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The past two Pioneer Profiles have partially explored the public persona of Peter Britt, the pioneer Swiss photographer famed for documenting Southern Oregon’s people, activities, and landscapes, and father of the region’s commercial orchard, wine, and ornamental horticulture industries. Britt also served two terms on the Town Council, was one of the largest landholders in Southern Oregon, and was heavily involved in the many local German organizations. But Britt also had a

In Part 1, we highlighted Peter Britt’s renown as a photographer, artist, and documenter of pioneer life in Southern Oregon. However, Britt was also an avid gardener and is considered to be the father of Southern Oregon’s commercial orchard, wine, and ornamental horticulture industries. Britt Park, now the Britt Festival grounds and the City-owned lower Britt Gardens, was the focal point of many of these efforts. When Britt arrived in Jacksonville in the fall of 1852, he ca

It’s Britt season, so what better subject for summer’s Pioneer Profiles than Peter Britt, whose pioneer homestead is now the site of Britt Festivals, the Britt Gardens, and portions of Jacksonville’s Woodlands Trail System. Perhaps best known as the pioneer photographer who documented Southern Oregon’s people, activities, and landscapes from the 1850s to 1900, Peter Britt was also a visionary, a painter, a respected horticulturalist, a vintner, and an entrepreneur. Family t

On November 23, 1863, the newly ordained Father Francis Xavier Blanchet arrived in Jacksonville to take charge of the Catholic Church’s southernmost mission in Oregon. Fresh out of his Quebec seminary, he had been sent to the parish by his uncle, Francis Norbert Blanchet, Archbishop of “the Oregon Country.” Following the 1852 discovery of gold in Southern Oregon and the influx of miners and settlers, priests from California and northern Oregon began visiting the mining camp

Jackson County greeted the Chinese with a $2-per month Chinese mining tax levied in 1857 and doubled in 1858, and Oregon included a provision in its original 1857 state constitution stating that “no Negro, Chinaman, or Mulatto shall have the right of suffrage.” No non-white was allowed to testify against a white settler until 1862, and when Chinese residents were eventually given voting privileges, they were charged a $5 poll tax. Chinese engaged in trading were charged $50 p

It’s March and spring is in the air! The daffodils and forsythia are blooming, and the birds have on their “mating colors,” so Love seems an appropriate topic for this month’s Pioneer Profile —although in this case the Love in question is John Love and the Love family. John Swan Love was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1830.He had already established himself as a merchant at the age of 20 when he, like so many other young men, heard the call of the West. With miners

The Jacksonville Boosters Club and the City are exploring a project that would refurbish one of Jacksonville’s Historic Landmarks, the “Gold First Found Here” marker on Applegate Street where it crosses Daisy Creek just after it branches off South 3rd. The original marker was placed there in 1932 by the Jacksonville Chamber of Commerce as part of the town’s first Gold Rush Jubilee. The marker subsequently fell prey to vandalism and in 1967 the Jacksonville Garden Club replace

“Merritt Divorce Case Testimony Thrills J’ville” read the 1924 Medford Mail Tribune headline. June may be a traditional time for weddings and all the accompanying pageantry, but there’s nothing like a juicy divorce to set neighborhood tongues wagging! The Merritt divorce even gained statewide attention. Gossipy charges and counter charges included profanity, bad temper, incompatibility, smoking cigarettes, sitting on another man’s lap, interference by the plaintiff’s rela

When we left the “George and Gracie show” last month, George Merritt had his divorce; Grace Wick Merritt had $30 a month in alimony and custody of three cats. To bring readers up to speed, George was the only grandson of Jacksonville pioneer icon Jane McCully. He had been raised by his doting “Aunt Issie” McCully when his mother died shortly after his 1884 birth. Grace was the actress George had married in 1916 when he escaped Aunt Issie’s thumb and moved to Boston. The coupl

Our saga of William T’Vault (or Tevault, or Teevault, depending on his current persona) is drawing to a close. An individual who regularly reinvented himself, we’ve traced T’Vault through legal and political careers in Indiana, Arkansas, and Oregon; a marriage to the supposed “granddaughter” of Daniel Boone; a jail break following charges of rape and murder; an arduous trek across the Oregon Trail; a very short-lived tenure as the Oregon Territory’s first newspaper editor; an

It’s been nine months since we parted company with William Green Hamilton T’Vault, aka TeVault or TeeVault, but that hasn’t prevented him from getting in trouble or reinventing himself. We’ll encourage you to go online and read the first two installments in the September and October 2022 editions of the Review. In the meantime, here’s a quick refresher. We’ve traced his early legal career in Indiana and Arkansas; a marriage to the supposed “granddaughter” of Daniel Boone; a

Last month we introduced you to William T’Vault, or Tevault, or Teevault—depending on the when and where—inasmuch as this pioneer regularly reinvented himself. We traced him through an early legal career; a marriage to the “granddaughter” of Daniel Boone; a jail break following charges of murder and rape; an arduous trek across the Oregon Trail; resumption of a law career in Oregon City; increased involvement in politics, and a short-lived tenure as a newspaper editor. A reli

Prior to 1859, individuals seeking the opportunity, riches, and promise of the Oregon Territory were literally leaving the United States. They were also leaving behind their former lives, providing them with a chance to reinvent themselves. This “reinventing process” might even include a name change; it appears to have occurred often enough to be captured in song lyrics: Oh, what was your name in the States? Was it Thompson, or Johnson, or Bates? Did you murder your wife and

Did you know that Jacksonville had a museum as early as the 1870s? Ot that it was housed in a saloon—the Table Rock Billiard Saloon? Originally a bakery, it morphed into a saloon after the demise of its neighbor, the notorious El Dorado Saloon, in the fire of 1874. The Table Rock brick building survived. Cabinet of Curiosities It’s not known when Table Rock co-owner and saloonkeeper Herman von Helms began collecting fossils and oddities but soon after the Table Rock reopene

Aaron Maegly arrived in Jacksonville sometime after 1880 where he became the chief clerk in prominent merchant Gustav Karewski’s hardware store. By 1884 he was a partner in Bilger and Maegly, one of the 3 largest local manufacturers of agricultural machinery and implements, a competitor to Karewski. Two years later Maegly had established his own business, A.H. Maegly and Company, dealing in stoves, tinware, hardware, and agricultural implements. In 1885 Maegly married Cecelia