WHAT DIDN'T GET TAUGHT IN HISTORY CLASS

I really didn't know how this post was going to work out. Guess it just depends. But it's starting to look like a batch of my bread dough. It's trying to get out of the bowl. I grew up in Oakridge, Oregon. Just under forty miles SE of Springfield/Eugene. When we wanted to go back for a visit there are two ways to get there. The fast way and the slow way.

If you are sort of in a hurry and not too much on sight seeing you can pick up the freeway, head south east and take the exit for Hwy 58. And until today I had passed through Pleasant Hill and by the Elijah Bristow State Park without too much thought. Pleasant Hill doesn't look like much from the highway but the net claims a population of over five thousand. I know mom lived there for a year or so when she was a little girl. Went to a one room school house with an out house and pump to work if you wanted a drink of water.

Elijah Bristow. Born in Southwestern Virginia in 1788. Served in the War of 1812. Got married in Tennessee, moved around ended up in Illinois. Raised a family. Left them in Illinois while he headed west with an ox team. I can't find out if he was traveling alone or with a party. Fetched up at Sutter's  Fort. 

This was 1845, before the gold rush and Bristow was 58 years old. Headed north in 1846 following a route through the mountainsknow as the Siskiou Trail that later became Interstate 5. Traveled as far as the Salem area, came back south passed through what is now Jasper and forded the MIddle Fork of the Willmette.

Bristow checked out the land south of what is now Springfield. Liked what he saw and named the area Pleaant Hill. Claimed 640 acres and built the first permanent house in what is now Lane County and sent for his family.Pleasant Hill was the first town in the county. Bristow became the first postmaster. He and his wife donated land for a school, a church and a cemetary. The cemetary is still there. You can see it from the highway. it isn't very big.

Well, well. See what happens when you head in one direction and find yourself exploring something and somewhere else entirly. Two of the four settled near the Bristow claim. The fourth member of the party was named Eugene Skinner. Three guesses which city is named for him. I;ll get back to him later.

Might as well stop here and pick up the road trip tomorrow.