Methodist Mission

The Methodist Mission was founded in Oregon Country in 1834 by the Reverend Jason Lee. Started by United States Protestant missionaries to educate the Native Americans in the Willamette Valley, it developed as an important center for European-American politics and economics in the early settlement period of Oregon. People associated with the mission set up the first government in Oregon. In 1842, settlers established the Oregon Institute as the first school in the territory for European-American children and bought a mission building originally intended for Native children. The mission closed down about 1844.

The mission was founded about five years after 90 percent of the Native Americans in the lower Willamette Valley had died as a result of infectious disease epidemics. The mission did some teaching and set up trading posts, but accomplished little in terms of conversions to Christianity.