Back When in Benton County Series from the Benton Bulletin

 

Submitted to Genealogy Trails by Dianne Skidds

 

Copyright of Articles belongs to the Benton Bulletin

 

 

From-Benton Bulletin July 16,1980 p. 4

Back When in Benton County

The Kings of Kings Valley

By Kenneth Munford

Part of a continuing series on the history of Benton County.

 

Part 1

Kings Valley in northwest Benton County, Kings Boulevard in Corvallis, and Kings Heights in Portland take their names form members of the King family who came to Oregon by covered wagon in 1845. There were 26 of them when they left St. Joseph

Missouri on May 2: 7 men, 7 women, 6 boys and 6 girls. One man two women and a baby boy and a young girl died on the way west.

 

The others spent their first winter in Oregon on Gales Creek, near present day

Forest Grove. During the winter the men folk and older boys went hunting- not only for game but also for land. They felt sure that the U.S. Congress would grant them free land when the Willamette Valley became part of the United States. Eventually their faith proved well founded. The provisional claims they staked out that winter and spring became donation land claims under the law of 1850.

 

We do not have a record of the rout the Kings took on their land-hunting trip. If they followed the old Hudsons Bay Company pack trail that skirted the western foothills of the valley, they would have found settelers on the Yamhill River who would soon found the towns of Lafayette and Dayton. The three Applegate brothers had settled two years before along Salt Creek. Nathaniel Ford and his relatives had settled Ricreal the year before.

 

After crossing the Little Luchiamute, the hunters may have followed an alternate pack trail south up the Lukiamute. After passing present Pedee, they came up over a rise and looked down into a pleasant little valley where no one had settled or claimed land.

 

Nahum King, patriarch of the King clan, like other leaders in other times and places, may have declared something like, “Boys, this is the place!”

 

Open grassland surrounded by dense forest along the meandering river looked good to them. It had adequate water and fuel, rich soil and abundant building materials. It was well draned so they would not suffer the floods they had experiences in Ohio and Missouri.

 

From the Benton Bulletin July 23, 1980 pg.4

Back When in Benton County

The Kings of King’s Valley

 

Part 2

Nahum and Serepta Norton King

Nahum King, patriarch of the King family who first settled Kings Valley in northwest Benton County, was born in New Salem, Massachusetts in 1783. His parents, Amos and Hopestill Haskins King, whose ancestors had come to the Massachusetts Colony before 1638, moved as far west as Albany, New York, when Nahum was a boy.

 

Grown to manhood, Nahum married a local belle, Serepta Norton, daughter of

James and Dulany Howe Norton.  Nahum was 24: Serepta was midway between

Her 15^th and 16^th birthdays when they married  May 9, 1807 in Columbus County

New York.

 

The family Bible show that their first child, Saretta, arrived in March 1808 and a second daughter, Lucretia, in July 1809. Both girls later became wives and mothers. Lucretia and her family came to Oregon eight years after the rest of the family.

 

In all, Serepta and Nahum had 16 children. Three of them died while still children. Eleven, most of them born in Ohio, continued the westward trek with their parents.

 

In Ohio, they lived in Madison County for more than 20 years. Nahum served briefly in the army in the War of 1812. High water flood periods may have been a factor in their decision to move on to Missouri. They settled in Carroll County on the Big Bend of the Missouri in the central part of the state about 1841.

 

The flood of 1844 destroyed their farm and the spring of 1845 finds them getting ready to move on to Oregon, where they hope to find well drained free land where floods would never bother them again.

 

Other families, including the Arnold Fullers who had lived near them I Ohio, joined them near St. Joseph with covered wagons, oxen, horses, cattle and food and equipment for the long trip across the plains and mountains. By this time two sons and two daughters had married and the King clan included seven grandchildren. There were ten members in the Fuller family.

 

The Kings’ son-in-law Rowland Chambers protested that he could not afford the take his wife Sarah and their two children to Oregon. Father Nahum insisted, however and provided funds for the purpose of equipment and supplies. He wanted to keep the family together.

 

 

From-Benton Bulletin Aug. 6, 1980

Back When in Benton County

The Kings of King’s Valley

By- Kenneth Munford

 

Part 4

 

The Nahum Kings, the Arnold Fullers and other families who left St. Joseph, Missouri on May 2, 1845 followed the Oregon Trail across what are now Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming and Idaho. At Fort Boise they made a decision they later regretted.

 

Up to that point, as one of them later wrote, “We had beautiful weather all the way, no rain of any account. We got along fine. The Indians did not disturb us any, except stealing our horses.” But at Fort Boise, Stephen Meek, a trapper-guide, persuaded the Kings and drivers of about 200 other wagons to follow him across central Oregon. No wagons had gone that way before. There were no roads. Grass for stock was scarce and water holes hard to find. But Meek promised the cut-off would save them 1590 miles.

 

Sickness also plagued the company. Of the 25 in the King party, all except

Anna Maria Allen King (Stepehn King’s wife) and young Solomon had been ill t one time or another. IN the Malheur Mountains, Sarah King Chambers, wife of

Rowland Chambers died of what was called ‘camp fever’. A stone marker with

 “S. Chambers, sept. 3, 1845” scratched on it was placed over her grave. Located in recent years near the village of Beulah, the marker has now been put on a concrete foundation.

 

Sarah had four younger, unmarried sisters in the company to look after the two small children she left. The eldest of the four Lovisa later married the widower.

 

A member of one of the parties on this so-called ‘terrible trail’ found a yellow stone and brought it to camp in a blue bucket. No one seemed to know what is was, even after it had been beaten flat on a wagon wheel. But after the discovery of gold in California three years later, the incident was recalled, and legends developed in regard to the lode this gold nugget must have come from. Thousands of people-up to present day- have spent countless hours searching for the ’Blue Bucket Mint.’

 

Hundreds f people following Meek’s ‘trapper trail’ ran out of food, not only for their stock but also for themselves. The Kings fared reasonably well; old father Nahum had seen to it that they had brought along an adequate supply of flour and bacon to carry them through.

 

The wagons finally straggled into The Dalles, the end of the Oregon Trail for wagon travel. The so-called cut-off had taken about a month of valuable time and the immigrants still had to cross the worst barrier of all-the Cascade Mountains.

 

From-Benton Bulletin August 13, 1980

Back When in Benton County

Shooting the Columbia Rapids

By- Kenneth Munford

 

Part 5

 

Getting over or through the Cascade Range was the hardest part of the 2000-mile cross-country journey for the covered wagon immigrants.

 

When the King family arrived at The Dalles of the Columbia River early in October 1845, another party led by Samuel Barlow and Joel Palmer had just left to blaze a wagon road over the mountain range south of Mt. Hood. Having Suffered on Stephen Meek’s trappers’ trail through central Oregon, the Kings wanted no part of another so-called ‘short-cut’.

