Editing Willamette River (section)

===19th century===
The 1805–1806 [[Lewis and Clark Expedition]] originally missed the mouth of the Willamette. On their return journey, only after receiving directions from natives along the [[Sandy River (Oregon)|Sandy River]] did the explorers learn about their oversight. [[William Clark (explorer)|William Clark]] returned down the Columbia and entered the Willamette River in April 1806.<ref name="Benke 616"/>

Fur trappers originally working for the [[Pacific Fur Company]] (PFC)) and subsequently for the [[North West Company]] (NWC) were next to visit the Willamette River and various tributaries.<ref>Mackie, p. 115</ref> The [[Siskiyou Trail]] (or California-Oregon Trail) originally developed by Indigenous people, was used to reach farther south. This trail, over {{convert|600|mi|km}} long, stretched from the mouth of the Willamette River near present-day Portland south through the Willamette Valley, crossing the [[Siskiyou Mountains]], and south through the [[Sacramento Valley]] to [[San Francisco]].<ref>Engeman, p. 63</ref>

In 1812, William Henry and Alfred Seton paddled up from [[Fort Astoria]] (PFC) on the [[Columbia River]] into the mouth of the Willamette, continued on until the falls portage (present-day [[Oregon City]]) and finished their journey at a flattening of both banks, the later site of [[Champoeg]]. A first trading post was established. By early 1813, William Wallace and John C. Halsey established a second outpost, [[Wallace House (fur-trade post)|Wallace House]], farther south, north of present-day Salem. 

By the end of the [[War of 1812]], the NWC acquired the PFC. Free trappers Registre Bellaire, [[John Day (trapper)|John Day]] and Alexander Carson hunted and traded furs during the winter of 1813–14 along the Willamette. About thirty NWC employees were stationed at the Champoeg post, now called the [[Willamette Trading Post]], along with freemen housed in two huts and Kalapuya nearby. [[Nez Perce]] and [[Cayuse people|Cayuse]] warned the NWC to stay out of the Willamette Valley hunting grounds. Skirmishes went on for several years over fishing and hunting grounds contended by several groups.

By the winter of 1818–19, [[Thomas McKay]] led a hunting brigade farther south towards the sources of the Willamette River and reached the upper [[Umpqua River]]. More violent skirmishes were fought. Most brigade members returned to Fort George (formerly called [[Fort Astoria]]). Louis LaBonté, [[Joseph Gervais]], [[Étienne Lucier]], Louis Kanota, and Louis Pichette (dit DuPré) remained in the Willamette Valley as free trappers.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.usgennet.org/usa/or/county/clackamas/timeline1.html |title=Clackamas County Oregon History, 1800 to 1843}}</ref> Meanwhile, in 1821 the HBC merged with the NWC. In 1825 a new [[Fort Vancouver]] headquarters was built on the north shore of the Columbia closer to the Willamette, and Fort George was closed. [[Alexander Roderick McLeod]] traveled up the Willamette in 1826 and 1827, to the [[Umpqua River|Umpqua]] and the [[Rogue River (Oregon)|Rogue]] rivers.

In 1829 Lucier established a land claim near the Champoeg trading post and started to settle, soon joined by Gervais (1831), [[Pierre Belleque]] (1833) and 77 French Canadian settlers by 1836. By 1843, approximately 100 newcomer families lived in the vicinity of the Willamette on a section referred to as [[French Prairie]].

By 1841, members of the [[United States Exploring Expedition]] came through the Siskiyou Trail. They noted extensive salmon fishing by natives at Willamette Falls, much like that at [[Celilo Falls]] on the Columbia River.<ref>Wilkes, pp. 341–74</ref>

In the middle part of the 19th century the Willamette Valley's fertile soils, pleasant climate, and abundant water attracted thousands of settlers from the [[eastern United States]], mainly the [[Upland South]] borderlands of Missouri, Iowa, and the Ohio Valley.<ref>Meinig, p. 71</ref> Many of these emigrants followed the [[Oregon Trail]], a {{convert|2170|mi|km|adj=on}} trail across western North America that began at [[Independence, Missouri]], and ended at various locations near the mouth of the Willamette River. Although people had been traveling to Oregon since 1836, large-scale migration did not begin until 1843, when nearly 1,000 pioneers headed westward. Over the next 25 years, some 500,000&nbsp;settlers traveled the Oregon Trail, to reach the Willamette Valley.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.isu.edu/%7Etrinmich/Introduction.html |title=Introduction |publisher=Idaho State University |work=The Oregon Trail |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100529081949/http://www.isu.edu/~trinmich/Introduction.html |archive-date=May 29, 2010 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.isu.edu/%7Etrinmich/routewest.html |title=The Route West |publisher=Idaho State University |work=The Oregon Trail |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100529081928/http://www.isu.edu/~trinmich/routewest.html |archive-date=May 29, 2010 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.octa-trails.org/articles/where-did-the-oregon-trail-go |title=Where did the Oregon Trail Go? Reaching Oregon's Willamette Valley |publisher=Oregon-California Trails Association |access-date=September 3, 2014}}</ref>

[[File:Oregon City and Willamette Falls, 1867.jpg|thumb|left|alt=Oregon City in 1867|Oregon City circa 1867, with Willamette Falls in the background]]

