In 1962, a century-old tower bell was spotted at the bottom of a deep part of the Smith River, 24 miles east of Crescent City, Calif.

One of the oldest known business sites in Jacksonville is located at the corner of California and Oregon Streets, occupied today by the Scheffel’s Toys store.

Before settling in Little Shasta, Ore., in 1855, Samuel Musgrave struggled to get to America from Northern England.

Before he was a Civil War hero and President, Ulysses S. Grant spent a miserable assignment in 1854 at Fort Humboldt near Eureka, Calif. Fresh from the battlefields of the Mexican War, the young Army captain often joined the remote outpost’s other bored officers in drinking whiskey and playing poker.

The Red Rock area of Butte Valley, Calif, was a barren landscape in the early days of settlement, with only a few homesteads and many bad roads. It was hard to attract teachers, and children had difficulty getting to school regularly.

Oregon has a substantial population of Roma people, mostly in the Willamette Valley and around Portland. The Roma, also known as Gypsies, trace back to Northern India with tribes living primarily in Europe.

The pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Redding, Calif., in the 1960s, Noble M. Streeter, enjoyed sharing stories about his hard times as a child in the Northern California town.

The Medford, Ore., poet and artist, Atlanta Parker Satchwell, was also a secretary of the Commercial Club and the Chamber of Commerce, leader of many civic organizations, and the local chapter of the League of Western Writers. For the 75 th Jubilee of Oregon statehood, she wrote this “Anthem to Oregon” for the League. It is contained in her handwritten notebook of poetry now in possession of the Southern Oregon Historical Society. It was set to the tune of “Maryland My Maryland.”

Prior to 1924, the village of Gold Beach, Ore., was hardly recognized by the Catholic Church until Father L.E. LeMiller decided to build a small place of worship to accommodate the dozen or so parishioners.

In 1919, a robber hijacked a taxi, known then as a jitney, and left the gagged-and-bound driver in the woods.