 

 Like many other immigrants of 1845, they built rafts, took their wagons apart and loaded wagon box, wheels and equipment on the rafts in hopes of getting through the rapids on that way. It was a life and death struggle. In a wagon box on one raft on October 22, Malinda Crabtree (later Linn County resident) gave birth to twins sons. Four days later the eldest Kong son, John, his wife Susan, their 3-year-old Electra and an 8-month-old son were thrown into the water and drowned. Their 5-year-old Luther survived.

 

We do not have a record of how the Kings completed the journey. They may have stopped at Fort Vancouver, as many immigrants did, to enjoy the hot food and medical attention Dr. Mc Loughlin had prepared for them. They finally reached Linnton, a town Peter Burnett had founded two years before on the Willamette River below Portland. There we assume they gathered their horses and stock, which had been driven on a rough trail along the south bank of the Columbia.

 

From Linnton they climbed up over the Tualatin Mountains and made their way across the Tualatin Plains to their western edge. On Gales Creek they found a measure of hospitality form notable Joseph Gale, an adventurous trapper, ship builder and sea captain, who had helped form the Provisional Government two years before. Now he was building a gristmill on the beautiful clear stream at the foot of Gales Peak.

 

Here the remaining 20 of 25 members of the King family who had left Missouri in May spent their first winter in Oregon.

 

From-Benton Bulletin August 20, 1980

Back When in Benton County

Home sites on Free Land

By Kenneth Munford

 

Part 6

 

From their winter camp on Gales Creek near Forest Grove, the men went out hunting for home sites.

 

At that time, 1845-56, the boundary between Canada and the American part of the Oregon Country had not yet been drawn, but the pioneers of the early 1840’s felt sure the Willamette Valley would some day be U. S. Territory. One of their motivations in coming west was to ‘save Oregon from the British’. Ad they waited for Congress to act, they set up the Provisional Government with a land office where Provisional claims to square mile (640 acres) of free land could be recorded.

 

If the King land hunters rode southward on the old Hudson’s Bay Company pack trail along the western margin of the Willamette Valley, they would have found settles in the Chehalem, Yamhill, Salt Creek and La Creole ( Rickreall) valleys. From the ford on the La Creole at present Dallas the old trail crossed the Lukiamute and wound around the edge of the foothills passing present Adair Village, Lewisburg, and Corvallis to ford the Marys; River at present Philomath.

 

Other 1845’ ers were coming this way. Arnold Fuller and his son Price-who soon married Abigail King-staked claims northwest of Lewisburg. Thomas and Nancy Read settled south of Adair-and soon started a house that still stands. J. C. Avery and his wife’s brother, Edmund Marsh, came to the mouth of the Marys. Along this pack trail later in 1846, the Applegate brothers and others scouted out a wagon road that became known as the Applegate Trail.

 

An alternate route on the old pack trail between fords on the La Creole and the Marys lay farther west through a cleft in the foothills along the Luckiamute. We can imagine the excitement of the King land-hunters following that trail when they came up over the rise south of present Peedee and gazed down into the beautiful green valley on the banks of the meandering Luckiamute. It had an abundance of what they sought: rich well drained grass lands easy to clear for cultivation, forests to supply fuel and building materials, streams to supply water. And, best of all not a single settler.

 

From-Benton Bulletin August 27, 1980 pg. 4

Back When in Benton County

The Kings of King’s Valley

By Kenneth Munford

 

Part 7

 

Serepta and Nahum King had sixteen children between 1808 and  1835. There of them, Dulany, Hannah, and James Russell died before they reached their teens. The rest, except the two eldest daughters, Saretta, 37, and Lucretia, 36, came to Oregon with their parents by covered wagon in the summer of 1845. The clan, with the approximate ages at the time included:

Nahum King 62

Serepta Norton King 54

John King 32 and his wife Susan

      Children

      Luther 5

      Electa 3

      Baby boy 9 months old

Hopestill King Norton 30 her husband Lucius Carolus Norton 27

     Children (later had 8 more children)

       Isaac 3

       Wiley 1

Stephen King 27 and wife Anna Maria Allen King

Isaac King 26 married after arriving in Oregon to

     Almeda Van Bebber daughter of Lazarus Van Bedder settled in Kings Valley 1847

Amos Nahum King 23 married Malinda Fuller 19 in 1846. The Fuller family came west

        On the same wagon train as the Kings

Sarah “Sally” King 22 and husband Rowland Chambers 32

     Children

      Margaret 3

      James 1

Lovisa King 17 married widowed Rowland Chambers in WA County Feb 1846 before moving

    To Kings Valley. She eventually had 14 children.

Abigail King 16 married Price Fuller 20

Lydia “Lydie” King 14 later married Jonathan Lafayette Williams also a member of the 1845   

          Immigration

Solomon King 12 later married Stephen King’s widow Anna Maria Allen King in 1853

Rhoda Ann 10 later married twice. First to John Phillips then to Eli Summers.

 

From-Benton Bulletin 1980 pg 4

Back When in Benton County

Roots of the King Family

By-Charlotte Price Wirfs

 

Part 8

 

We have a new author this week in the history of Benton County column. Charlotte Price Wirfs is a descendant of two branches of the Kings of King’s Valley. Her ancestors include Isaac and Almeda Van Bebber King and Rowland and Lovisa King Chambers.

 

Charlotte was born in Salem, attended schools in Lane and Tillamook counties and graduated from Oregon College of Education at Monmouth. After teaching fifth and sixth grades in Lebanon for three years she settled down as a wife and homemaker for Walter Wirfs, superintendent of the Willamette Industries mill in Dallas. They have two children, Carolyn 6 and Matthew 4.

 

Charlotte edited the recently published Volume IV of the Polk County Historical Society series ‘Historically Speaking’. We welcome her as one of the contributors to our Kings of King’s Valley series.

 

Nahum King’s American ancestry dates back to 1635 when his great-great-great grandparents, William and Dorothy Hayne ‘Kinge’, and their five children arrived on the sip ‘Abigail’ out of Weymouth in Dorsetshire, England. They settles in Salem, Massachusetts. Some of the family moved west to New Salem in central Massachusetts. There Nahum was born on July 25, 1783. His parents, Amos and Hopestill Haskins King, moved on to New Your State, settling south of Alban I New Lebanon, Columbia County. Siblings of Nahum were Luther, Hiram, Isaac, Louisa (married a Sherman), Betsy (married a Warne), Hopestill (married a Johnson, William O. and Lydia (married a Sherman).

In Columbia County, Nahum 24 and Serepta Norton 15, were wed on May 9, 1807. She had been born on Nov. 12 1791 the fourth child of James and Dulany Norton. Her brothers and sisters were Solomon, John, Cloe (married a Howe), Abigail (married a Dominic), Keziah (married a Knapp). Many of these given names appear throughout later generations of Kings.

 

Serepta and Nahum's first three children were daughters, none of whom traveled to Oregon with the family in 1845. Sareta, born in New York on March 18, 1808 later married Moses Moore and lived in Madison County, Ohio and in Illinois, were Moses died. In a letter from Oregon I n1846, Anna Maria Allen King wrote that Moses Moore was expected in Kings Valley but never arrived. Younger generations of Kings referred to Saretta and ‘Aunt Saret’ so she remained in contact with the family. She had one son, who died in the Civil War and three daughters.

