Steamboats of the Columbia River

The paddle-wheel steamboat has been described as an economic "invasion craft" which allowed the rapid exploitation of the Oregon Country, a huge area of the North American continent eventually divided between the United States and Canada, and of Alaska and the Yukon.

Rapids further upstream at Clackamas were a hazard to navigation, and all river traffic had to portage around Willamette Falls, where Oregon City had been established as the first major town inland from Astoria.

Imnaha and Mountain Gem were able to proceed 55 miles (89 km) upriver from Lewiston, through the Snake River Canyon, to the Eureka Bar, to haul ore from a mine that had been established there.

[4] In the 1840s and 1850s, ocean-going ships equipped with auxiliary steam engines were able to and did come up the lower river as far as Portland, Oregon and Fort Vancouver.

After that, Columbia made the Oregon City-Portland-Astoria run twice a month at four miles per hour, charging $25 per passenger and $25 per ton of freight.

Lot Whitcomb was able to run upriver 120 miles (190 km) from Astoria to Oregon City in ten hours, compared to the Columbia's two days.

She operated above the falls for a little less than a year, but her deep draft barred her from reaching points on the upper Willamette, so she was returned to the lower river in May 1852, where for the time she had a reputation as a fast boat, making for example the 18-mile (29 km) run from Portland to Vancouver in one hour and twenty minutes.

Belle lasted until 1869, and was a good boat, but was not considered a substitute for the speed and comfort (as the standard was then) of the departed Lot Whitcomb.

Also operating on the river at this time were James P. Flint, Allen, Washington, and the small steam vessels Eagle, Black Hawk, and Hoosier, the first two being iron-hulled and driven by propellers.

[4] Operations on the middle Columbia were hampered by the existence of the Cascades Rapids, which blocked all upriver traffic and substantially impeded everything going downriver.

Van Bergen built the James P. Flint at the lower end of the Cascades, then winched her along the bank to operate on the middle river up to The Dalles.

Business wasn't enough on this run, as overland emigration had fallen off, so in 1852, her owners winched her back down along the bank of the Cascades to the lower river.

[2] Eventually the Oregon Steam Navigation Company built a portage railroad on the south side of the river that ran between The Dalles and Celilo.

pressured the government to do something about this, and so in 1867, the Corps of Engineers launched a two year survey of the upper Columbia and the Snake River, targeting rapids and other areas for work to improve navigability.

Coe formed the Oregon Steam Navigation Company which quickly gained monopoly power over most of the boats on the Columbia and Snake rivers, as well as the portages at the Cascades and from The Dalles to Celilo.

gave Villard and his allies control over just about every steamboat then operating on the Columbia, including all the OSN boats already mentioned, plus Emma Hayward, S.G. Reed, Fannie Patton, S.T.Church, McMinnville, Ocklahama, E.N.

Cook, Governor Grover, Alice, Bonita, Dixie Thompson, Welcome, Spokane, New Tenino, Almota, Willamette Chief, Orient, Occident, Bonanza, Champion, and D.S.Baker.

O.R.& N. started bringing its boats down to the lower river from the middle and upper stages, with the strategy of forcing patrons to use its railroads rather than its steamboats.

& N then made one of his biggest mistakes when he brought from the east coast two enormous iron-hulled vessels, Olympian and Alaskan, and placed them on routes on the Columbia and Puget Sound.

As the railroads were building on the south bank of the Columbia neared competition, O.R.& N. withdrew its boats from the middle and upper river.

While these projects did open the river first to The Dalles, and then all the way to Wallula, there was no long-term improvement for the steamboats' position in their losing competition against the railroads.

In that year, Altona was rebuilt for the Yellow Stack line, and a brand new Hassalo was launched for the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company.

[11]Mills, an English professor when he was not writing books on history, used his full talent with the language to capture the occasion: On up the Columbia the Georgie Burton sloshed along while the fog thinned and the sky brightened.

Slowly the lock filled and the Georgie Burton slid out into the slack water beyond, riding over what had been the awesome Cascades, now nothing more than a quiet pool.

... Near Hood River, where the gorge widens, the Spencer had broken her back in the gale, and the big twin-stackers Oneonta and Iris had brought a touch of Upper Mississippi to the Columbia.

The famous actor James Stewart and other members of the cast of the recently filmed movie Bend of the River were on board the Henderson.

Homer T. Shaver, who stated that as both were running fast for their design, as towboats, the speeds were not much compared to what he'd seen as a young man on the river.

Again, the results were summed up by McCurdy: It was, however, a stirring sight as the two paddlers, smoke pouring from their stacks and stately waterfalls at their sterns, re-enacted the glory days of steamboating on the Columbia.

Boats were lost for many reasons, including striking rocks or logs ("snags"), fire, boiler explosion, or puncture or crushing by ice.

The propeller steamer Virginia V which technically may have been the last wooden steamboat in regular commercial passenger service on the Columbia (in 1942) has been restored and is operational in Seattle, Washington.