loneerkozi.et1ion; - ScholarsArchive at Oregon State University

ANNUAL ADDRESS.
BY HON. WILLARD H. REEl.
MR. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN
OF THE OREGON PIONEER ASSOCIATION:
Having been invited by the Executive Board to deliver the seventh AnnualAddress
before the Association, upon the subject, "The early settlement and settlers
settlers of French Prairie." While feeling no disposition to shrink from the labor
and responsibility which would be incured by complying with the wishes of the
Executive Managers, I stated in reply to the letter of invitation, that I would prepare
a paper, taking as a basis the subject suggested, and placethe same at the discretion
of the Board, as in consequence of ill health, there was a probability of my
not being present on the occasion of the thirty-third anniversary of the day we
commemorate. The officers of the Association making no objection to this condition,
I have the honor, fellow members, to lay before you the following re-
marks.
The early Pioneers of Oregon could not well contribute toward the accomplishment
of a more praisworthy object, than the one set forth in the second Article
of the Constitution, which gave to your Association an organized existence,
namely, the collection and preservation of facts relating to the Pioneers and
early history of the Territory of Oregon. The efforts required in the consumation
of so laudable an object, is truly a work worthy to crown the labors of a
generation fast passing away, a generation of Pioneer men and women, who,
unaided by any government or other organization, brought from their homes in
the Atlantic States over the wild intervening mountains and plains, a distance
of two thousand miles, and successfully established in a savage wilderness upon
these Pacific shores, the arts of civilized life as they existed in their Eastern
homes. You, Pioneers, have lived in what must ever remain one the most important
and eventful periods in the history of the North Pacific States. A gen
eration whose like under the many strange vicissitudes through which it has
passed, this continent will never again behold.
When we recall to mind the events that were taking place around US a third