 

Lucretia King the second daughter was born July 5, 1809, in New York and later married Heman S. Hallock in 1827 in Madison County Ohio. Heman Hallock had been born in Vermont in 1803. The Hallocks apparently remained in Ohio when the rest of the family moved to Missouri. They too were expected in Kings Valley in 1846 but did not arrive

Until  1853.

They

Settled

 on a land clim just south of Kings Valley on March 15, 1854. ‘Aunt Crish’, as she was known dies May 14, 1869 and is buried in the Kings Valley Cemetery. The probate record of Nahum King lists her heirs as Sally Hallock Edleman, Hope Hallock Mason, Rhoda Hallock Pitman, Amos Hallock, Seretpa Hallock Rexford and Margaret Hallock Irwin.

Dalany King, the third daughter, named for Serepta;s mother Dulany Howe Norton, was born April 12, 1811, probably in Ohio an diedat the age of 12 on October 1, 1823

 

From-Benton Bulletin September 10, 1980

Back When in Benton County

John King’s Family

By-Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 9

 

John King, the first son of Nahum and Serepta, was born in Madison County, Ohio

March 23, 1813. He and his wife, Susan Cooper King, and their three children were in the party of Kings leaving Missouri in May 1845. Four members of this family lost their lives on the same day in an accident on the Columbia River near Cascade Locks. The drowning occurred October 26, 1845. It must have been a defeating blow to the exhausted and trail-weary travelers who were so close to their destination.

 

One child, Luther, 4 survived the accident. His sister, Electra, 3, and his infant brother were drowned with their parents. Later, as an adult, Luther had a second brush with death, which earned him the name ‘Rattlesnake King’, after barely surviving a deadly snakebite.

 

Nahum and Serepta took their orphaned grandson into their household as they still had four children under the age of 17 living with them. The 1850 census for Benton County shows Luther, age 10, living in the Nahum King household. Nahum died in 1856 and teenaged Luther, ‘Little Lute’, went to live with his Uncle Amos and Aunt Malinda in Portland. Amos N. King was officially appointed guardian of Luther in March of 1857 by Multnomah County Judge of Probate, Anthony L. Davis.

 

In the 1870 Census Luther King, 30, and his wife, Caroline Ladd King, 17, are living in Benton County. He began application for a Donation Land Claim on Blakesly Creek east of Wren on August 9, 1867, but Eli Summers, Luther’s uncle, proved up on the claim after Luther’s application was cancelled, October 21, 1887.

 

At age 32 Luther was sentenced to one year in the Oregon State Penitentiary, beginning April 22, 1873. At that time he was listed as being a farmer from Benton County. He served a little less than a year for the crime of ‘Abduction’. Prison records provide one of the few physical descriptions of any member of the King family. He was 5’ 3 ½” tall, fair complected with brown hair and hazel eyes.

 

Luther’s second was wife Annie Laurie Bayes. They had a son, Luttie Russel King, born in Gardiner, Oregon, on April 9, 1886. Other children of Luther King were: Charlie, Dellie, Electra and Ettie.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

September 17, 1980

By-Charlotte Wirfs

 

Part 10

 

Hopestill King and Lucius Norton
 

Before leaving Missouri, the Kings agreed that Hopestill’s younger brother would relieve her at driving the wagon. Her husband, Lucius Carolus Norton, was not well and spent much of the journey bedded down.

 

Hopestill and Lucius were first cousins. Both had been born in Madison County, Ohio.  ‘Hope’ on February 7, 1815, and Lucius, son of Solomon Norton and Cynthia Knapp,

On December 26,1818. They were married in Ohio in October 1839 and had two sons, Isaac, 3, and Wiley, 1, when they came west.

 

The Nortons staked their donation land claim in the center of Kings Valley between Price and Maxfield Creeks and extending onto the west bank of the Luckiamute. The two-story house they build in the 1850’s housed several generations of Nortons before it burned in 1927. Eight of their then children were born there.

 

Ashnah Norton, their first daughter, was the first white child born in Kings Valley (February 8, 1847). She was a teenage when the California Volunteers replaced the regular army troops at Fort Hoskins and was undoubtedly amoung the ‘Webfoots’ entertained by the soldiers on special occasions. She was about 17 when she married Private James Plunkett, 26, a gunner and part time drummer at Fort Hoskins. (the bass drum he used is in the Horner Museum in Corvallis). Ashnah and Him built a house and settled down on Plunkett Creek.

 

Hopestill’s next children were triplets, Nahum, Serepta, and Cynthia. Cynthia lived only a few days. The others grew to maturity. Nahum ‘Bub’ married and lived near Blodgett. Serepta ‘Sis’ married Willard Price, long time storekeeper in Kings Valley.

 

Amoung the later children

Melinda ‘Linn’ married Dillard Price, brother of Willard, and son of Larkin Price, a 1846 pioneer. Sarena was nearly 19 when she died and Cerilda dies at 1 ½. Youngest son Lucius C. Price married Mary Ellen Patterson, a pioneer from Illinois, and lived for 30 years near Norton Station.

 

Father Lucius died in 1859. Hopestill and the children still at home moved into the upper Yaquina Valley. When the Oregon Pacific Railroad built through the area in the 1880’s the station there was named Norton Station. Norton’s post office opened in 1895. It was in the vicinity of that Hopestill died on November 16, 1892 aged 77. Many of her descendants still live in western Oregon.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

September 24, 1980

Back When in Benton County

By-Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 11
 

Hannah and Stephen King’s Family

Hannah King was born in Madison County, Ohio, November 30, 1816 and died there August 28, 1825 at the age of ten. Two worn stones mark the graves of Hannah and her sister Dalany, in the Plain City, Ohio cemetery.

 

Stephen and his wife, Anna Maria Allen, had no children when they left Missouri in 1845. Like Lucius Norton, Stephen was ill during most of the journey and relied on help from his younger brothers and sisters.

 

Stephen King, born July 13, 1818, in Madison County, Ohio, was the second son of Nahum and Serepta King. Anna Maria Allen King, daughter of John and Anna Bangs Allen, was born March 26, 1823. They were married in Madison County on Christmas Day in 1843.

 

On April 1, 1846, after they settled in Kings Valley, Anna Maria wrote a letter to her mother and family and reported that she feared Stephen’s illness to be ‘consumption’ but that he seemed to have recovered. The letter encouraged the Allen family to come to Oregon and described the land:

“…You perhaps wish to know how I like the country. I like it well. It is an easy place to make a living. You can raise as many cattle as you please and not cost you a cent, for the grass is green the whole winter and cattle are as fat as they had been stall fed the whole year round. Wheat is raised without trouble and will fetch anything, the same as cash…”

 

the letter then described what supplies were needed to make the journey. The main supply was flour, at least 175 or 200 pounds, supplemented with 75 pounds of bacon per person. Bedding was to be only the essentials and clothing was to last a year after arrival. She advised to start with four to five yoke of young cattle per wagon and to bring coffee, sugar, and other supplies needed in case of illness.

