OREGON FOLKLORE - WORK PROGRESS ADMINISTRATION: Surnames: Mendenhall, Worden, Lien, Holman, Price, Mitchell, Cordinell, Dolph,Mann, Leonard, Evers
Title: Rush Mendenhall of Indian Wars - Early-day Portland - White House
Tavern - Toll Road - Justice Courts

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OREGON FOLKLORE STUDIES

Subject Rush Mendenhall of Indian Wars - Early-day Portland - White House
Tavern - Toll Road - Justice Courts

Name and address of informant Mr. Bert Mendenhall 209 Railway Exchange Bldg.,
Portland, Oregon

Date and time of interview: May 16, 1939; 11:00 to 12:30 P.M.
Place of interview: Law office of informant
Name and address of person, if any, who put you in touch with informant: Miss
Nina B. Johnson, Lake Grove, Oregon
Description of room, house, surroundings, etc.: Small consulting room of usual
type. One window; desk and table, two chairs; two or three pictures on wall.
Partition of glass, shutting off outer office. Office building of eight or ten
stories, constructed in the early 1900's.

1. Father, Rush Mendenhall Quaker English
Mother, Esther Worden Mendenhall English
2. Washington County, Oregon. August 29, 1861.
3. Wife, one Daughter, Ruth Lien; Sons, Rush Mendenhall, Clifford Mendenhall,
Harry Mendenhall
4. Home always in Oregon. Since boyhood in Portland.
5. Public schools of Portland. Studied law in private law office. Admitted to
bar in 1884.
6. Practice of law and ranching.
7. Outdoor life.
8. Sons and daughters of Indian War Veterans; Sons and Daughters of Oregon
Pioneers. No church affiliation. Mother one of founders of Portland Unitarian
church.
9. Medium, well-built, with brown eyes, dark gray hair and clipped mustache.
Well-groomed, and affable in manner.

Text: 

My dad, Rush Mendenhall, crossed the Plains in '47. He was captain of the
train. Later he took an active part in the Indian wars of the Northwest. He
was sergeant-orderly in the Nesmith company. The missionaries at that time had
plenty of meat, which they traded to the immigrants for clothing. Well, dad's
company was short on food, and particularly short on meat. The men were
getting mighty tired of a diet of cayuse meat. When they heard the squealing
of pigs at the mission station, that was just about the last straw in whetting
their appetities. One night two or three of them went out on what is now
called AWOL. The next morning everybody in camp had some nice fried porkchops.
And that same morning the missionaries discovered they were short several nice
fat porkers. They instituted a search, that included a visit to the soldiers'
encampment, but on asking questions all the reply they got was "See the
orderly," "See the orderly." "The orderly is the one for you to see, if
anybody saw the pigs, he did." The orderly was dad. They hunted for him, but,
strangely enough, he was no place to be found.

It was in 1848 that dad and a partner built a 63-ton schooner at Linn City. I
don't remember the name of the schooner. Don't know if I ever knew it. Anyway
after the schooner was built dad and his partner realized they had no
navigator, nor anybody else who knew anything about navigating a ship. About
that time there happened to be a good sized British vessel anchored at
Vancouver. Dad and his partner made a quiet visit over to Vancouver, and when
they returned they brought two British sailors with them. With his full
complement of crew and navigators enlisted from Vancouver dad sailed his ship
down the river. When he reached Baker's Bay he found it expedient to put in
there. It seems the British were on his trail, but their craft was too big for
the shallow waters of Baker's Bay, a fact of which dad was aware when he went
in there, so, eluding his pursuers, he made the run safely down to California,
where the gold mining excitement was at its height. Shortly afterward he sold
the schooner and with the proceeds went into the business of furnishing
miners' supplies at Sacramento. He made some money, went back east and
married, and returned with his bride on the "Governor Morton" around the Horn.
He and a partner bought land from the Spanish in California, but in that they
got swindled, so eventually he came back to Oregon. He built the old
courthouse at Lafayette in '58 or '59. When he started it the brickmakers
raised the price of brick on him, so he bought five acres of land just outside
the town limits, built some kilns and made his own bricks. Then they raised
the price of lumber on him, so he bought a little water-power mill up on the
Chehalem mountains; he bought some standing cedar, and so he made his own
lumber and shingles, and in the end found he cleaned up $2,000.00 more than he
otherwise would have on the courthouse contract, and had a brick plant and
lumber mill besides. With a partner by the name of Price, who was father of
the girl Senator Mitchell afterward married, dad went into the mercantile
business, with a store at Amity and one at Bethel. In doing this they staked a
fellow by the name of Holman, who was in charge of the stores. It wasn't long
before word reached dad and his partner that if they hurried they might get to
Amity and Bethel in time to find the buildings -- and that was about all they
did find. Holman and everything else had disappeared.

