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Cage 581
John Spencer
Papers, 1831-1964

Washington State University acquired the John Spencer daily journals and miscellaneous papers in November 1990 (MS 90-67). It received the accession from the author's great-grandson, John Spencer, a retired Washington State University faculty member residing at Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. In 1950 the State College of Washington acquired a typescript copy of a journal that Spencer wrote while on his trip from Ohio to Oregon in 1852. It is catalogued separately as Cage 4140. Robert W. Hadlow processed Cage 581 in late 1991 and early 1992.

BIOGRAPHY

John Spencer was born at Clove Creek, Huntingdon County (later Blair County) on April 17, 1802. In his journal, Spencer wrote of a conversion experience that he had in February 1823, in which he decided to become a Methodist minister. He began to preach in 1826. On February 8, 1832, Spencer married. He and his wife, Julia Ann, lived in western Pennsylvania, western Virginia, and eastern Ohio. John Spencer became Presiding Elder of the Ohio District of the Pittsburgh Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the 1840s. John and Julia began their family of nine children while living in the Upper Midwest. By the early 1850s Spencer yearned to cross the continent to Oregon Territory and work in his church's missionary district there. Elders, though, denied his request because of his obligations to his wife and children. Spencer eventually resigned his post in Beallsville, Ohio. He and his family and others travelled cross country to Oregon, arriving in Portland on Novmber 10, 1852. John Spencer took up his claim to land in Yamhill County, thirty miles southwest of Portland, in January 1853. There, near Lafayette, he and his boys constructed a log cabin. They sowed and harvested red and white wheat, and oats. They also planted an orchard of apple and peach trees. Spencer built a new home on his claim in 1865. He served a two- year term as superintendent of schools for Yamhill County, beginning in July 1866.

In 1872, after their children had reached adulthood, the Spencers sold their claim to their son-in-law Stephen A. Young. They moved to a new home that they built in nearby McMinnville. There, John Spencer served as postmaster from 1874 to 1880. While John Spencer was not a paid minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church's missionary district of California and Oregon, he did serve the church by occasionally conducting worship services, and performing weddings and baptisms. He was also a regular contributor to the periodical entitled "The Pacific Christian Advocate." In May 1871, John and Julia Spencer travelled by train to Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania to visit friends they had not seen in nearly twenty years. They financed the trip from donations collected during lectures that John gave about life in Oregon. He and his wife returned to the Pacific Northwest in October. It appears that John and Julia Spencer lived into the 1880s. Their dates of death are unknown. Below is a list a vital statistics of the Spencer family as assembled from the daily journals.

     John         b. 04-17-1852 Huntingdon Co., Pennsylvania;
                                married 02-08-1832
     Julia Ann    b. 02-03-1810
     Emeline      b. 11-15-1830
                  d. 03-1832    buried West Middletown, Wa. Co., Pa.
     Wm Valentine b. 02-14-1835 married Etta 09-1869; military career;
                                bank cashier, Portland
     M. Cecilia   b. 02-22-1839 married S. A. Young 1862, physician;
                                child--Rosimond Isabella, May 1868;
                                lived in McMinnville area
     Cornelia J.  b. 11-29-1841 married Geo. H. Greer, 12-07-??,
                                minister; children--Elwin, 08-10-1865;
                                William, 06-06-1867; lived at Puget
                                Sound, later in California
     Armininius   b. c.1841-45
                  d. c.1841-45  buried Beallsville, Wash. Co., Ohio
     Manlius F.   b. 04-10-1845 Moundsville, Ohio; becomes a teacher;
                                lived in McMinnville area
     Theodore W.  b. 01-04-1848 married Kate Handley, 12-31-1870;
                                children--Cornelia J., 07-02-1873;
                                Walter J., 04-30-1875; Jessie, 03-09-1876
                                dentist, McMinnville area
     Jas. Orpheus b. 04-19-1850 studied medicine
     John Julius  b. 02-07-1853 Otterbrook, Yamhill Co., Oregon, druggist

ARRANGEMENT AND DESCRIPTION

John Spencer's daily journals present a chronological record of the events of the lives of an Oregon pioneer and his family. They cover every year from 1857 through 1880. There is also a final entry in in the 1880 volume for New Year's Day 1881. There are a few irregularities in how Spencer arranged his entries. These are noted below in the container list. Spencer included a wide variety of types of information in his daily log. It included farm records describing crops he sowed, when he harvested them, their yields, and his income. He also wrote of his activities as a Methodist minister and his own spirituality as a Christian. He described in detail physical ailments of his family and the quality of his own health. Finally, Spencer wrote of his views on topics such as temperance, slavery, and the successes of the Republican party in the 1860s and 1870s. The remainder of the collection is miscellaneous papers and correspondence. It includes a few sermons that Spencer authored, receipts for expenses, and incoming and outgoing correspondence. In this last category, letters from the 1830s and 1840s become important additions to the journals. Also, a letter from Cose and Cooke, dated June 28, 1852, discussed how and why the Spencer family decided to settle in Oregon. There was no particular filing arrangement for the items in Series 2. These miscellaneous papers were scattered indiscriminately among the leaves of Spencer's journals. The Libraries has foldered them alphabetically by document type.