 

This descriptive letter was published in eastern papers and was one of the more accurate reports which encouraged other settlers to endure the Oregon Trail.

 

Stephen and Anna Marie settled on their claim on November 1, 1851 between Wren and Blodgett. At the age of 34 Stephen died on November 28, 1852, leaving a three-year-old son, Charles, who later inherited his father’s claim. Anna Maria didn’t remain a widow for long, for in 1853 she married Stephen’s younger brother, Solomon, who was then 20 years of age.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

October 1, 1980

Back When in Benton County

By-Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 12
 

Isaac King’s Family

 

For Isaac King, 25, and his younger brothers, Amos and Solomon, the trip to Oregon must have been one of adventure. Hunting game along the trial was one from of recreation for these young men and although the emigrants did not rely on the meat, which these jaunts provided, it was nice to have an occasional rabbit stew if time could be found to cook it properly.

 

Isaac was born November 23, 1819, in Madison County, Ohio. He was married by Isaac Wesley Staats of Benton County, to Almeda Jane Van Bebber on March 22, 1847 and they settled on a claim in August of that year. Located in Kings Valley, their clima bordered that of Almeda’s parents, Lazarus and Martha Van Bebber. The Van Bebbers were born in Tennessee and traveled from Illinois, where Almeda was born about 1832, to Oregon in 1846.

 

Nothing remains of the Isaac King Donation Land Claim except an old orchard and a few footings where the barn once stood. A small graveyard located on an oak knoll overlooks the farmstead and Isaac rests there with his 2-½ year old daughter, Ellen, and an infant named Lillie Zumwalt.

 

The death of Isaac still remains a mystery. The Daily Herald, of Portland, reported that Isaac became ‘…tired of life and blew his brains out with a pistol…’ The Corvallis Gazette December 8, 1866, disclaimed the report and stated the neighbors and friends believed Isaac “…came to his death by an accidental discharge of a pistol in his own hands…’ Another report survives today in oral history from Kings Valley. Residents there give varying accounts of the murder of Isaac, plotted by members of his immediate family.

 

Through it all these facts remain. Following a hunting trip with his sons, Isaac was found shot to death in his barn by his wife. The ball had entered under the chin and came out at the top of his head, leaving his thick beard without a powder burn. Three loads remained in his pistol but all the caps had been snapped. He died on his 47^th birthday leaving a wife and eight children: Alfred, Samuel, Stephen, Elenor (married a Zumwalt), Olive (married a Reed), Hollis, U.S. Grant, and Melvina S. (Married a Ramsdell).

 

Almeda married Andrew Jackson Zumwalt in Corvallis on April 30, 1868 and had four more children: Sarah Jane (married a Dickins), Lilly May, George Henry, and Addie (Married a Plunkett). She dies about April 1890 and is buried in Kings Valley Cemetery. A metal marker is her only memorial.

From-Benton Bulletin

October 8, 1980 PG 4

Back When in Benton County

By Kenneth Munford

 

Part 13

Kings and Fullers Unit

 

On starlit nights around campfires on the Oregon Trail, romances blossomed. Marriages resulted. The Arnold Fuller and Nahum King families, who had traveled west together, were linked by two weddings in 1846. Melinda Fuller 19 married Amos Nahum King, 24. Abigail King, 17 married Price Fuller, 20.

 

Each couple had concerns other than themselves. Price Fuller’s father, Arnold had lost his wife and a daughter Tabitha on the way west. Abigail and Price Fuller staked their donation land claim alongside Arnold’s just north and west of present Lewisburg. Both could claim 640 acres; Price by virtue of his marriage to Abigail and Arnold though a second to Mary Ann Lewis in 1848.

 

Amos and Melinda King first staked a claim on the Willamette north of Corvallis but soon sold their rights to it. Believing that the village of Portland offered better opportunities, they moved there in 1849, taking his parents with them. The parents, Serepta and Nahum King, did not stay long. They were back on Benton County in time to be counted in the 1850 Census, with son Solomon and grandson Luther in their household.

 

In Portland, Amos worked in a tannery-the only one in the Pacific Northwest at that time-and eventually owned it. It was on the site of the Portland Civic Stadium. He and Melinda bought squatters’ rights to a 535-acre tract of untellable hill land nearby. It encompassed the area west of what is now 18^th Avenue from Canyon Road to Lovejoy Street. They eventually received title to it as a donation land claim. They built a fine home on the property and raised six children.

 

As Portland expanded, they opened their land for suburban housing. In Kings Heights they named streets for the family. King Avenue, Kings Court, Kingston and Melinda have survived. Nartilla, named for a daughter Nautilla, has become SW 19^th. Lucretia, named for Amos’ elder sister, is now NW 22^nd Place. Ella, named for a granddaughter, is now NW 20th Place.

 

They sold 40 acres-a t$800 an acre-to Portland for the first City Park. It is the nucleus of present Washington Park, the northeastern segment where stands the statue of Sacajawea, a memorial to Lewis and Clark.

 

One of their sons, Nahum Amos King, remembered his mother as the strongest woman he had ever seen. She weighed 336 pounds, he said, and she could lift a 50-pound sack of flour by the ears and hold it at arms length.

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

October 22, 1980

By-Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 14
 

Rowland Chambers Families

 

Family history relates that Rowland Chambers arrived in Oregon with tem cents in his pocket. Twenty years later he had become the patriarch of the King family and had amassed a small fortune which he kept locked in a safe in his bedroom.

 

Approximately 450 people living today are direct descendants of Rowland Chambers, son-in-law of Nahum and Serepta King. He was born March 12, 1813, the son of Joseph and Susan Van Gundy Chambers. On August 15, 1841, he married Sarah King in Franklin County, Ohio. Sarah, born July 25, 1823, had two children, James and Margaret, when the Chambers family left Missouri in the spring of 1845.

 

Five months later, ‘Sally’ died of ‘camp fever’ on September 3, 1845, and was buried on the Oregon desert French trappers named Malheur, ‘Evil Hour’/ Her grave was one of the few marked graves of the 1845 emigration fro most graves were deliberately camouflaged to discourage Indian grave robbers.

 

Care for Sally’s two babies undoubtedly fell into the hands of her 17-year-old sister, Lovisa. In Washington County, Oregon, on February 22, 1846 Lovisa King became the bride of Rowland Chambers. That same spring land claims of approximately 640 acres each were laid out in Kings Valley.  Members of the King family drew lots from a hat. Rowland promised to build a gristmill for the community if he could have first pick of locations. That was agreed to and in 1852 Rowland Chambers and Mr. Reynolds, with the help of Stephen King, raised a two-story mill on the banks of the Lukiamute where a natural out-cropping of rock provided a four-foot waterfall. For 50 years the mill ground flour on the stone burrs, which had been shipped around the ‘Horn’ from France before modern machinery was installed. The mill survived until 1963 when the ruin was burned.

 

The first home of Rowland and Lovisa was a log cabin. Later a large house was constructed with numerous high-ceilinged bedrooms, large hall, a parlor, dining room, kitchen, cheese room, and pie room where unbaked mincemeat pies were set on shelves to freeze in winter. This house was nearly destroyed by fire and was replace with a house which still can be seen alongside the road in Kings Valley. A memorial plaque is posted on front.

