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Sumpter
"The visitor to the thriving little city of
Sumpter is impressed as soon as he alights from the train by the
spirit of progress which everywhere pervades the place. Hardly will
he have reached the nearest hotel before he will have mentally
observed how thoroughly the people believe in their town; at least
such was the experience of the writer. No sooner had he entered the
hotel door than he was handed a glass of water with the injunction:
"Sample this water; you have no such water as that in Baker City."
The genial host then called attention to his healthy looking person,
supplied with an abundance of adipose tissue, remarking that he felt
ten years younger than he did four years ago when he first came to
Sumpter and attributed this remarkable rejuvenation to the
purity of the air and water and the general salubrity of the
climate. Sumpter certainly has pure water and a healthy climate; it
also has a beautiful location at the head of the fine mountain
valley whose name it bears, while the mineral wealth of the
surrounding country gives earnest of the continuance of its material
prosperity and forms the foundation of its present hopefulness and
courage.
The town is old and yet new. The first settlement in
its vicinity, we are told, was made by a party of five southerners
in the fall of 1862. They named the primitive cabin which they built
in a gulch near by, Fort Sumpter, to manifest their pleasure at the
fall of the famous stronghold of that name in South Carolina. From
this circumstance the valley and the little city which later sprang
into existence came to be known by the names they now bear.
Though Sumpter began to be several decades ago, it
remained for many years a mere hamlet, containing, perhaps, not more
than a dozen houses. The timber in its vicinity could not be
utilized owning to the lack of transportation facilities. Only a
very vague idea of the mineral wealth hidden in the depths of the
Blue mountains contiguous to the town existed in the minds of men,
and there was nothing to keep it up but the places mines, which,
after the first few years, were worked only by Chinese. Chinamen may
yet be seen in large numbers during the mining season on a hillside
near town, industriously digging for the precious metal, but no
estimate can be made of the amount of gold which rewards their
labors, as inquiry into this delicate matter of private business
invariable elicits the same reply: "Some days belly well, some days
no good at all."
"Gold bearing quartz ledges were discovered in Sumpter
district before the close of the 'sixties, and even at that early
date some few local miners had a general idea of the existence of
mineral wealth, but time alone and the general development which it
brings could render this wealth available. In 1896 came the much
needed railroad, the Sumpter Valley narrow gauge being that year
extended from McEwen. Naturally the advent of modern means of
transportation infused new life into the town, but it was not until
1898 that it began to forge ahead at a rapid rate. Four years ago
last January, the town consisted of two small general merchandise
stores, a blacksmith shop, two hotels, a meat market, a small
hardware store and a few other business establishments, a public
school and a limited number of residences. It covered an area of
about thirty acres, had a population of a few hundreds of
improvements worth perhaps twenty-five or thirty thousand dollars.
Such was Sumpter when the boom came. In 1901, according
to the Blue Mountain American, it covered an area of fourteen
hundred acres, had eighty-one business houses with stocks of foods
aggregating $420,000 in value; improvements worth in the vicinity of
$500,000, eight brick buildings with a combined frontage of 351
feet, all the brick and lumber for which were manufactured at
Sumpter; a fine gravity system of water works, the reservoir having
a capacity of 1,200,000 gallons and the mains measuring five and a
half miles; a thirty-thousand dollar electric light plant; an
efficient fire department, equipped with two hose carts, a drying
tower, a well equipped hook and ladder truck, a three-hundred-dollar
fire bell and tower, rubber coats, rubber boots, service hats, etc.;
1,850 feet of graded and paved streets; five and a half miles of
sidewalk; twelve and a half miles of local telephone wire, and ten
long distance telephones; an efficient city government, and almost
everything else that an up-to-date town of more than three thousand
inhabitants might be expected to have.
While the boom is now over no demoralizing reaction has
yet come to the town, but progress continues and the evidences of
commercial health are everywhere to be seen. Though the marks of
Sumpter's rapid growth are plainly visible, and the vices which go
wherever prosperity reigns are well represented, the forces which
make for morality; culture and the highest enlightenment are also
here. The churchman may have his choice of four denominations, the
Methodist Episcopal, Protestant Episcopal, Presbyterian or Catholic.
Of these, one society, the Presbyterian, already has a neat church
building, and the Methodists and Catholic have taken the initial
steps toward erecting suitable temples of worship. It is expected
that the last-mentioned denomination will also build a school and a
hospital. The town has a fine public school building, in which four
teachers are at work, but it is not large enough to accommodate all
who seek its benefits, so another room has to be rented and a fifth
teacher employed. Among the educational forces of the community, the
newspapers may also be classed. Of these there are three, the Blue
Mountain American, the Sumpter Miner and the Sumpter Reporter, the
last named being a daily. The papers are in an unusually healthy
financial condition, and are surprisingly well equipped with
machinery, presses, type and everything needful to well regulated
modern plants. Editorially they are conducted on broad, liberal
principles, and no effort is spared to make them faithfully portray
the life of the community. The fraternal organizations are quite
generally represented in the town.
To give a full and complete resume of all the business
establishments of Sumpter would not be an easy task, but so far as
could be learned in a brief space of time, the principle ones are as
follows: Five general merchandise stores, one large hardware, two
meat markets, two groceries, a racket store, two bakeries, one candy
and cigar store, fourteen or fifteen saloons, four of five general
blacksmith and repair shops, two millinery and fancy goods stores,
two banks, four hotels, two restaurants, a large number of boarding
and lodging houses, a large saw and planing mill, several mining
offices, two assayers, three newspapers, three warehouses, two feed
stores, two clothing stores, carrying shoes, etc., two plumbing
establishments, four barber shops, two tailor shops, a photograph
gallery, a second hand store, a dance hall, an opera house, three
physicians and four lawyers.
Such is the Sumpter of to-day. Of its future it is not
the province of the historian to speak, but all will readily see
that it depends almost entirely upon the development of the mining
region contiguous. Lumbering is still an industry of great
importance and hay raising and some other forms of the hardier
farming are carried on successfully in the valley, but these are
subsidiary to mining and without the main source of wealth
production would not support the town. The future of the mining
district is, of course, more or less uncertain, but all indications
point toward an indefinite development both in the number of
properties and the average output. The opinions of some noted
experts have been obtained and they are all to the effect that, if
the experiences of mineralogists in California and elsewhere are to
be confirmed here, the district must long continue one of the
largest producers in the world. If the best mining science of the
present is to prove trustworthy in Sumpter district, the future of
the active, energetic little city which forms its central gem must
be a bright one indeed. " -- An Illustrated History of Baker,
Grant, Malheur and Harney Counties, 1902 |