the valley. The nearest
postoffice at this time was Camp Harney, which was visited once each week by a
mounted mail carrier from Canyon City. The following year McGowan & Martin
opened a general merchandise store at Egan, with the result that a postoffice
was established there, a new mail route granted and the town given a fair start.
About the same time, however, A.O. Bedell started a small
store on the site on which P.F. Stenger's residence was afterward erected. Later
Robertson & Johnson put up a building in the same locality, forming the nucleus
of another town. The usual rivalry resulted, but fortunately was of short
duration for Bedell sold his stock to P.F. Stenger, who formed a partnership
with Mr. McGowan, of Egan, uniting the two mercantile establishments. With this
bond of union drawing them together, weak as they both were, their consolidation
in May, 1883, was a natural consequence. The postoffice was removed from Egan.
Its name was changed to Burns, in honor of the celebrated Scottish poet, and the
foundations of the metropolis of Harney valley and county were fairly laid.
At this period an influx of population set in toward Harney
valley. Would-be settlers began disputing the claims of stockmen that the
country was of no value for agricultural purposes and contending with them for a
foothold in the broad unsettled region. The result was that Burns grew quite
rapidly. In 1883 it had so far progressed as to justify the establishment of a
newspaper, and Horace Dillard came in with a small plant and began the
publication of a four page six column patent outside sheet, known as the Harney
Valley Items. On November 23, 1887, volume No 1, of the East Oregon Herald, made
its debut, announcing that in politics it would be straight-out Democratic and
that its purpose should always be to promote the interests of its home town and
county in every way, holding itself strictly independent of any corporation
control or class domination of whatsoever nature. D.I. Grace was its first
editor and proprietor. under date of May 16, 1888, this publication gives a
register of the business of Burns, from which we learn that P.S. Early was then
engaged in blacksmithing and wagon making; that J.C. Welcome carried a stock of
harness and saddles; that W.C. Byrd was proprietor of the Red Front Livery barn;
that T. Sillman was engaged in the saloon business; that N. Brown was building a
flouring mill near the town; that W.E. Grace had a drug store; George McGowan a
hardware, P.F. Stenger a general merchandise store, Charles Sampson a jewelry
store, and that J.W. Sawyer, of the firm of Sawyer & Dore, was the proprietor of
the best equipped saw mill in the valley, situated near Burns. The town at this
time, so the paper states, was forging ahead at a rapid pace. The influx of
settlers had continued for three years previous, exerting a marked effect upon
the development and upbuilding of the principal trading point of the country.
But notwithstanding this healthy condition of things, the ignorance obtaining on
the outside with regard to Burns and eastern Oregon generally was very dense, as
it strikingly illustrated by the fact that the Oregon State Board of Agriculture
stated in one of its publications that this rising star of the interior of
eastern Oregon was the county seat of Malheur county. The same statement was
also made in the Pacific States Newspaper Directory.
Although Burns was not in Malheur county and had no desire to
leave its own most favorable location, even at the behest of the board of
agriculture or the newspaper directory, and though it was not ambitious to
contest with Vale and Ontario for the honor of being the political center of
Oregon's newest governmental division, it was ambitious both for county seatship
and for segregation from the county of which it then formed a part. It had led
in the movement for the formation of Harney county in 1887. Though defeated in
its purpose it was not disheartened, and in 1889 it was again before the Oregon
legislature with its new county proposition, determined to win. It did win.
Its next effort was in the direction of securing to itself
the prestige and advantage always attending the location within the borders of a
town of county buildings, and all the machinery of county buildings, and all the
machinery of county organization. In the legislature its rival, Harney, had
secured a decided advantage by getting itself designated as the temporary county
seat, but Burns went to work with a will to carry the ensuing election. Its
business men showed their energy and public spirit by purchasing a new and
suitable building and pledging themselves to convey the same to Harney county by
warranty deed in case the town were chosen as the seat of government.
Burns had already secured the location within its limits of a United States land
office. Its two newspapers were not slow in pointing out this advantage and also
that it was the terminus of all stage lines, and the center of public highways,
that it had a daily mail and the only distributing postoffice in the valley, the
only money order and postal note office, the largest number of private
residences, the only harness and saddlery store, the only jewelry establishment,
the only boot and shoe shop, the only brewery, the only flouring mill, the only
tin shop, the only drug store, the only public bath house, the only photography
gallery, and the only church building. Persons wishing to transact certain lines
of business or make certain purchases must, therefore, of necessity come to
Burns, and to such location of the county seat in that town must be a great
convenience. Mention was also frequently made of new enterprises under way, such
as the fine central school building, a large and complete saw mill, a furniture
manufactory, a bank building and a modern hotel.