 

Before his death in September in Kings Valley, Rowland was able to return for a visit with family he had left in Ohio. Lovisa died December 18989 at her home in Kings Valley. They are buried in Kings Valley Cemetery.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

October 29, 1980

Pg 4

By Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 15
 

Heirs and Memories of the Rowland Chambers.

 

Rowland Chambers, with the help of the Kings, started a miniature population explosion in Northwestern Benton County. Lovisa King Chambers raised 16 children including her sister’s two, James and Margaret.

 

James married Clarinda Kizer and later became president of Philomath College. Margaret Married Mr. Bagley. Sarah, the first of Lovisa’ s children, married William Watson of the Kings Valley and had a family of eight children.  William (Bill) married Minnie Fairchild. Jackson (Jack) had two children. John lived in Kings Valley and had three sons. Franklin (Jake) married Emma Maxfield and lived in Kings Valley. Henry and his wife Barbara had one son and resided in Whitcom County, Washington, before moving to Portland. Oredelia (Delia) married Henry David Randall and raised 11 children in Olex, Washington. Samual raised two sons and lived in Newport. Lydia and Tip Maxfield had several children. Rebecca married Asa B. Alexander and raised three daughters in Benton County. Julia became the bride of Larkin G. Price and lived in Benton County with her five children. Lincoln (link) and Corra had three children.  Anna and Alice died in 1879 in a diphtheria epidemic.

 

Like most Oregon Pioneers the Chambers valued education. Because of difficult road conditions and short school terms Rowland hired a teacher to tutor his children. Daughter Julia remembered attending school in Kings Valley and later going to the Little Red Schoolhouse, which stood about two miles south of the present Kings Valley store. One of Julia’s teachers was her brother, James, and another was Henry Randall, who later became her brother-in-law. Classes included the three ‘R’s” and geography and algebra for the older boys. Julia states that her older brothers and sisters attended Willamette University in Salem. Her half-brother James held an A. B. (probably from Willamette University) when he was president of Philomath College in 1869.

 

Dancing was disapproved of but the young people organized parties where they played Weevily Wheat and other dancing games. For the annual May Day celebrations every little girl got a new dress for the occasion. The two girls who died in the 1879 diphtheria epidemic were buried in their May Day Dresses.

 

Everyday dresses were made from homespun wool. Rebecca Alexander remembers her mother Lovisa spinning wool from Rowland’s sheep and her older sisters weaving it. Lovisa dyed the wool with peach leaves and different kinds of bark. Later, when carding mills were set up, rolls of pre-carded wool could be purchased.

 

A granddaughter, Mae Watson Landess, described the Chambers’ homes and recalled that Lovisa was probably the first homemaker in Kings Valley to have a kitchen stove.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

November 5, 1980 PG 8

By-Kenneth Munford

 

Part 16
 

Anna Marie and Solomon King

 

Solomon, who became the best known of the King family in Benton County, was an energetic lad of 12 when he came to Oregon in 1845. His sister-in-law

Anna Marie Bangs King wrote home that only she and Sol escaped the “slow lingering fever that prevailed” amoung the two dozen people in the wagon train.

 

Sol staying with his parents, Nahum and Serepta King, after the other brothers and sisters had left home. After a brief stay in Portland with brother Amos, they returned to Benton County. By that time the best land in Kings Valley had been claimed. Nahum went a few miles south and staked out his donation land claim next to George Wrenn’s. Nahum’s claim of 640 acres lay north and west of present village of Wrenn. He built a house on the pleasant slope in the southwestern part of the claim-south of present highway US 20 and Gellaty Creek, which runs through the property.

 

In 1852 brother Stephen dies, leaving Anna Maria a widow with a 3-year-old son Charles. A year later Sol and Anna Maria were married. To them were born Anna, Lucy, Eli, William, Abe or Abraham and Scott.

 

In June 1852, Sol bought the home place from his parents. His father died the next year. His mother, after a time, went to live wither daughter Lovisa Chambers.

 

Sol began to acquire additional property, buying part of the Wrenn and Byrd claims, and in partnership with another man, a sawmill on the Sour claim.

 

In 1872 the Sol Kings moved into Corvallis, having purchased the Corvallis Livery, Feed and Sale Stable on 2^nd Street between Madison and Monroe. They operated this business for 14 years, but gave it up after the barn burned.

 

In 1876 Sol ran for county sheriff. The Gazetter praised him for his struggle ‘to manhood thro’ the pioneer difficulties’ and said, ‘For his opportunities, no man, for generosity and whole-souled help, to those in need, has more to rise up and call him blessed than Sol King.’ He won election that year and four more times in two-year intervals, serving as sheriff from 1867 to 1886.

 

With Wallis Nash, T. Egenton Hogg, and others, in 1880 Sol became on of the incorporators of the Oregon Pacific Railroad, which built what are now the Southern Pacific branches through Philomath and Wren. To the coast and through Corvallis and Albany and up the North Santiam Canyon.

 

In 1891 Sol and Anna Marie moved to a farm north of Corvallis, between Dixon Creek and present Walnut Boulevard. The way to their place became known as Kings Road-now Kings Boulevard.

 

Through the years they made money buying and selling property, the livery stable, in shorthorned cattle, in a dairy, and in general farming. One biographical sketch says they  ‘prospered exceedingly.’

 

Anna Maria was 83 when she died in 1905. Sol had just passed his 80^th birthday when he died in 1913.

 

From-Benton County Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

November 1980

By- Charlotte L. Wirfs

 

Part 17 (Possibly 18, missing either 17 or 18)
 

Abigail, Lydia and Rhode King

 

Nahum King’s three youngest daughters were Abigail, Lydia and Roda Ann. Like most of the to his children they were born in Madison County, Ohio and were ages 16, 14, and 10 when they arrived in Oregon.

 

The trip to Oregon culminated in marriage for Abigail when she married Price Fuller, son of Arnold, on August 23, 1846 in Benton County. Price was born in Franklin County, Ohio I 1826. is younger sister, Melinda, had married Abigail’s brother, Amos King, in the spring of that year. By 1850 Abigail and Price had three children named Albert, Sarah A., and Serepta J. and they lived on their Donation Land Claim in Benton County. IN May of 1856 Abigail died in Benton County and Price married

Mrs. Martha Jane Mc Mann (McMahan).

 

Lydia became the bride of another 1845 immigrant Jonathan L. Williams in Benton country two days before Christmas in 1847.  “Jont” was born in Grainger County, Tennessee, in 1826 and arrived in Oregon with his parents, James Edward and Martha Williams, in 1846. They settled near Airlie in Polk County. That is also where ‘Jont’ and Lydia settled their Donation Land Claim in May of 1854. Their know children were Lafayette (Lafe), Lena, Emmet, and a daughter who died in infancy. ‘Jont’ died in Polk County January 24, 1907 and is buried in the Odd Fellow Cemetery in Salem. Minnie Price, 92, of Portland remembers hearing her mother, Serepta Norton Price, speak of

‘Aunt Lyd’, who lived in Portland and was almost blind.