Yes, I used to go to most of the dances round about. North Plains was a
popular place. We danced on a puncheon floor in a log cabin, and all we had
was one fiddle to dance to. They were most square dances and I never cared
much for those. I remember our first dancing master was a man named Cordinell.
He had a daughter who helped him. Afterward she was Mrs. Cyrus Dolph and
became pretty tony.

For a long time I lived out on South Third and Hall streets, here in Portland.
The Manns, John Mann and his wife, who founded the Mann Home on the east side,
lived up the street just a block away. They were awful good church people in
their later years. I can remember when old John Mann   though he wasn't old
then -- started his money-making out of fast horses and his livery stable.
Mrs. Mann raised flowers. She got a young fellow to sell them for her. He
peddled them about town every place, bawdy houses and all.

Do I recall anything about the old White House, out on the Riverdale Road?
I'll say I do. I was there a lot in my young days. The White House was
started, if I recall rightly, by a man named Leonard. H. C., I think, were his
initials. The road leading out to the place was the first macadamized road in
this part of the country, and for a long time it was known as the Macadam
Road, where anybody who owned a horse, fast or otherwise, went out to take
their girls buggy-riding. All the gay folks in town went out to the White
House where no questions was asked and most anything could he had. I was under
age, I remember, and couldn't get anything in town, but nobody questioned me
out there. Once, heh! heh! I saw a fellow come running out of the place with
no hat or coat on and another fellow was chasing him and yelling: "I'll learn
you how to break up my family," and about then he caught up with him and
knocked him out. Then another fellow ran up with a pan of dishwater that he
threw on him and somebody else emptied a cuspidor over him and pretty soon
they brought him to.

Leonard kept up the Macadam Road through levying a toll. It began at about the
foot of Hall street, if I remember correctly, where the toll gate was.

About half way out there was a place called the Red House, but that was later
and not high-toned like the White House.

When I began the practice of law I was in my brother Ed's office. There was
another young fellow in the office named Gordon Hayes. He was afterwards
county judge of Clackamas county. My brother turned over little cases to us to
start us off, such as those in the justice courts. We couldn't understand why
we lost-'em all -- every damned one. We couldn't imagine what was wrong. Well,
of course, we weren't on to the ropes. The justice court was held in a room
over a saloon, and the jury was selected by the constable, who picked 'em up
in the saloon downstairs. All the jurors got was a dollar. Jack Evers kept the
saloon. The jury would go into deliberation in a little room back of the
court. There was a window in the little room, and the jurors had a gallon can
with a rope tied to the bail. They would put their money in the bucket or can
and then lower it out the window and knock it against the back door of the
saloon. Then the barkeep would come out, peek in the bucket to see if there
was any money, and if there was, it was o,k., he'd send it up full of beer or
whatever they wanted. Then the jury would come to an agreement, but what they
agreed on, depended on which side furnished the money for the bucket. Once
there was a State case involving a criminal charge. The jury was pretty full
that time. It brought in a verdict that read, "State guilty as charged."

It was about '84 or '85 that there was a justice court out on Ninth and Glisan
streets, where the front room was the bar and the rear room with a side
entrance, the place for holding court. The justice of the peace owned the
place and the barkeeper was the constable.

At one time, when the justice court was held opposite of where the courthouse
now stands, there was a case where a Jew junk-man among the jurors kept asking
who the attorney for the defence was. When he found out, he said, "Vell, I'm
for him.

Right or wrong, I'm for him," Later, when the verdict was brought in for the
defense, the lawyer for the plaintiff said to the Jew, "Why, what d'ya go
against me for? I'm a friend o' yours. You remember, I was down in your place
not long ago, looking at a stove?" "Sure, I remember," answered the Jew, "you
vas down in my place, an' you vas lookin' at a stove, but did you buy the
stove?"

Comment:

The interviewer is of the opinion that Mr. Mendenhall possesses considerable
other information of a folklore nature that would be of interest, but he
refused to grant further time in an interview at the present time.