The Columbia River: Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery, Its Commerce

by William Denison Lyman

Spokane Falls and City, 1886.
Photo. by T. W. Tolman, Spokane.

Spokane Falls and City, 1908.
Photo. by T. W. Tolman, Spokane.

From the Inn one can climb in a few minutes to Photographer’s Point, from which he can look right down on the Elliot Glacier, not a large, but an exceedingly fine specimen of that most interesting of all features of a great peak.

Hood, though so steep, can be ascended from several points. It was for a long time supposed to be unscalable from the north side. But William Langille, one of the most daring and successful mountain climbers of Oregon, soon found his way up the sharp ascent, and, once marked out, that route has been followed by the great majority of climbers. Though very steep, there has never been an accident on this route except in one case, when a stranger undertook the climb alone and never returned. He probably lost his footing and fell into a crevasse. With the usual precautions of ropes and ice hatchets and caulks, a party can make their way over the steep slope, and its very steepness makes the ascent quicker and less exhaustive than to overcome the longer and more gradual ascents of Adams or “Takhoma.” While it takes but about four or five hours for an average party to go from snow-line to summit of Hood, either of the other mountains named demands from seven to ten hours.

And having reached the summit, what a view! If the day be entirely clear—a rare occurrence—you will behold a domain for an empire. On the south, the long line of the Cascades, with the occasional great heights, Jefferson, Three Sisters, Thielson, Diamond, Scott, and, if it be very clear, even Pitt. To the north, the giant bulk of Adams, the airy symmetry of St. Helens, and the lordly majesty of Rainier, rule sky and earth, while in mazy undulations the great range, alternately purple and white, stretches on and on until it blends into the clouds.

Seemingly almost at the feet of the observer, a dark green sinuosity amid the timbered hills, now strangely flattened, as we stand so high above them, marks the course of the River on its march oceanward. If the day be very clear, a whitish blur far westward shows where the “Rose City” on the Willamette reigns over her fair domains, while a dim stretch of varied hues denotes the Willamette Valley. Some climbers have even asserted that late in the afternoon of extremely clear days the glint of the western sun can be seen upon the Pacific, a hundred and fifty miles distant. Toward the east lie the vast plains of the Inland Empire, marked at their farther limit by the soft curves and lazy swells of the range of the Blue Mountains.

While it is an ungracious and even a fruitless undertaking to compare such objects as the great mountains or the views from the respective summits, it may be said that Hood has one conspicuous feature of the view, and that is that it is nearest the centre of the great mountain peaks, as well as systems, and also best commands the outlook over the great valley systems and river systems of this part of the Columbia Basin. And therefore, though the view is not equal in breadth to that from the summit of Adams or Rainier, it is unsurpassed for variety and interest. It may be said to cover more history than the view from any other peak. Across the southern flank lies the old Barlow Road, over which came the greater part of the immigration in the days of the ox-team conquest of Oregon in the forties and fifties. Thirty miles east is The Dalles with its old fur-trader’s station, its old United States fort, its mission station, its Indian wars, its early settlement, the most historic place in Eastern Oregon. From the old town, during all the years from the opening of the century, there descended the River the trappers, missionaries, immigrants, miners, soldiers, hunters, home-seekers, of a later day, adventurers and promoters of every species, to say nothing of the generations of Indians who lived and died along the banks.

To the west of our icy eyrie, Portland and Vancouver, with the rich valleys around them, represent the earliest explorations and developments of the fur-traders, as well as the earliest days of the era of permanent settlement. There in the westward haze is the little town of Champoeg where the Provisional Government of Oregon was established. In fact, in whatsoever direction we may look, we see illustrations of the heroic age of Old Oregon, the drama of native races, rival powers of Europe and America, the march of empire, a section of humanity and the world in the making.