Note 175 — Chapter VII · [II]

Col. Joseph L. Meek (1810-75) was one of the most picturesque of the "mountain men" who settled in Oregon. An extended account of his adventures was published by Frances Fuller Victor, under the title River of the West (Hartford, 1870). Born in Washington County, Virginia, he left home while still a boy, and in 1829 joined Sublette's caravan for the mountain trade. During eleven years he experienced adventures similar to those of other hunters and trappers, in one of which he killed a grizzly bear. The Englishman Stuart (see our volume xxi, p. 197, note 42), coming up with his artist Miller, had a sketch made of the beast which was afterwards elaborated into a picture, and later a wax model for the St. Louis Museum (River of the West, pp. 220-223). Meek went out to Oregon in 1840, settling on Tualatin Plains, where he was active in establishing the provisional government, of which he was first sheriff. After the Whitman massacre of 1847 he was the accredited messenger to Washington, D. C., to obtain consideration for the condition of Oregon. His visit to the East was replete with amusing adventures. Returning as United States marshal, he acted as guide to the party sent to escort to his post the first American governor of Oregon, General Joseph Lane. Meek was prominent in Oregon throughout his later life, being generally known as "Uncle Joe," and he aided in founding the Pioneer Association. See Oregon Pioneer Association Transactions, 1875. His meeting with Farnham is mentioned by Frances Fuller Victor in River of the West, p. 256. For a portrait of Meek, see the frontispiece to that volume, also Lyman, History of Oregon, iii, p. 66.—Ed.