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On this day in 1834 the founder of the American Society of the Settlement of the Oregon Territory, Hall Jackson Kelly, arrived at Fort Vancouver from Massachusetts. While reading the Journals of Lewis and Clark in 1818, Kelly became enthusiastic about the Oregon country and subsequently wrote books and pamphlets extolling its virtues. Kelly planned a caravan of several hundred prospective emigrants from New England to Oregon that failed to materialize. Undaunted, he set out alone for Oregon by way of Mexico, where he encountered difficulties and finally arrived at the Columbia River sick and penniless. The following year, 1835, he sailed to Hawaii and then back to Boston where he spent the remainder of his life.
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