Starting in the 1830s, [[Oregon City]] developed near Willamette Falls. It was incorporated in 1844, becoming the first city west of the [[Rocky Mountains]] to have that distinction.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://sos.oregon.gov/blue-book/Pages/local/counties/clackamas.aspx |title=Clackamas County |publisher=Oregon State Archives |work=Oregon Blue Book |access-date=October 26, 2018}}</ref> [[John McLoughlin]], the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) superintendent of the [[Columbia District]], was one of the major contributors to the founding of the town in 1829.<ref>Samson, p. 125</ref> McLoughlin attempted to persuade the HBC (which still held sway over the area) to allow American settlers to live on the land, and provided significant help to American colonization of the area, all against the HBC's orders.<ref>Holman, pp. 96–97</ref> Oregon City prospered because of the lumber and grist mills that were run by the water power of Willamette Falls, but the falls formed an impassable barrier to river navigation. [[Linn City, Oregon|Linn City]] (originally Robins Nest) was established across the Willamette from Oregon City.<ref>McArthur, p. 1022</ref>

After Portland was incorporated in 1851, quickly growing into Oregon's largest city, Oregon City gradually lost its importance as the economic and political center of the Willamette Valley. Beginning in the 1850s, [[steamboat]]s began to ply the Willamette, despite the fact that they could not pass Willamette Falls.<ref>Gulick, pp. 28–29</ref> As a result, navigation on the Willamette River was divided into two stretches: the {{convert|27|mi|km|adj=on}} lower stretch from Portland to Oregon City—which allowed connection with the rest of the Columbia River system—and the upper reach, which encompassed most of the Willamette's length.<ref>Gulick, p. 22</ref> Any boats whose owners found it absolutely necessary to get past the falls had to be [[portage]]d. This led to competition for business among steam portage companies.<ref>Timmen, pp. 14, 17, 27</ref><ref name="Alan Lewis">{{cite web |last=Lewis |first=Alan |url=http://www.willamettefalls.org/hislocks#!history-of-the-locks/c1tb3 |title=Conquering the Falls: The Willamette Falls Locks |publisher=Willamette Falls Heritage Foundation |work=History of the Willamette Falls |date=August 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130517061950/http://willamettefalls.org/HisLocks#!history-of-the-locks/c1tb3 |archive-date=May 17, 2013}}</ref> In 1873, the construction of the [[Willamette Falls Locks]] bypassed the falls and allowed easy navigation between the upper and lower river. Each lock chamber measured {{convert|210|ft|m}} long and {{convert|40|ft|m}} wide, and the canal was originally operated manually before it switched to electrical power.<ref name="Alan Lewis" /> Usage of the locks peaked in the 1940s, and by the early 21st&nbsp;century, the lock system was little used.<ref>{{cite news |last=Balingit |first=Moriah |author2=Lednicer, Lisa Grace |url=http://www.willamettefalls.org/LocksNews |title=Living on Borrowed Time |work=The Oregonian |date=May 18, 2006 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130521074956/http://willamettefalls.org/LocksNews |archive-date=May 21, 2013}}</ref> Since 2011, the Willamette Falls Locks have been inactive.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.nwp.usace.army.mil/willamette/locks/ |title=Willamette Falls Locks |publisher=U.S. Army Corps of Engineers |access-date=December 22, 2022}}</ref>

As commerce and industry flourished on the lower river, most of the original settlers acquired farms in the upper Willamette Valley. By the late 1850s, farmers had begun to grow crops on most of the available fertile land.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.opb.org/programs/oregonstory/farming/timeline.html |title=A Chronology of Farming in Oregon |publisher=Oregon Public Broadcasting |year=2000 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304055646/http://www.opb.org/programs/oregonstory/farming/timeline.html |archive-date=March 4, 2016 |url-status=dead}}</ref> The settlers increasingly encroached on Native American lands. Skirmishes between natives and settlers in the Umpqua and [[Rogue River (Oregon)|Rogue]] valleys to the southwest of the Willamette River led the [[Government of Oregon|Oregon state government]] to remove the natives by military force.<ref>Edwards and Schwantes, p. 61</ref> They were first led off their traditional lands to the Willamette Valley, but soon were marched to the [[Coast Indian Reservation]]. In 1855, [[Joel Palmer]], an Oregon legislator, negotiated a treaty with the Willamette Valley tribes, who, although unhappy with the treaty, ceded their lands to non-natives.<ref>Edwards and Schwantes, p. 62</ref><ref name="Jette">{{cite encyclopedia |last=Jette |first=Melinda |url=http://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/kalapuya_treaty/ |title=Kalapuya Treaty of 1855 |publisher=Portland State University |encyclopedia=The Oregon Encyclopedia |access-date=June 6, 2010}}</ref> The natives were then relocated by the government to a part of the Coast Reservation that later became the [[Grande Ronde Reservation]].<ref name="Jette"/>

Between 1879 and 1885, the Willamette River was charted by [[Cleveland S. Rockwell]], a topographical engineer and cartographer for the [[United States Coast and Geodetic Survey]]. Rockwell surveyed the lower Willamette from the foot of [[Ross Island (Oregon)|Ross Island]] through Portland to the Columbia River and then downstream on the Columbia to [[Bachelor Island (Washington)|Bachelor Island]].<ref>U.S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, p. 76</ref> Rockwell's survey was extremely detailed, including 17,782&nbsp;hydrographic soundings. His work helped open the port of Portland to commerce.<ref>Stenzel, pp. 37–39</ref>

In the second half of the 19th&nbsp;century, the [[United States Army Corps of Engineers|USACE]] dredged channels and built locks and levees in the Willamette's watershed. Although products such as lumber were often transported on an existing network of railroads in Oregon, these advances in navigation helped businesses deliver more goods to Portland, feeding the city's growing economy. Trade goods from the Columbia basin north of Portland could also be transported southward on the Willamette due to the deeper channels made at the Willamette's mouth.<ref name=Willingham>{{cite encyclopedia |last=Willingham |first=William F |title=U.S. Army Corps of Engineers |url=http://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/u_s__army_corps_of_engineers/ |encyclopedia=The Oregon Encyclopedia |publisher=Portland State University |access-date=September 14, 2011}}</ref>