The remains of Mrs. Mary Kilgore, relict of the late James Kilgore, were laid to rest Tuesday afternoon alongside the remains of her husband in Hargadine Cemetery. The funeral took place from the home on Factory Street. A choir composed of Miss Isa Duncan, Mrs. T. A. Hays, Mrs. C. F. Tilton, Elmer Patrick and Mr. Abbott sang several numbers including two favorite hymns of the deceased, "Rock of Ages" and "A Charge to Keep I Have." Rev. J. T. Abbott of the M.E. Church gave an account of the pioneer lady's history and life and preached a sermon on the theme.
    Miss Mary Dean was born and reared in Stark County, Ohio, near Massillon, and married to James Kilgore in 1838, and with husband and seven children came to Oregon in 1854. Of 11 children born to her eight survive--Mrs. M. W. Hargadine and Florence Kilgore of Ashland, Ed G. Kilgore, Mrs. Amanda Whitmore, Mrs. Mary Duncan and Silas W. Kilgore of Langell Valley, Klamath County, Mrs. Josephine Squires of Portland and David Kilgore of Rocklin, Placer County, Cal. Her husband died in Ashland in 1888. She was aged 82 years, 6 months and 5 days and departed this life Sunday morning.
Valley Record, Ashland,  April 17, 1902, page 3


Special to the Union.
    KLAMATH FALLS (Ore.), July 11.--At 2 o'clock yesterday afternoon occurred the funeral of Silas Wright Kilgore, one of the best known of the pioneers of this section, who passed away at the Henry Duncan ranch in Upper Langell Valley Sunday morning, after an illness lasting for five days.
    Had Mr. Kilgore lived but nine days longer he would have been 70 years of age. He was a son of James Kilgore, a pioneer of the Rogue River Valley, and one of the most influential of the early-day settlers in Oregon. In 1864 the son left the Rogue River Valley with an ox team for the Klamath region, and that same year, in partnership with one Mecum, he constructed the first bridge across Link River, hewing out the timbers to be used in the work.
    Kilgore later entered the Indian service, and was connected with the Yainax sub-agency for two years. After retiring from the Indian service he settled in Langell Valley, where he remained till his death, prominent in the work for the interests of Klamath County, and one of the most substantial citizens in the boundary of the county.
Sacramento Daily Union, July 12, 1911, page 8

    "Yes, I'm a Bunchgrasser" [Oregonian living east of the Cascades], said [Edward] G. Kilgore. "I was born a Buckeye and later became a Webfoot. I was born in Ohio, August 10, 1852, and I was one of 11 children. Mrs. Josie Squires, my sister, lives here in Portland. My people came across the plains when I was a baby, so I don't remember a thing about it.. When we got to Ashland the Rogue River war had started, and the people were 'forted up' in the grist mill. The first settlers to make permanent homes in Jackson County were the men who established ferries there--at Long's Ferry, Perkins' Ferry and Evans' Ferry. This was in 1851, the same year in which Judge A. A. Skinner, Indian agent of the Rogue River Indians, took up the first claim in the county, southeast of Table Rock. He built a log cabin on Bear Creek. The government interpreter, Chesley Gray, took a claim next to Judge Skinner's. Late in December 1851, Moses Hopwood took a claim on Bear Creek. Jackson County was organized by an act of the territorial legislature passed January 12, 1852. In 1854 two grist mills were built on Bear Creek--one the Eagle Mills, by Tom Brothers, the other the Ashland mills, by Helman, Emery and Morris on the present site of Ashland. The first sawmill was put up in 1852 by A. V. Gillett. In 1855 Jackson County had more population and more wealth than any other county in Oregon. Jacksonville was flourishing and was the metropolis of Southern Oregon. After living two years at Ashland our family moved to Central Point.
