Editing Warrenton, Oregon (section)

== History ==
[[File:Warren_House_-_Warrenton_Oregon.jpg|thumb|upright|[[Daniel Knight Warren House|D.K. Warren House]], built 1885]]

Prior to the arrival of the first settlers, this land was inhabited by the [[Clatsop]] tribe of [[Native Americans in the United States|Native Americans]], whose tribe spanned from the south shore of the [[Columbia River]] to [[Tillamook Head]]. The county in which Warrenton is located was named after these people, as well as the last encampment that the [[Lewis and Clark Expedition]] established. Today, a replica of [[Fort Clatsop]] still stands just outside of Warrenton city limits.

The first pioneers who settled on the land that would become Warrenton (between 1845 and the early 1850s) were Jeremiah Gerome Tuller, J. W. Wallace, D. E. Pease, Ninian A. Eberman and George Washington Coffenbury. Coffenbury remains a household name in the town, as a local lake in [[Fort Stevens (Oregon)|Fort Stevens]] was named after him.

The first settlement within Warrenton city limits was Lexington, which was laid out in 1848, and served as the first [[county seat]] for Clatsop County. The name fell out of use for a time, and the area became known as Skipanon – a name that is now preserved by the [[Skipanon River]], which flows through the town. A Lexington post office operated intermittently between 1850 and 1857; a Skipanon post office operated continuously from 1871 to 1903.

In 1863, the military battery, [[Fort Stevens (Oregon)|Fort Stevens]], was built in the Warrenton area near the mouth of the [[Columbia River]]. Though military activity ceased in 1947, the remains of the fort are preserved as part of [[Fort Stevens (Oregon)|Fort Stevens]].

Very few improvements were made to the land until the early 1870s, when D. K. Warren bought out some of the first settlers. With the help of Chinese labor, Warren reclaimed a large tract of the land by constructing a dike about {{convert|2.5|mi}} in length, which was completed in 1878. Warren laid out the town in about 1891, and in the following year built the first schoolhouse, at a cost of $1,100, and gave it to the school district.<ref>{{cite book|url=http://files.usgwarchives.net/or/clatsop/bios/warren1529gbs.txt|title=History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III|date=1928|publisher=The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company|pages=526–532}}</ref>

Warrenton was [[platted]] in 1889 and incorporated as a city in 1899. Built on [[tidal flats]], it relied on a system of dikes built by [[History of Chinese Americans|Chinese laborers]] to keep the [[Columbia River]] from flooding the town.