 

Minnie also remembers hearing about ‘Aunt Rhoda’, that would be the youngest child of Nahum and Serepta, Roda Ann, who was born April 17, 1835. Rhoda Ann lived briefly in Portland with her parents and brother, Solomon. Perhaps that is where she met and married John Phillips. They were married February 19, 1850 in Clackamas County. Phillips was a native of White County, Illinois and was born in 1830. He arrived in Oregon in 1846.

 

Rhoda Ann and John lived for a while with Nahum and Serepta on their claim near Wren before settling on their own Donation Land Claim next door in November of 1850. John must not have lived long after settling his claim for Rhoda married her neighbor, Eli summers, about 1856 or 1857. Summers was born in Mahoning County, Ohio and arrived in Oregon in July of 1853. He proved up on the claim that had been obtained for Luther, the orphan. It was east of Wren on Blakesly Creek. Summers settled there in September 1853. John Phillips, Solomon King, James Edleman, and Heman S. Hallock signed the affidavit for Eli’s claim. Rhoda Ann died near Heppner, Oregon after 1905.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

November 26, 1980

By Dorothy A. Brown

Rt. 1 Philomath Oregon

 

Part 19
 

Charles King’s Family

 

Charles King was the only son of Stephen and Anna Maria Allen King and the grandson of Nahum and Serepta King, whose family settled in Kings Valley. Stephen’s donation land claim, which Charles eventually inherited, was on the Marys River and half mile west of the covered bridge at Harris. This area, which at one time had a store and a one-room school, had two names: Harris for the railroad station; Elam for the post office.

 

Charles was born in 1848 and was three when his father died. His mother married Soloman King, Stephen’s younger brother, and lived for a time on Nahum and Serepta’s claim near Wren.

 

About 1869 Charles and Susan Robinetter were married and presumably lived on his father’s claim, raising three children: Anna Maria, Edward and Adella. They later separated and Charles married Margaret Barnes. He died in 1915 and is buried in the Odd Fellow Cemetery on Witham Hill in Corvallis.

 

Charles and Susan’s eldest daughter, Anna Maria, never married. She spent many years in The Dalles because of asthma.

 

Edward, born in 1871, grew up in Elam-Harris area. One of his favorite stories was about taking a local girl to a dance at Summit. In those days of horse-and-buggy and railroad travel going to a square dance sometimes took all night going, dancing, and coming home. On this occasion they went to Summit on an old two-man railroad handcar that had to be pumped up and own like a teeter-totter to make it go, with one person pumping on each end. They had plenty of exercise before arriving at the dance. All went well until coming home down the long grade, the girl’s end of the pumper got tangled in her dress and ripped off her skirt. Explanations were in order when they arrived home!

 

Edward married Minnie Harrison in 1896 at Harris and they raised their family there. He worked in the store and the Elam post office. Their children were: Glen (1898-19640, Gladys (1901-1964), and Helen (1901-?). Glen and his wife Eunice had a son Neil who died and a daughter Gleneva who lives with her family in Bend. Helen married Henry Schweitz. Their son Jack and his family live in Bend. Helen, now Mrs. Rundle, resides in Corvallis. One time when Glen was logging with horses above Harris he lost a team when a load of logs rolled over a bluff into the Marys River.

 

Edward died in 1949 and is buried at Wren with Glen, Gladys and father Charles.

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

January 21 1981

By-Albert Warren King

Fruitland Idaho

 

Part 20
 

Abe King Family

 

Sol King, the youngest son of Nahum and Serepta King, whose family settled in Kings Valley, and his wife Anna Maria had two daughters and four sons. The third son may have been named Abraham, but he was always called Abe. He was my father.

 

Abe was born in September 1860, while his parents still lived on the Nahum King donation land claim near Wren. He attended School in Wren and later in Corvallis, where he became a god mathematician. In his youth, Abe worked for his father in the livery stable in Corvallis. One time when Abe was driving a hearse for a funeral he let the hoses run away. Sol was not happy about this, but he could not help laughing. He told Abe he had better give up hearse driving and go live with his older sister Lucy.

 

She was married to William Bailey ‘Doc’ Kiger, and had moved to Grant County. They needed help on their ranch. Abe files and lived on his own homestead, and also worked for Pete French and for Miller and Lux, the big landowner from California.

 

In German in the late 1860’s, Albert Busse, tiring of the military discipline and stern religious life in that county, decided to come to America. His wife, Bertha Pribenow Busse, whose people were Huguenots, was also ready to get away from religious persecution and start a new life overseas if they could get out of the county. By rather devious means Albert successfully reached the United States. Bertha and their tiny daughter Clara came later. Clara born February 15, 1868, took her first steps on the ship crossing the Atlantic. After several moves the Busses finally settled in Grant County, Oregon, and homesteaded on the Blitzen River.

 

While livin with the Kigers, Abe met Clara Busse, who like himself was fond of horses. Their friendship led to marriage in January 1888. She was 20, he was 28. Their first child, Bertha was born February 20, 1889 in Grant County. They moved to eastern Washington, where little Ester was born and died. Other disasters befell them there. Abe brought the family back to Benton County, where he leased one of the Lewis places north of Corvallis for a time, then moved closer to town.

 

Altogether Abe and Clara had eleven children, all but Esther living to maturity. I was the youngest of the brood. The fusion of the King and Busse blood seemed to enhance the pioneer spirit that ran in the veins of their fore bearers. Both of my grandfathers, Sol King and Albert Busse, were enterprising and innovative. Albert dammed the Blitzen and successfully raised irrigated vegetables in the high desert county. Sol dammed Dixon Creek, north of Corvallis, for irrigation and stock water. Both encouraged their children to get good educations and to accomplish something in life.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

By-Kenneth Munford

 

Part 21

 

Kings Valley Legends

 

Old legends never die-they just grow and grow.

 

Take for example some of the tales about General Philip H. Sheridan.

 

One story has him a great friend of Jim Plunkett and a rival for the hand of Ashnah Norton, the first while child born in Kings Valley. The talk has a romantic end with drummer boy Plunkett beating out the famous General.

 

A Gazette-Times reporter recently declared that Sheridan was the ‘founder’ of Fort Hoskins in Kings Valley.

 

People in Yamhill County like to think of Sheridan as the builder of the Fort Yamhill blockhouse that is now at Dayton and of the road to the coast from the town of Sheridan over the Salmon River Trail.

 

Twenty years ago, Gunter Barth in  ‘All Quiet in Yamhill’ tried to slay some of these wild stories, but they have continued to flourish.

 

It is true, Barth says, that P.H. Sheridan, later one of the most famous generals in the Union Army in the Civil War, as a 25-year-old lieutenant three years out of West Point, was stationed at Fort Yamhill and Fort Hoskins between 1856 and 1861. At Fort Hoskins in the fall and winter of 1856-576, as the junior officer present, he was given the dirty, rain-drenches task of supervising the construction of a pack trail over the coast range. It ran through fire-blackened snags and downed timber from Hoskins over Bonner Mountain, up the wet fork of the Marys River, and down Little Rock and Rock Creeks to Siletz. It did not lead from Fort Yamhill to the coast, as some legends would lead us to believe.