     "The first settlement at Ashland was made January 6, 1852 by R. B. Hargadine and a man named Pease. About a week later A. D. Helman, Dowd Farley, E. Emery, J. B. Emery, J. A. Cardwell and A. M. Rogers took up places there. The first log house was that of Hargadine. Then came the sawmill built by Eber and J. B. Emery, D. Hurley and J. A. Cardwell. It was begun in February and was ready to saw by June. It was named the Ashland sawmill in honor of the hometown of Ashland, Ohio, of A. D. Helman. The third building was A. D. Helman's house. Then came Eber Emery's. The building of the big grist mill, the Ashland mills, really determined the fact that the site of the mills would become a permanent city.     "Central Point, to which place we moved from Jacksonville, took its name from being in the center of the county. Later we bought the John T. Miller farm, and I went to school at Jacksonville. Ben Beekman, Robert A. Miller, Bill and Tom Kinney, Alvin and Dave Cardwell, Florence, May, Mike, Bill and Ed Hanley were schoolmates of mine. Ed Hanley lives in Alaska and at Seattle. Bill Hanley lives at Burns. Bob Miller lives in Portland and is a politician and lawyer. Ben Beekman also lives in Portland. The rest have scattered hither and yon.
    "In the early '70s I took a band of cattle over the Green Spring Trail to Klamath County, and we took up a place in Langells Valley, not far from Linkville. Linkville--now called Klamath Falls--at that time had but one store, and a hotel run by Uncle George Nurse. Matt Langell was a shoemaker at Jacksonville. His brother Arthur was a stockman. The valley was named for these brothers. My son, Ivan E. Kilgore, bought the 2800-acre ranch owned by Arthur Langell. Langell was killed in a dispute over a pasture boundary. I married Nettie Herron of Ashland. Her brother Dave lives here in Portland, and her brother Fred in Ashland. Her brother Will is the head of the legal department of the Southern Pacific and lives at San Francisco.
    "I was in the Modoc War. I made two trips to the mouth of Lost River. I drove the rig in which we brought out Meacham, the peace commissioner. He had been knocked on the head and partially scalped. Later he, with an associate, got up an Indian show and took it east. Some of his Indians couldn't stand the East, so they got away and made their way back to Klamath County. The promoters had all sorts of evil luck, so the show broke up.
    "In the early days packers got 9 cents a pound for bringing in freight on the pack horses from Ashland to Linkville. Lots of the freight was wet goods, and it flowed pretty freely. As a consequence there used to be occasional killings in the saloons. I happened to be in one of the saloons when a man named White was shot and killed over a difference of opinion in a poker game. One of the men who worked for me, Frank Trimble, was killed in the Lava Beds. It was foggy. He thought he saw an Indian, and so he raised up to get a better view and fell back dead. It was an Indian he had seen, and the Indian got him--through the head."
Oregon Journal, Portland, December 14, 1921, page 10; reprinted in "Pioneer Recounts Early Experience in Southern Oregon," Ashland Tidings, December 21, 1921, page 2


    Mrs. Elizabeth E. Ogilvie lives at Tigard. "My father, Robert B. Hargadine, was the first man to settle at Ashland," said Mrs. Ogilvie. "He took up a place there on January 6, 1852. Ed Pease went with him and for a while was my father's partner, but Father bought him out before long. My father left Wilmington, Del., in 1850, when he was 20 years old, to come West. He sailed from the Atlantic Seaboard on an English brig for San Francisco. He mined in 1850 and '51 on the Yuba and Feather rivers, but he did not care for mining, so he decided to go to Southern Oregon and take up a claim and raise stock.
    "After Father had selected his donation land claim, on which the city of Ashland was later built, he went to Oregon City to secure supplies and seed wheat. He had six horses and his riding horse, but he decided to use his riding horse as a pack horse, so he walked back from Oregon City to Ashland. While camped at Jump-off Joe Creek the Indians stampeded his horses, and, though they shot at Father they did not hit him, and he escaped. The Indians took all his supplies except the flour and wheat. They dumped the flour and wheat out by the side of the road and took the sacks. Father waited around there till some emigrants came along. They helped him gather up his flour and wheat and took it to his homestead. Next year he raised a fine garden and sold all he raised at his prices to the miners, who were going through Southern Oregon to Yreka, Scott's Bar and the other mines in Northern California. Father later ran a pack train from Ashland to Yreka. He started the first store in Ashland.
