Editing Columbia River (section)

== New waves of explorers ==
{{See also|History of Oregon|History of British Columbia|History of Washington (state)|Oregon Country|History of the west coast of North America}}

[[File:Cascade Columbia River.jpg|left|thumb|alt=Artist's rendering of a tall, narrow waterfall cascading down a series of vertical or nearly vertical rock faces into a big river. Mountains, largely devoid of vegetation, rise on both sides of the waterfall and connect to a range of mountains in the background.|[[Multnomah Falls]], painted by James W. Alden, 1857]]

Some historians {{Who|date=August 2022}} believe that Japanese or Chinese vessels blown off course reached the Northwest Coast long before Europeans—possibly as early as 219&nbsp;[[Before Common Era|BCE]]. Historian Derek Hayes claims that "It is a near certainty that Japanese or Chinese people arrived on the northwest coast long before any European."{{sfn|Hayes|1999|p=9}}{{Citation needed|date=August 2022|reason=Single author for this claim means it could be seen as dubious.}} It is unknown whether they landed near the Columbia.

The [[Maris Pacifici]] map published in 1589 features on the west coast of North-America an intriguing resemblance of two major coastline features: the mouth of the Columbia River identified as ''"Rio Grande"'' and the delta of the Fraser River labeled ''"Baia de las isleas"''. These rivers may have been too sighted by European visitors long before official records would confirm nearly 200 years later. In spite of limited evidence of [[Francis Drake's circumnavigation|Francis Drake expedition]] 1579 whereabouts in the [[Pacific Northwest]], Pacific Northwest BC history commentator [[Sam Bawlf]] posited that the [[Abraham Ortelius|Ortelius]] mapped coastal features were a proof that Drake sighted the mouth of the Columbia and the Fraser River delta.<ref>Samuel Bawlf, The Secret Voyage of Sir Francis Drake 1577-1580, Douglas & McIntyre, 2003, pages 303 and 316</ref> Evidence exists that Spanish castaways reached the shore in 1679 and traded with the [[Clatsop]]; if these were the first Europeans to see the Columbia, they failed to send word home to Spain.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}}{{Citation needed|date=August 2022|reason=Single author for this claim means it could be seen as dubious.}}

In the 18th&nbsp;century, there was strong interest in discovering a [[Northwest Passage]] that would permit navigation between the Atlantic (or inland North America) and the Pacific Ocean. Many ships in the area, especially those under Spanish and British command, searched the northwest coast for a large river that might connect to [[Hudson Bay]] or the [[Missouri River]]. The first documented European discovery of the Columbia River was that of [[Bruno de Heceta]], who in 1775 sighted the river's mouth. On the advice of his officers, he did not explore it, as he was short-staffed and the current was strong. He considered it a bay, and called it ''[[:wikt:ensenada|Ensenada]] de Asunción'' (''[[Assumption of Mary|Assumption]] Cove''). Later Spanish maps, based on his sighting, showed a river, labeled ''Río de San Roque'' (''The [[Saint Roch]] River''),<ref name="HistLinkGray" /> or an entrance, called ''Entrada de Hezeta'', named for [[Bruno de Hezeta]], who sailed the region.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}} Following Hezeta's reports, British [[maritime fur trade]]r Captain [[John Meares]] searched for the river in 1788 but concluded that it did not exist.<ref>{{cite web |title = Cape Disappointment State Park |url = https://www.nps.gov/lewi/planyourvisit/caped.htm |year = 2006 |publisher = National Park Service |access-date = September 4, 2009 |url-status = dead |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090831031245/https://www.nps.gov/lewi/planyourvisit/caped.htm |archive-date = August 31, 2009 |df = mdy }}</ref> He named [[Cape Disappointment (Washington)|Cape Disappointment]] for the non-existent river, not realizing the cape marks the northern edge of the river's mouth.{{sfn|Denton|1924|p=174}}

What happened next would form the basis for decades of both cooperation and dispute between British and American exploration of, and ownership claim to, the region. [[Royal Navy]] commander [[George Vancouver]] sailed past the mouth in April 1792 and observed a change in the water's color, but he accepted Meares' report and continued on his journey northward.<ref name="HistLinkGray" /> Later that month, Vancouver encountered the American captain [[Robert Gray (sea captain)|Robert Gray]] at the [[Strait of Juan de Fuca]]. Gray reported that he had seen the entrance to the Columbia and had spent nine days trying but failing to enter.{{sfn|Roberts|2005|p=23}}

