Western Tollgate of the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Wagon Road
c. 1900
Linn County, Oregon, United States
Photograph of a man standing at the western gate of the Willamette Valley & Cascade Mountain Wagon Road, a toll road, next to a board with the toll prices. The road, also known as the Santiam Wagon Road, ran from Albany to Ontario, and at the time of its construction in 1865 was the only reliable wagon road across the Cascade Range. It remained a main route for travel east and west in Oregon until the construction of the McKenzie and Santiam Highways in the 1920s, despite poor construction and limited usability during bad weather. The poor condition of the road, especially in the eastern section, became the focus of a federal congressional fraud investigation into the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Wagon-Road Company, which had received over 400,000 acres of land via land grants on the premise that it had constructed and maintained a usable road across the state. The western tollgate was located east of Sweet Home, on John Gilliland's claim - Gilliland served as the gatekeeper until 1880, when the gate was relocated to Lower Soda Falls, also east of Sweet Home.
More about this item
- Description
- Photograph of a man standing at the western gate of the Willamette Valley & Cascade Mountain Wagon Road, a toll road, next to a board with the toll prices. The road, also known as the Santiam Wagon Road, ran from Albany to Ontario, and at the time of its construction in 1865 was the only reliable wagon road across the Cascade Range. It remained a main route for travel east and west in Oregon until the construction of the McKenzie and Santiam Highways in the 1920s, despite poor construction and limited usability during bad weather. The poor condition of the road, especially in the eastern section, became the focus of a federal congressional fraud investigation into the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Wagon-Road Company, which had received over 400,000 acres of land via land grants on the premise that it had constructed and maintained a usable road across the state. The western tollgate was located east of Sweet Home, on John Gilliland's claim - Gilliland served as the gatekeeper until 1880, when the gate was relocated to Lower Soda Falls, also east of Sweet Home.
- Provenance
- Found in collections. The prices on the board are identical to the prices reported in the initial charter from 1866.
- Date
- c. 1900
- Subject
- Toll roads
- Tolls
- Roads
- Gates
- Oregon
- Location
- Linn County, Oregon, United States
- Rights
- http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/
- Identifier
- ghs1013
- Contributor
- Gresham Historical Society
- Extent
- Print, Photographic
- Type
- StillImage
- Item sets
- Gresham Heritage
Part of Western Tollgate of the Willamette Valley and Cascade Mountain Wagon Road