    "My mother, whose maiden name was Martha Washington Kilgore, crossed the plains from Massillon, Ohio, in 1854. They came by way of the southern trail, by Goose Lake. Joe Anderson met them in the Klamath country, with ample supplies of fresh vegetables, flour, bacon, etc. My grandfather took up a claim of 640 acres near Jacksonville, and raised hogs, which he sold to the Chinese placer miners.
    "In 1872 my grandfather had the contract for carrying the mail between Ashland and Linkville, as Klamath Falls was then called. They moved to Linkville and were there during the Modoc War. Mother's father did everything he could to oppose the match and prevent mother marrying Father, but he was unsuccessful. His objection to my father was that Father was a Democrat. Grandfather was a 'Black Republican.' Father and Mother were married February 16, 1856, at the Ashland Hotel, which was run by Mr. and Mrs. Eber Emery.
    "In 1862 my father sold his donation land claim to Lindsay B. Applegate of Yoncalla. Father had set out a large orchard and made a beautiful farm of his place. Father bought out a number of settlers on the east side of Bear Creek till he had a 6000-acre stock ranch, on which he ran cattle, horses and sheep. He had 160 acres of bottom land near Ashland. He had two sawmills, one of which was located on Ashland Creek, about where the auto camp in Lithia Park is now located. Father used to ship his freight in by way of Crescent City. Later he got his freight from Redding, Cal. John and Henry Norton had a place about where Medford is now. My father employed them to bring his freight to Ashland. Father died on January 13, 1877, at San Francisco. He was 48 years old.
    "I was born in Ashland, August 2, 1862. I was married October 17, 1883, and had two children. My daughter Mabel Musick now lives in Pasadena and Bernice Ludlam in Irvington. After the death of my first husband I married Alexander Ogilvie. We were married April 30, 1890. My first husband was a sheepman of Fossil, Or., and was born in Scotland."
    R. B. Hargadine and Ed Pease were the original settlers on the site of Ashland. They were followed in a month or less by Eber Emery, J. B. Emery, J. A. Cardwell, A. D. Helman, A. M. Rogers and Dowd Farley. The first house to be put up in Ashland was built by Mr. Hargadine and his partner, Ed Pease. The next building was a sawmill, built by Eber and J. B. Emery, J. A. Cardwell and Dowd Farley. It was started in February and completed on June 16 and was named the Ashland sawmill in honor of A. B. Helman's home at Ashland, Ohio. The third building was a house for A. B. Helman, and the fourth one for Eber Emery.
    In 1854 another flour mill was built, which cost $15,000, and the town was called Ashland Mills. John R. Foster started a hotel, Marion Westfall a butcher shop, John Sheldon a wagon shop, R. B. Hargadine a store, and, before long, a school near Ashland was started by Rev. Myron Stearns. The first school to be taught in the town of Ashland was taught in the home of Eber Emery in the winter of 1854-55 by Lizzie Anderson, who later married General McCall. In 1859 Eber Emery built a hotel called the Ashland House, at a cost of $3000. He ran it for 10 years, and then sold it to Jasper Houck. In 1860 R. B. Hargadine donated a lot on which a frame schoolhouse, 18x20 feet, was built. This was the first public school to be built in Ashland. In 1865 James H. Russell put up a marble sawmill to use the native marble in the vicinity. They shipped marble slabs and tombstones all over Southern Oregon. This was the first marble works to be operated south of Portland. In 1869 Rev. C. Alderson, of the Methodist Episcopal church, suggested the establishment of a college and normal school at Ashland. Money was raised, but the funds proving insufficient, Rev. J. H. Skidmore, in 1872, took over the school funds and completed the building and ran the Ashland academy as a private enterprise. In 1878 it became a normal school, Professor L. L. Rogers being president. The normal school did not prove successful, so it was taken over by the Methodist Church and Rev. M. G. Royal was made principal.
    In 1868 J. M. McCall, with other stockholders, started the operation of the Rogue River Woolen Manufacturing Company. John Daley was the superintendent of the mill. Later the name of the firm was changed to the Ashland Woolen Manufacturing Company, the proprietors being James Thornton, Jacob Wagner, E. K. Anderson and W. H. Atkinson. The town of Ashland was incorporated on October 13, 1874, the population at that time being 300.
Oregon Journal, Portland, May 1, 1927, page 18