These and other arguments must have had their weight with the
voters, for the official county gave Burns a small majority. The contest which
followed has been sufficiently treated of in other parts of this work. It is
sufficient here to state that Burns held and still holds the county seat and
that it still holds the lead among the rising towns of Harney valley.
In January, 1891, Burns secured from the legislature of
Oregon a charter permitting it to organize and maintain a city government, and
in accordance with the powers therein granted, it elected as its first officers:
Captain Kelley, mayor; J.C. Welcome, recorder; Irwin Geer, treasurer; Peter
Stenger, Lee Cladwell, L.M. Brown and Dr. J.W. Ashford, councilmen.
The city of Burns has enjoyed a steady, substantial and
almost uninterrupted growth, though it has never had a boom. Not even during the
period of financial depression did it cease to forge ahead, and since the advent
of prosperity it has been steadily building up and assuming a more solid and
substantial aspect. It is the center of a large area of rich country, and wares
from the shelves of its merchants find their way into the homes of families
living many miles distant. The stock raisers and farmers who make Burns their
base of supplies have for the last few years been realizing good prices for
their products, while the seasons have been favorable for abundant yields and
large increase. The prosperity resulting has been shared by the merchants and
business men of the towns to such an extent that it may with truth be asserted
that there is not a single commercial establishment in the place which is not
realizing excellent profits upon the money invested. As soon as the stranger
enters Burns he perceives unmistakably that progress and improvement are the
watchwords. The services of every man who can handle a mason's trowel are called
into requisition, the man known to possess even a little skill in any of the
building trades is not only offered employment and good wages, but is importuned
to endeavor to arrange his plans so that he may lend a hand in the erection of
some of the brick and stone structures in course of construction. Commercial
travelers are agreed in classing Burns among the finest business points in the
west.
A residence of some weeks in this prosperous inland city has
enabled the writer to form a fair estimate of the people of Burns, and he must
bear testimony that he has invariably found them genial, approachable, obliging
and orderly. were it not for the long freight trains that are to be seen daily
on the streets, the arrival and departure of stages and the conspicuous absence
of the locomotive's sonorous whistle, one might easily forget that he was in a
frontier town more than a hundred miles from the nearest railroad. The carousing
and breaches of the peace which are usually to be found in the commercial
centers of cattle countries may have obtained here in times past, but at present
the rules of order and decorum seem to be as well respected and when necessary
the laws and ordinances as faithfully enforced as in any other city in the west.
A reasonably comprehensive register of the present business
of the city would include the following: Five hotels, the Burns, Samuel Bailey,
proprietor; the Syme, Mrs. H.B. Syme; the Oregon House, Mesdames Weis and
Winters; The French Hotel, Mrs. L. Racine; and the Cottage; one restaurant, of
which Tom, the Chinaman, is proprietor; the Harney Valley brewery, owned by L.
Woldenberg; Geer & Cummings and Voegtly & Kenyon, hardware and implements; N.
Brown & Sons, Lunaberg & Dalton, Miller & Thompson, Schwartz & Budelman, general
merchandise; the City drug store, owned by H.W. Welcome & Company; G.W. Waters &
Brother and J.W. Jones & Company, dealers in fruits, farm produce, ect.; the
Burns Furniture Company, of which W.C. Byrd is manager; John Gemberling's
jewelry store; the White Front and Red Front livery stables, both owned by
McClain & Biggs, also Jorgensen's and Simon Lewis' barns; Mrs. C.M. Byrd's
millinery; three newspapers, the Times-Herald, the Harney Valley Items and the
Harney County News; Shelley & Foley, Grant Kesterson's and Joe Tupker's
blacksmith shops; five saloons; the harness and saddlery establishments of J.C.
