| Walling's Landing From a letter from Levi. W. Myers, Portland, Oregon, January 16, 1906, printed on Page 1 of the Friday, January 26, 1906 issue of the Wapello Tribune.
"EDITOR OF THE TRIBUNE: it will be a matter of melancholy interest to many of your oldest citizens to know that Aaron Cisco died at Oswego, a landing on the Williamette river eight miles south of Portland, on December 22, 1905, aged 85 years. He was a brother of Mrs. R. S. Strong, who formerly lived at Grandview, and one of his nieces, Mrs. W. T. Thompson, is a resident there now, or was recently. Samuel G. Strong, of Jefferson township, has been here in Portland for three or four years, having a sort of oversight of his uncle Cisco, and now that the old gentleman has passed away, Mr. Strong expects to locate next summer with his brother in Galloway county, Missouri.
Mr. Cisco left Grandview in 1849, and came across the plains in an ox wagon, as was then the custom. He lived and died a bachelor. A shoemaker by trade, he took to farming also, after making his home in Oregon, and accumulated considerable property. Some twelve years ago he lost $10,000 by the failure of a Portland bank, but he was yet in good circumstances at the time of his death.
When Mr. Cisco left Louisa county in 1849, he had as a companion across the plains, Mr. George Walling, of Walling's Landing, afterwards called Port Louisa. They came through together and Mr. Walling settled near Oregon City, fifteen miles south of Portland, and up the Williamette river. Our rivers here, you see, run the other way. Mr. Cisco lived for many years with Albert Walling, one of George Walling's sons, and it was at his home that Mr. Cisco died. Walling's Landing, on the Mississippi, took its name from George Walling, who first settled there, and the name was afterwards changed to Port Louisa, in honor of Mr. Walling's oldest daughter, Louisa. She lives here in Portland and is a well preserved lady of some seventy years. I saw and talked with her recently, but out of feelings of delicacy, of course, I did not ask her to tell me her age. But we had a very pleasant chat about early times and the old homes "so far, far away. Her name is now Mrs. McGrew. How we scatter over the earth, east, west, north, south, and I sometimes wonder whether in the mysterious hereafter if even the Infinite will be able to find us all.
LEVI W. MYERS. |
