Whiteaker, John

From Lane Co Oregon

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.]