Welcome & Son and Hopkins and Hunter; one bank, the Bank of Burns; a United
States land office; John McMullan, photographer; James Smith, shoe maker; the
meat market of Levens & Mace; G.W. Clevenger's undertaking parlors; several
barber shops; Hibbard & Broneton, dentists; Marsden & Geary, and H. Volp,
physicians and surgeons; Parris & Rembold, Biggs & Biggs, Williams & Fitz
Gerald, John G. Saxton, George Sizemore, A.W. Gowan, C.S. Sweek and Charles L.
Leonard, attorneys.
There are also the flouring mill of Joseph Sturdevant and
four saw mills and two shingle mills in the country surrounding the town.
Burns has three churches, the Presbyterian, Baptist and
Catholic, all supplied with commodious frame or stone edifices and settled
pastors. All the leading fraternal and some of the less known secret orders are
represented, some of them by flourishing lodges.
The educational interests of the town are conserved by an
excellent public school, employing five teachers, and well attended. There is
also a well equipped business college in Burns, maintained by a joint stock
company of local business men.
HARNEY.
The old fort from which this pleasantly situated little town
received its name has been referred to in the former chapter. It was located
about two miles from the site of the Harney of the present on Rattlesnake creek.
The fort has done its work and not a vestige of it remains at this day, for the
soldier, whose habitation it once was, has done his work and in his place has
come the farmer, the stockman and the merchant.
One of the results of this supercession of the military by
the civil is the town of Harney, whose first business establishment was
instituted the summer of 1885 by Thomas Bain. At this time the land which was to
form the site of the town was held by one Robert Ivers, under the pre-emption
laws of the United States. Mr. Bain paid him for lots on the property, taking
some kind of an obligation that title should be furnished as soon as Ivers
received his patent from the government. The same year a saloon was built by
Samuel Overlander and Herman Lawen, and a hotel and livery stable by N. Fisk.
Several dwellings were also erected, no doubt in the expectation that Mr. Ivers
would convey title to the lots whereon they stood as soon as he was able to do
so. During the next summer Stewart Brothers put in a flour and feed store, and
one other business was established, of a decidedly temporary character, however.
So far all was harmonious, but in 1886 Ben Brown, J.C.
Buckland and Jasper Davis determined to build a rival town on a site near by.
Brown put in a general merchandise establishment. Davis moved a small stock of
goods from Harney and opened a store in the new town and Buckland built a hotel
and feed stable. A saloon was started by a man named Coatsworth, in 1887.
Now came a battle for supremacy. Mr. Ivers seems to have
decided with the new town, for he conveyed one-third of his own site to Ben
Brown and one-third to john Ainsley, retaining the remaining third for himself.
This evidently made it possible for the new town to put a stop to the growth of
its rival or kill it entirely. But the indignation of the friends of Harney
proper was thoroughly aroused by this procedure. They determined to checkmate
the adversary if possible and they found their opportunity in the fact that
Ivers had violated the law in obligating himself to convey the land before final
proof had been made the patent had issued. Suit was begun, Henry Lyons filing
the complaint at the instance of Mr. Bain. The case was carried to the secretary
of the interior, who decided against Ivers, holding his title void, and all
transfers under it. Mr. Bain then had the land declared a government town site
so that any person wishing to settle in the place and erect a building might
have two lots for the cost of filing and final proof. To further work the
discomfiture of his adversaries, he secured indirectly a third interest in their
town site. The result was that the opposition town ceased to grow and soon its
business houses were removed to Harney or allowed to stand idle. When the post
office was removed from old Fort Harney it was established in the lower town,
but after Cleveland's election T.B. James was appointed postmaster, and by him
the postoffice was taken to the present town.
According to a Burns newspaper, the business men of the town
in 1888 were Victor J. Miller, attorney at law; Jasper Davis, general merchant;
J.C. Buckland, hotel keeper and liveryman; J.H. Loggan, store keeper for W.J.
Snodgrass, and deputy postmaster; Lessing & Coatsworth, saloon men; Van S.
Curtis, blacksmith and wagon maker; E.H. King, sawmill man on Rattlesnake creek.
As before stated, Harney was designated as temporary county
seat by the act which created Harney county, and it made a desperate struggle to
retain the honors and advantages accruing to the county's official center. It
failed, however, though many of its citizens still believe in the justice of
their cause in that contest and fell that the county seat was not fairly won by
Burns.