[[File:Western North America 1778.png|left|thumb|[[Jonathan Carver|Carver]]'s map from 1778, showing the River of the West, [[New Albion]], [[Lake Winnipeg]], and the [[Canadian Rockies|Mountains of Bright Stone]]]]

On May 12, 1792, Gray returned south and crossed the Columbia Bar, becoming [[Robert Gray's Columbia River expedition|the first known explorer of European descent to enter the river]]. Gray's fur trading mission had been financed by [[Boston, Oregon|Boston]] merchants, who outfitted him with a private vessel named ''[[Columbia Rediviva]]''; he named the river after the ship on May 18.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}}{{sfn|Loy|Allan|Buckley|Meacham|2001|p=24}} Gray spent nine days trading near the mouth of the Columbia, then left without having gone beyond {{convert|13|mi|km}} upstream. The farthest point reached was Grays Bay at the mouth of [[Grays River (Washington)|Grays River]].<ref name=history5052>{{cite web |title = Captain Robert Gray Explores Grays Bay and Charts the Mouth of Grays River in May 1792 |publisher = HistoryLink.org |url = http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?displaypage=output.cfm&file_id=5052 |access-date = May 16, 2009 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20150924093133/http://www.historylink.org/index.cfm?displaypage=output.cfm&file_id=5052 |archive-date = September 24, 2015 |url-status = live }}</ref> Gray's discovery of the Columbia River was later used by the United States to support its claim to the Oregon Country, which was also claimed by [[Russian Empire|Russia]], [[Kingdom of Great Britain|Great Britain]], Spain and other nations.{{sfn|Jacobs|1938|p=77}}

In October 1792, Vancouver sent Lieutenant [[William Robert Broughton]], his second-in-command, up the river. Broughton got as far as the [[Sandy River (Oregon)|Sandy River]] at the western end of the Columbia River Gorge, about {{convert|100|mi|km}} upstream, sighting and naming Mount Hood. Broughton formally claimed the river, its [[drainage basin]], and the nearby coast for Britain. In contrast, Gray had not made any formal claims on behalf of the United States.<ref name="mockford">{{cite journal |last = Mockford |first = Jim |title = Before Lewis and Clark, Lt. Broughton's River of Names: The Columbia River Exploration of 1792 |jstor = 20615586 |journal = Oregon Historical Quarterly |year = 2005 |volume = 106 |issue = 4 |pages = 542–567 |publisher = Oregon Historical Society  |doi = 10.1353/ohq.2005.0011 |s2cid = 165732801 }}</ref>{{sfn|Friedman|2003|pp=304–05}}

[[File:ColyerColumbia76.jpg|thumb|upright=1.3|alt=Painting of a big river in the foreground flowing out of mountains in the background. Evergreen trees line both banks of the river. A large spire of rock rises in the middle distance along the left bank.|''Columbia River, Cascade Mountains, Oregon'', (1876) by [[Vincent Colyer]] (oil on canvas). [[Beacon Rock State Park|Beacon Rock]] is visible on the left.]]

[[File:Lewis and Clark Columbia River.jpg|thumb|alt=Early grayscale map of the lower Columbia River and its tributaries and surrounds showing the locations of mountain ranges and Indian villages from what is now eastern Washington to the Pacific Ocean.|Detail from the [[Lewis and Clark Expedition]] map. The Willamette River is shown as the "Multnomah", while the Snake River is "Lewis's River". ([[:File:Map of Lewis and Clark's Track, Across the Western Portion of North America, published 1814.jpg|See complete map.]])]]

Because the Columbia was at the same latitude as the headwaters of the Missouri River, there was some speculation that Gray and Vancouver had discovered the long-sought Northwest Passage. A 1798 British map showed a dotted line connecting the Columbia with the Missouri.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}} When the American explorers [[Meriwether Lewis]] and [[William Clark]] charted the vast, unmapped lands of the [[American West]] in their [[Lewis and Clark Expedition|overland expedition]] (1803–1805), they found no passage between the rivers. After crossing the [[Rocky Mountains]], Lewis and Clark built [[dugout canoe]]s and paddled down the Snake River, reaching the Columbia near the present-day Tri-Cities, Washington. They explored a few miles upriver, as far as [[Bateman Island]], before heading down the Columbia, concluding their journey at the river's mouth and establishing [[Fort Clatsop]], a short-lived establishment that was occupied for less than three months.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}}

