The sunshine that was let into our hearts at La Grande was also refreshing. "Yes, we will have a monument," the people responded. And they got one, too, dedicating it while I tarried.
We had taken with us an inscribed stone to set up at an intersection near the mouth of Ladd's Canyon, eight miles out of La Grande. The school near by came in a body. The children sang "Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean," after which I talked to the assemblage for a few moments, and the exercises closed with all singing "America." Each child brought a stone and cast it upon the pile surrounding the base of the monument.
The citizens of Baker City lent a willing ear to the suggestion to erect a monument on the high-school grounds, although the trail is six miles off to the north, and a fine granite shaft was provided for the high-school grounds and was dedicated. A marker was set on the trail. Eight hundred school children contributed an aggregate of sixty dollars to place a children's bronze tablet on this shaft. Two thousand people participated in the ceremony of dedication.
News of these events was now beginning to pass along the line ahead. As a result the citizens in other places began to take hold of the work with a will. Old Mount Pleasant, Durkee, Huntington, and Vale were other Oregon towns that followed the good lead and erected monuments to mark the old trail. A most gratifying feature of the work was the hearty participation in it of the school children.
Howard R. Driggs