 

Twice, for brief periods, Sheridan happened to be the senior officer on duty at Fort Yamhill, for five weeks in 1856 and for two months in 1861, and was therefore in command of the post, but that was only during the absence of the senior officers. He was called east for more active duty in the Civil War, leaving on September 1, 1861.

 

A short time later, James Plunkett, Royal Bensell and other young men of California, eager to get into the War Between the States, volunteered for duty in Eldorado County. Instead of being sent of to the battlefields of Manassas and Bull Run, however, they were sent to relieve the troops at Fort Hoskins and Fort Yamhill. They arrived in the Willamette Valley in November; two months after Sheridan had left. It is difficult to see how Lt. Sheridan and Pvt. Plunkett could have been friends.

 

Ashnah Norton (born 1847) would have been nine years old when Sheridan was stationed at Fort Hoskins. She was a teenager by the time the California volunteers arrived. She subsequently met and married Pvt. Plunkett.

 

There are enough romances and adventure in true stories in the valley of the Kings without clouding them with unfounded myths and legends.

 

This is the last of the series of the Kings of Kings Valley.

 

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

January 28, 1981

PG 4

By-Warren King

Fruitland Idaho

 

(No Part Number)

 

More on Abe King’s Family

 

My Mother, Clara Busse King has strong hands. She could drive a spirited horse to town and never break an egg. Dressing chickens for our table or for market, she made the feathers fly. She was a master at whipping up baking powder or sourdough biscuits, and popping them into the hot oven of our wood stove. And were the results ever good! Those strong hands of hers also had a way of prodding, poking, pointing the way for her ten children of make something of themselves.

 

Bertha Anna the eldest, born February 29, 1889, graduated from Oregon Agricultural College in 1908 and became a schoolteacher. Between assignments, she helped raise her younger brothers and sisters. She was the family nurse. She used to take me, her youngest brother (twenty years her junior) along o prune, apple, and berry picking jaunts, where I was often mistaken for her son rather than her brother.

 

Lucy Adelia, born September 1, 1890, married Adolph Fromherz and raised nine children. One of them, Mary Married Leo C. Gerding and is one of the few King descendents who still lives in Corvallis.

 

Clara Winifred, born November 14, 1894, attended OAC and became a teacher, a nurse and an administrator at Eureka, California.

 

James Allen, born September 26, 1896, joined the Navy. After his hitch, which was mostly spent in the Philippines, he lived in and around Manila for 13 years. He homesteaded some timberland, but because of malaria had to leave this venture.

 

Florence Kathleen, born March 15, 1899, attended OAC and became a Presbyterian missionary to China, where her five boys were born. Her husband was Albert Van Etten. Four of their sons graduated from Oregon State.

 

Ines Elizabeth, born September 4, 1901, attended the University of Oregon, worked in the journalism department there and afterwards pioneered back to North Dakota. She married William Herring.

 

Dorothy, born January 25, 1904, after high school and three months at Oregon Normal School in Monmouth, taught school in Kings Valley for a year. Then she went to Humboldt State, in California, to finish her education and continue a successful career as a teacher. She also became an authority on wild flowers.

 

Arthur Solomon, born September 13, 1906, got those two names because his grandfather promised the new boy two acres of land if he was named Solomon, and a cousin Arthur Hope said he would guy the boy his first suit if he was named Art. Both lived up to their agreements. Art King became the best known of Sol’s grandsons in Benton County and throughout the state. He graduated from Oregon State and became an OSC Extension Specialist in irrigation, where he was recongized authority on the use of commercial fertilizer.

 

Charles William, born January 1, 1909, sometimes called “C.W.” graduated from OSC and then went to the University of Pennsylvania for advanced study in law. He was admitted to the Oregon Bar in 1935, and is still practicing law in Lincoln City, Oregon.

 

Warren, the youngest, born May 27, 1912, turned his hand to farming and logging. He became interested in the combination of irrigation and commercial fertilizers. Limited success came to him after a move to eastern Idaho many years ago.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

February 4, 1981

PG 4

By-Charlotte L. Wirfs

Dallas Oregon

 

(No Part Number)

 

Larkin Price

 

Price Creek and the big J.V. Price sign on the general store in Kings Valley are reminders of the legacy of Larkin Price. He was an 1846 pioneer to Oregon who live din the Pedee-Lewisvill-Kings Valley area from 1870 to 1910. His family intermarried with the Kings of Kings Valley and related families.

 

Larkin was born in the turbulent years preceding the Civil War. His parents were plantation owner and slaveholders in Patrick and Henry Counties, Virginia. As he was growing up he witnessed family discord over slavery. Arguments eventually scatter individuals into Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri and finally to Oregon. In 1846 with his new bride, the former Harriet Simpson, Larkin left Missouri and headed west. Her brother, Ben Simpson, who later became one of the agents to the Grande Ronde Indian Reservation, captained their wagon train.

 

Larkin and Harriet took up a 640-acre donation land claim in the Waldo Hills east of Salem near Sublimity. Most of their children were born in that area. Larkin raised horses, farmed, and served as clerk of the Rock Point School District in 1858 and in 1870. Harriet died about 1867.

 

The only other member of Larkin’s immediate family to come to Oregon was a brother Fantly R. Price. He and his wife, nee Gilla Simpson, arrived in Oregon in 1851. They settled on a donation land claim near Ballston in Polk County. Many of their children also lived in the Kings Valley area. Some of them are buried in the cemetery there.

 

A severe winter in the Waldo Hills killed many livestock. Widower, Larkin moved his family to Polk County in 1870. He married Sarah Gilliam in August 24, 1872. In his later years he moved to Kings Valley. He was in his eighties when he died in 1910. He is buried in Kings Valley Cemetery. Most of his nine children settled in the area surrounding Kings Valley. As a result the Price name can be found in both Benton and Polk Counties.

 

Larkin’s son, Willard Lane Price, married Serepta Norton, daughter of Lucius and Hopestill King Norton. They started the Kings Valley Store. The original building burned down in 1919. The rebuilt store has always been owned and managed by Price descendants, including the present owners, Norman and Terri Arnold.

Mary Elizabeth married her first cousin, James Price, son of Larkin’s brother Fantly Price. Son, A. Dillard, married Melinda Norton, daughter of Lucius and Hopestill King Norton. Dillard’s second wife was Rosetta Porter. Larkin’s daughter Frances E., married John Gage of Polk County and later moved to Mitchell, Oregon. Larkin G. married  Julia Chambers, daughter of Rowland and Lovisia King Chambers; they remained in Benton County. Nancy “Ann” married James G. Cherry of Dallas. Phoebe M. married Charles Mc Timmonds of Polk County and later lived in Salem.