Canadian explorer [[David Thompson (explorer)|David Thompson]], of the [[North West Company]], spent the winter of 1807{{ndash}}08 at [[Kootanae House]] near the source of the Columbia at present-day Invermere, BC. Over the next few years he explored much of the river and its northern tributaries. In 1811 he traveled down the Columbia to the Pacific Ocean, arriving at the mouth just after [[John Jacob Astor]]'s [[Pacific Fur Company]] had founded Astoria. On his return to the north, Thompson explored the one remaining part of the river he had not yet seen, becoming the first Euro-descended person to travel the entire length of the river.{{sfn|Hayes|1999a}}

In 1825, the [[Hudson's Bay Company]] (HBC) established [[Fort Vancouver]] on the bank of the Columbia, in what is now Vancouver, Washington, as the headquarters of the company's [[Columbia District]], which encompassed everything west of the Rocky Mountains, north of California, and south of Russian-claimed Alaska. [[Factor (agent)|Chief Factor]] [[John McLoughlin]], a physician who had been in the fur trade since 1804, was appointed superintendent of the Columbia District. The HBC reoriented its Columbia District operations toward the Pacific Ocean via the Columbia, which became the region's main trunk route.{{sfn|Meinig|1995|pp=73–79}} In the early 1840s Americans began to colonize the Oregon country in large numbers via the [[Oregon Trail]], despite the HBC's efforts to discourage American settlement in the region. For many the final leg of the journey involved travel down the lower Columbia River to Fort Vancouver.{{sfn|Mackie|1997|p=318}} This part of the Oregon Trail, the treacherous stretch from The Dalles to below the Cascades, could not be traversed by horses or wagons (only watercraft, at great risk). This prompted the 1846 construction of the [[Barlow Road]].<ref name="eotot">{{cite web |url = http://www.endoftheoregontrail.org/road2oregon/sa21barlowrd.html |title = The Final Leg of the Trail |publisher = End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20081012035621/http://www.endoftheoregontrail.org/road2oregon/sa21barlowrd.html |archive-date = October 12, 2008 |url-status = dead }}</ref>

In the [[Treaty of 1818]] the United States and Britain agreed that both nations were to enjoy equal rights in Oregon Country for 10&nbsp;years. By 1828, when the so-called "joint occupation" was renewed indefinitely, it seemed probable that the lower Columbia River would in time become the border between the two nations. For years the Hudson's Bay Company successfully maintained control of the Columbia River and American attempts to gain a foothold were fended off. In the 1830s, American religious missions were established at several locations in the lower Columbia River region. In the 1840s a mass migration of American settlers undermined British control. The Hudson's Bay Company tried to maintain dominance by shifting from the fur trade, which was in decline, to exporting other goods such as salmon and lumber. Colonization schemes were attempted, but failed to match the scale of American settlement. Americans generally settled south of the Columbia, mainly in the Willamette Valley. The Hudson's Bay Company tried to establish settlements north of the river, but nearly all the British colonists moved south to the Willamette Valley. The hope that the British colonists might dilute the American presence in the valley failed in the face of the overwhelming number of American settlers. These developments rekindled the issue of "joint occupation" and the [[Oregon boundary dispute|boundary dispute]]. While some British interests, especially the Hudson's Bay Company, fought for a boundary along the Columbia River, the [[Oregon Treaty]] of 1846 set the boundary at the 49th&nbsp;parallel. As part of the treaty, the British retained all areas north of the line while the United States acquired the south. The Columbia River became much of the border between the U.S. territories of [[Oregon Territory|Oregon]] and [[Washington Territory|Washington]].{{sfn|Meinig|1995|pp=72–73, 75, 117, 146–47, 169–70}} [[Oregon]] became a U.S. state in 1859, while [[Washington (state)|Washington]] later entered into the Union in 1889.

By the turn of the 20th&nbsp;century, the difficulty of navigating the Columbia was seen as an impediment to the economic development of the [[Inland Empire (Pacific Northwest)|Inland Empire]] region east of the Cascades.<ref>{{cite news |last = Reeder |first = Lee B. |title = Open the Columbia to the Sea |publisher = Center for Columbia River History |url = http://www.ccrh.org/comm/umatilla/primary/opensea.htm |access-date = April 3, 2008 |archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20160306103837/http://ccrh.org/comm/umatilla/primary/opensea.htm |archive-date = March 6, 2016 |url-status = dead }} URL is to a reprint of a 1902 magazine edition of the ''Pendleton Daily Tribune'' published by E. P. Dodd.</ref> The dredging and dam building that followed would permanently alter the river, disrupting its natural flow but also providing electricity, [[irrigation]], [[navigability]] and other benefits to the region.