Methodist Mission - Foundation

Foundation

See also: Oregon Mission

In 1831, several Nez Perce Indians were said to have traveled to St. Louis, Missouri and met with General William Clark of the Lewis and Clark Expedition to inquire about the “white man’s God” from the General. This spurred a missionary movement to convert the Native Americans to Christianity. In 1834 the Methodist Church sent the Reverend Jason Lee, his nephew the Reverend Daniel Lee, Cyrus Shepard, Philip Leget Edwards, and Courtney M. Walker overland to preach to the Flathead Indians (Salish). The group contracted with the entrepreneur Nathaniel Jarvis Wyeth to travel overland with his party and to ship supplies around Cape Horn on Wyeth’s ship May Dacre.

Lee ignored the missionary board’s instructions and traveled to Oregon Country, where he set up a mission in the Willamette Valley. John McLoughlin, district director of the Hudson’s Bay Company recommended the Willamette Valley as a better spot for settlement than the area to the north where the Flathead lived. The mission was 60 miles up the Willamette River from its junction with the Columbia. The mission built a cabin, barn, and fencing before the first winter set in.

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