 SERIES LIST                                                     CONTAINERS
    Series 1.  John Spencer's Daily Journal 1858-1881     1-2
    Series 2.  Miscellaneous Correspondence and Papers      3

CONTAINER LIST
  JOHN SPENCER'S DAILY JOURNAL, 1858-1881
  BOX   FOLDER    DESCRIPTION
  1     1     Daily Journal for 1857 and 1858
        2     Daily Journal for 1859
        3     Daily Journal for 1860 and January 1 to March 3, 1961
        4     Daily Journal for March 4 to December 31, 1961 (marked 1858) (entries for January 1 to February 27 are from 1858)
        5     Daily Journal for 1862
        6     Daily Journal for 1863 and 1864 (side-by-side, marked 1863)
        7     Daily Journal for 1865
        8     Daily Journal for 1866
  2     9     Daily Journal for 1867 (originally marked 1865)
       10     Daily Journal for 1868
       11     Daily Journal for 1869, 1870, and 1871
       12     Daily Journal for 1872
       13     Daily Journal for 1873 and 1874
       14     Daily Journal for 1875
       15     Daily Journal for 1876
       16     Daily Journal for 1877 and 1878
       17     Daily Journal for 1879 and January 1-20, 1880
       18     Daily Journal for 1880 and January 1, 1881
  MISCELLANEOUS CORRESPONDENCE AND PAPERS
  BOX   FOLDER    DESCRIPTION
  3    19     Campaign Square, Republican Ticket [1876]
       20     Certificate, Sons and Daughters of Oregon Pioneers Elwin Spencer Greer, 1921
       21     Envelope and Calling Card, Capt. W. V. Spencer
       22     Handbill, Republican Ticket, Pierce Co., Wa. Terr., 1878
       23     Handbill, Temperance Reform Ticket, [Yamhill Co. Ore. 1876]
       24     Leaflet, Service and Lesson Leaf, 1930
       25     Letter, C. Black to Rev. J. Spencer, April 6, 1843
       26     Letter, W. Cose anc C. Cooke to Bro. Spencer, June 28, 1852
       27     Letter, J Drummond to Rev. J. Spencer, July 1, 1873
       28     Letter, F. G. Evans to Rev. Jno. Spencer, June 16, 1840
       29     Letter, Philip Greene to John Spencer, April 3, 1847
       30     Letter, Wesley Kenney to Bro. Spencer, June 20, 1831
       31     Letter, W. Kenney to John Spencer, April 24, 1872
       32     Letter, B. C. Lippincott to John Spencer, February 6, 1866
       33     Letter, J. K. Miller to Bro. Spencer, June 12, 1867
       34     Letter, John Spencer ("Grandpa") to Elwin Spencer Greer ("Win"), June 29, 1877
       35     Letter, John Spencer to William Spencer [father], November 29, 1839
  BOX   FOLDER    DESCRIPTION
  3    36     Letter, John Spencer to William Spencer [father], February 4, 1840
       37     Letter, W. V. Spencer to Cornelia J. S. Greer, Feb. 12, 1892
       38     Letter, Wesley Smith to John Spencer, December 26, 1839
       39     Miscellaneous Papers
       40     Newspaper Clipping, "The Christian's Home," Feb. 9, 1867
       41     Newspaper Clipping, "Francis Henry, Pioneer Bard," 1964
       42     Newspaper Clipping, "Scandalous Politics" [1870s]
       43     Newspaper Clipping, "A Surprise," [1884]
       44     Notebooklet, c. 1830s
       45     Paper, "The Difference," [Union Sunday School, 1870s]
       46     Paper, "Doggerel Alphabet No. 3," March 1, 1860
       47     Receipt, Knapp and Grant, Merchants, June 29, 1867
       48     Receipt, Post Office Supplies, March 2, 1878
       49     Sermon Text, 1 John 3:2
       50     Sermon Text, 2 Peter 1:5, March 22, 1868, Olympia
       51     Tract, "Shall We Have the Maine Law," Am. Temperance Union