Since its defeat in the struggle Harney has not grown
rapidly, indeed it is hardly as lively a town as it was twelve years ago. It has
had several fires which have done considerable damage, but never a general
conflagration. In 1894 a lamp exploded in the Pacific Hotel, and several
buildings were destroyed in consequence. The next year Waldenberg's and Price
Wither's stores were burned, also Buckland's and George Tregaskes' saloons and
Snodgrass' livery barn. Louis Waldenberg, Jr., built a store in the place of his
uncle's destroyed one; a saloon was moved on to Buckland's lot, and another was
put on the site of the destroyed livery barn, so that Price Wither's store was
the only business not replaced in some way.
A business register of the town at present would include the
general merchandise stores of Fred Haines and Seth Bower & Company; the
blacksmith shops of Seth Bower and Charles Crawford; the Hotel Harney, owned by
William Russell, and the Tremont, owned by Charles Roper; the carpenter shop of
R. Everett; and the saloon of Charles Rand.
Two years ago a fine city hall was built and last summer a
beautiful and commodious schoolhouse. These, with the few residences, constitute
about the only developments which have taken place since the buildings which
replaced those destroyed by fire finished.
An excellent graded school is maintained in Harney and there
is a church building belonging to the Presbyterian denomination, in which both
the Burns preachers hold services.
LAWEN
This is a small town in the Malheur lake country. It has
several business establishments and is growing steadily. Its population,
according to the last census, was 27. Other villages and settlements, in which
postoffices have been started are Andrews, Crane, Denio, Diamond, Egli, Narrows,
Riley, Shirk, Silvies, Smith, Van and Venator.
DREWSEY.
Situated near the southern boundary of what was the Malheur
Indian reservation, in center of a stock raising and agricultural community of
no little importance, is Drewsey, one of the four chief towns of Harney county.
Its inception is coeval with the opening of the reservation, and to the influx
of people resulting from the removal of the red men its owes its existence.
Messrs. E.E. Perrington and A. Robbins were the first to take advantage of the
opportunity for profitable trade incident to the new regime. They opened a
general merchandise store in 1883. The same year a post office was established
with Mr. Perrington as postmaster. Next came S.T. Childs, the first village
blacksmith, and in 1884 was established the first saloon. During the fall of
that year McAfee & Bales built a hotel, a saloon and a livery stable. They
succeeded to the business interests of the pioneer vendor of liquors, who shot a
man in a quarrel and was compelled to become a fugitive from justice. Hardly was
the hotel of McAfee & Bales completed when it fell victim to the fire demon.
Thomas Howard resolved to avail himself of the opportunity afforded by this
accident to establish a profitable business, so he erected what became known as
the Elkhorn hotel. In 1885 a man named Lessing started another store; Al Jones
became the saloon man of the town in place of McAfee & Bales, retired, and
Joseph Bales, of this firm, put up another hotel, which, in 1888, was purchased
by Thomas Howard and moved away.
After the impetus given to the building of the town by the
settlement of the reservation had spent its force, the growth of Drewsey was at
an end until 1897, in which year A.I. Johnson & Brother built a general
merchandise store, M.M. McDonald and William Altnow a saloon, and Annie
Robertson the City hotel. New structures have been erected a different times
since, among them the I.O.O.F. hall, built in 1899. At the time of the writer's
visit, in the fall of 1902, evidences were not wanting that a healthy
development was in progress. Though there has never been a general conflagration
in Drewsey, fire has on several occasions wrought its work of destruction, the
last business building to fall before its fury being the old Elkhorn hotel.
A register of the present business houses of the town would
include the Bartless Hotel; the City Hotel, owned by J.W. Ward; general
merchandise stores, J.D. Daly and A.I. Johnson & Brother; livery stables,
Williams & Drewett and J.A. Bartless, that of the latter having been erected
this summer; saloons, J.A. Weatherly and E. Olson; blacksmith shops, Jesse
Brunner and R.B. Johnson; a money order postoffice, H.J. Clark, postmistress.
Near the town is a grist mill, which was built in 1896, and is said to be
supplied with good, modern machinery. Though designed for water power, it was
run by steam one fall. Owing to some complications about the ditch in which it
was intended to convey the water to the mill, the plant has been idle for
several years, but the property is thought to have recently passed into the
hands of A.W. Gowan, of Burns, who is considering the advisability of putting it
in operation again. Should he do so a great impetus will be given to the wheat
raising industry of the country contiguous to Drewsey.
©Shauna Williams