Whiteaker, John

From Lane Co Oregon

Revision as of 19:34, 10 October 2007

JOHN WHITEAKER

The former Governor of the State of Oregon, was born in Dearborn county, Indiana, May 4, 1820, and was brought up a farmer. When the mighty shibboleth of gold was wafted from the Pacific shores to those of the Atlantic the echoes thereof found our subject in the midst of his agricultural pursuits. He at once set to work to cross the plains to the new Dorado and became one of that vast band of "forty-niners" who found their way into the ravines and gorges of the Sierra Nevada in the search for gold. but his horoscope had been already cast and the fiat had gone forth that Oregon should be the scene of his triumphs. In 1852 he came to that state and in the spring of 1853 took up his residence in Lane County; here he has engaged in agricultural and pastoral pursuits, and it was while attending to his flocks and herds that he was called by his fellow-citizens to assume the highest executive gift that it was in their power to bestow upon any one at home. The governor's record speaks for itself, it is written on the pages of fame and inscribed on the hearts of his admirers. He is now a hale and hearty man with many years of usefulness yet before him. He married in Putnam county, Missouri, August 22, 1847, Miss N. J. Hargrave, a native of Adams county, Illinois, and has had the following sons and daughters: Francis (who died on the plains), John C., Nancy A., Mary E., Ben and James H.

["Illustrated History of Lane County, Oregon." Portland, Oregon: A. G. Walling, publisher, 1884. pg. 490.]

Other

John Whiteaker (1820-1902) was Oregon’s first governor. He originally came west to California as one of the “Fortyniners” searching for gold. With his earnings from there he returned east, then brought his family over the Oregon Trail in 1852 and settled in Lane County. Soon active in the Democratic party, he was elected to the Territorial Legislature in 1857, and then governor when Oregon was admitted to the Union in 1859. His nickname was “Honest John.”

In May, 1861, little more than a month after the firing on Fort Sumter, Governor Whiteaker, whose southern sentiments were well-known, advised the people of Oregon not to become involved in the war, which he characterized as a "domestic disorder? Although settlers had come from both North and South, he maintained that peace and tranquility existed in Oregon. He said Union party meetings being held throughout the state were creating disorder, and maintained that those opposed to the war were not disloyal. Predicting that the war would easily be won by the North without any help from Oregon, he said Oregonians should concentrate on protecting the frontier from Indian attacks. Whiteaker said further that the North would never be able to re-establish friendly relations with the South, and that the freeing of the slaves, like the freeing of the slaves in the Roman Empire, would sow the seeds of its own destruction. He warned the North to protect its institutions, saying, "Have a care that in freeing the Negro you do not enslave the white man?

When the Civil War broke out in 1861, Whiteaker’s pro-slavery position alienated him from a number of Oregonians, and he was not nominated for a second term. But he didn’t retire from politics. He went on to serve in the Oregon Legislature and Senate, and in 1878 was elected to the U.S. Congress. A year later, he captured nationwide attention with what would come to be known as “John Whiteaker’s Ride.” On the night of March 7, 1879, Whiteaker was awakened in his Eugene home by an urgent message from Democratic congressional leaders in the nation’s capital. He was needed immediately in Washington, they said, for his vote to assure election of their nominee for Speaker of the House. He took a train to Portland, a steamship to San Francisco, and then a special train from Oakland to Washington, D.C. He crossed the country in five days — the fastest train trip recorded to that date. Ironically, it turned out his vote was not essential, as the Speaker had already been elected in a caucus the night before. “The country was safe,” said the New York Times a short time later. “And everything went on just as though he had not spanned the continent in five days, five hours, and eleven minutes.” But irony was not unfamiliar to Honest John — according to Lane County pioneer son Cal Young, who related this anecdote of 1860s Oregon politics:

When the Legislature adjourned, the senators and representatives would carry away from the building nearly every piece of furniture that wasn’t bolted down. One time, a senator came into a room to find the governor sitting very close to the heating stove. He asked why the governor was sitting there and why he didn’t go home. “You gentlemen have carried away almost everything from the State House,” the governor replied. “And I am waiting for this stove to cool off so I can take it home with me.”