 

Grandchildren of Larkin Price still living include Minnie Price of Portland, daughter of Willard L. and Serepta Price, and Willie “Bill” Price of Philomath, son of Larkin G. and Julia Price.

 

In this way the legacy of Larkin and Fantly Price has spread through the social fabric of the Willamette Valley.

 

From-Benton Bulletin

Back When in Benton County

Charles King’s Second Family

By-David Morgan

 

(No Part Number)

 

Charles King married his second wife, Margaret E. Barnes, on December 28, 1897. He lived at Elam on the Marys River west of Wren and farmed and worked in that area. His only child in his second marriage was Ethel Jane, born September 19, 1899.

 

Charles served on the school board and ran the store and post office at Elam. When the Corvallis-to-Yaquina railroad was being constructed he added to his house and he and Margaret furnished room and board for sawmill workers. Later it was a rooming and boarding house for sawmill workers and loggers. Charles King died in 1915 leaving the farm to his widow and daughter. Margaret and daughter Ethel carried on the post office and boarding house. (The writer does not know when the post office was closed).

 

Sometime later a young man homesteading in the Summit area needed funds to finish building his cabin so he went to Harris to work in the woods. There was a large sawmill at Harris (Elam) at that time. He took board and room at the King’s place. On May 13, 1919, this homesteader from Summit, Victor S. Morgan, married Ethel Jane King. They lived on her mother’s place after the marriage. Margaret King lived with them until her death May 13, 1927.

 

Victor and Ethel raised three children on the home place. Ray King Morgan was born May 14, 1920, now of Englewood, Colorado. Thelma Marie (now Dickey) born May 16, 1926, now of St. George, Utah and David Dale Morgan born April 18, 1929, now living at Corvallis.

 

 

From-Benton County Bulletin

Adella King-My Grandmother

By-Dorothy A. Brown

 

(No date and I am not sure it is part of the same series)

 

Adella King, daughter of Charles and Susan King, was born in 1875, and grew up in Wren-Harris area with her brother Edward and sister Anna. Her father and mother separated and re-married several years later. Charles married Margaret Barnes and Susan married Tom Casey) in later years, Adella and her husband bought property from Casey which was west of Wren, across Coast highway 20).

 

Adella married Samuel Creed Turner around the year 1895 at The Dalles, Oregon. Originally from Kentucky, Turner was a railroad engineer for Western Pacific Railroad. They lived for a while in Oakland, California, and Reno, Nevada. After moving to Oregon they bought the George P. Wrenn Donation Land Claim at Wren and built the big family house where four generations of Kings have lived.

 

Their four children were Larraine and Cleo, who both died young, Edward Charles, and Dorothy Mae who was born in Oakland, California in 1914. Dorothy Mae had early schooling in Benton County, but spent her married years in California, where she died in 1979. She had no children. Adella died in 1954 and is buried in the Wren Cemetery.

 

Edward was born in 1907 at The Dalles, Oregon. He attended the original old one-room grade school at Wren and Corvallis High School. Ad a high school student held the Willamette Valley wrestling championship. He also attended Oregon Agricultural College, now Oregon State University for two years.

 

He and Verna Schmidt were married at Dallas, Oregon, in 1929, and settled on the ranch at Wren, where their two children, Dorothy Ann, born 1929, and Lawrence Allen, born 1933, were reared. Edward farmed mostly, logged around the county, and loaded lumber into boxcars at the Wren sawmill.

 

Edward had a natural ear for music, and played for many dances over the years. He also taught his children piano and accordion. In the 1930’s he belonged to the Oregon Loggers, a musical groups that played for a time on radio and around the state. He served on the Consumers Power Board of Directors for several years, and was also a member of the Corvallis Senior Citizens recycling Band until his death in 1977. He is buried in Oaklawn Cemetery in Corvallis.

 

Lawrence and Dorothy Ann attended the newer old Wren Grade School and Corvallis High School. They have many memories of harvesting heavy stands of grand on the Wren Ranch and shocking grain in the moonlight, sewing sacks at the old threshing machines, and the huge threshing dinners cooked on grandmother Adella’s wood cook stove.

 

Lawrence married Juanita Smith of Corvallis in 1954, and had three children, Carey, Tina, and a son Robin. Dorothy married W.P. (Pat) Brown in 1949 and they settled on the north part of the ranch at Wren where they still reside. Their three children are Cheryl, born 1950, Michael, born 1953 and Susan, born 1954.

 

Many descendants of the King family gather each year in Kings Valley, Oregon, for the annual King-Chambers family reunion.

 

From-Benton County Bulletin

February 18, 1981

Pg. 4

By-Charlotte l. Wirfs

Dallas, Oregon

 

(No Part Number)

 

A.H. Reynolds, Millwright

 

The gristmill in Kings Valley cost Rowland Chambers at least $7520.13 to build according to the account book kept by A. H. Reynolds, a New York born millwright. Reynolds was 46 years old in 1854 when he erected the Chambers’ gristmill. He arrived in California from Iowa in 1850 and had planned to go to Chile because of failing health. A friend persuaded him to go to Trinidad instead. From there he drifted up the coast coming through Yreka to Oregon where he regained his health to the point of building mills. Besides the Chambers mill he also built the Elias Buell mill on Mill Creek in Polk County and did extensive work on the first woolen mill in Salem. His duties included ordering and erecting the machinery and in some cases purchasing and delivering it.

 

While Reynolds was working on the mill in Kings Valley, Rowland and Lovisa King Chambers had a daughter. Reynolds asked Lovisa for the privilege of naming the new baby and he chose Oredelia, perhaps his mother’s name. Oredelia married H.D. Randall in 1872 and they resided in Washington Territory near Olex. There they raised sheep, served as postmasters and managed a stage station where the John Day-Pendleton stage changed horses. Later they put up horses for the Dalles-Pendleton stage line.

 

Chambers obtained an unlimited water right for his gristmill in 1852. It was built on Chambers donation land claim where the Luckiamute River took a natural fall of about four feet. In 1936, Willard L. Price, a Kings Valley resident, stated ‘For more than 50 years the mill ground flour on the stone burrs shipped from France around the Horn. Finally more modern machinery was installed. The river bottoms here supplied hard wheat and the higher ground grew a fine grade of hard wheat. This made it possible for the Kings Valley mill to manufacture the finest grade of flour. In recent years the supply of local wheat has become insufficient and the quality of flour failed until it could not compete successfully. The mill is now used to grind feed for the surrounding farms.’

 

By 1859 A.H. Reynolds had passed from Oregon to Walla Walla, Washington where he continued building four and woolen mills receiving one-third interest in the mills he constructed. In 1861 he married Oregon pioneer, Mrs. Lettice J. Clark, widow of Ransom Clark who first crossed the plains with Fremont in 1843.  At the time of their marriage she lived in Walla Walla, Washington. Two sons, Harry A. and Allen H. Reynolds were born to them.

 

Reynolds’ period of mill building ended in the early 1860’s and in 1872 he established a bank in Walla Walla known as Reynold’s and Day’s. By 1882 he had become a prominent stockholder of First National Bank of Pendelton, Oregon and Dayton, Washington Territory.