Clackamas County OR Archives Biographies.....Dye, Eva Emery ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/or/orfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com May 22, 2007, 11:48 pm Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company EVA EMERY DYE. A gifted writer, who has won national renown owing to her contributions to the history of the Pacific northwest, was chosen by Fred Lockley as the subject of the following sketch, which was published in the Oregon Journal in the issues of January 15 and 16, 1920: “How did you come to write your book, ‘McLoughlin and Old Oregon?’” I inquired of Eva Emery Dye as we sat in front of the blazing fireplace in her home at Oregon City a day or so ago. She replied, ‘I read the Iliad and the Odyssey until my whole mind was tinged with the romance and beauty of the Homeric legends of the heroic old Greek warriors. It seemed as though Dr. McLoughlin was a brother of those old Greek heroes. To me he was the one dominant and outstanding figure of the Oregon country, and it was a labor of love to write the annals of his day and generation. No, I can’t remember when I didn’t look forward with pleasure and eagerness to writing books. I think it is in my blood—this desire to give written expression to my thoughts. “‘You enjoy writing about pioneers, don’t you? I must confess that I myself love to delve into the records of the past. Take my own case, for example. I have taken a great deal of pleasure in tracing my ancestry through all its various ramifications. My father, Cyrus Emery, was born in Maine. His people came to America from England in 1635, with the Puritans. Two brothers, John and Anthony Emery, were passengers on the sailing vessel James. They settled near Boston, later moving to Newbury, now called Newburyport, where Captain John H. Couch came from, and one of these Emerys is numbered among the Captain’s ancestors. Our old home is still standing there and is still owned and occupied by an Emery. Our name suffered a sea change, as so many names have. Originally it was D’Amory. The first progenitor of whom I have any knowledge was Sir Gilbert D’Amory, a Norman, who went to England in 1066. William the Conqueror, in return for his services, gave him an estate at Romsey. I was interested in your letter, Mr. Lockley, published in the Journal while ‘you were overseas and dated from Romsey. “‘When I was a child it gave me much pleasure to hear my father tell stories of the Revolutionary war. He often spoke of his grandmother, Mary Salter, a daughter of Captain Titus Salter, of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, who captured the British fort at the mouth of the river there. The powder from this fort was used at the battle of Bunker Hill. For this deed Captain Titus Salter was given a sword and placed in command of the fort until the close of the war. My father’s great-grandfather, Caleb Emery, served in both the French and Indian war and the Revolution and later became colonel of a regiment of militia. “‘My mother was Caroline Trafton and her grandfather also served in the Revolutionary war. One of his brothers was an Empire Loyalist and fled to Nova Scotia, Canada, where his descendants still live. A third brother went back to England, was made Lord Trafton and given an office in Ireland. My mother’s father, John Trafton, was colonel of a regiment from Maine in the War of 1812. “‘My parents were married in Maine in 1853. They moved to Illinois the following year, settling at Prophetstown, the headquarters of Black Hawk’s Indian prophet. I was the first child. When I was eighteen months old we moved into a new house, in which the plaster was still damp. Mother’s second child was born immediately after the family moved into the new house and she caught cold, dying a few days after the birth of my sister Carrie. Father married again and I have two half-sisters. “‘I took to history and general literature, while Carrie loved music. My first poem was written at the age of eight and when I was fifteen I composed a lyrical bit of verse, “Dreamland,” which the editor published in our local paper. The poem was reprinted in one of the city papers, whose editor came immediately to see me. I soon became a prolific producer of poems, many of which found favor with the editors, and was known as “Jennie Juniper” in the Illinois newspapers. Next I wrote a story, which I sent to the Tribune of Princeton, Illinois. To my surprise and delight they not only printed it but they sent me a small check, the first I ever received for writing. The next check was from a poem in the Youth’s Companion of Boston. “‘My father had a hardware store and a large family. It seemed my duty to be a bread winner instead of merely a bread eater, so when I was fifteen years old I secured a position as teacher at thirty dollars a month in the primary department of the Prophetstown school. Small as my wages were, I laid by most of my salary each month, for I determined to go to college—how or where, I did not know, but I felt that in spite of all opposition the way would be opened so I could realize my ambition. When I had taught for two years I was told that I must not spend the money I had saved on such “foolishness” as a college education, which was only for “rich men’s sons and daughters.” Next I secured a place as an instructor in a country school, where I taught for two years. Having saved enough to pay for a year’s work at Oberlin College, I fled away there, trusting to Providence. But my dear father did help me, also a small legacy came from an inheritance through my mother. Likewise I became college librarian and although the pay was small, it helped toward my expenses. Later I was appointed an instructor in the academic department of the college, so that the way cleared for me to complete my four years’ course. I was elected one of the editors of our college paper and won many awards for excellence in literature. I boarded with the family of the professor of Greek and in addition to the regular class work I devoured every old classic I could find time for. My course included literature, history, mathematics, Latin, French and German, with Greek as a major throughout. In 1882 I was graduated from Oberlin College and received the degrees of A. B. and later A. M. I wrote the Latin class song and was termed the “poet laureate” of the college. “‘Among my classmates was Charles H. Dye, to whom I was married a week after graduating, James H. Fairchild performing the ceremony. William Goodell Frost, at that time professor of Greek at Oberlin and later president of Berea College in Kentucky, attended our wedding. Henry Churchill King, the present president of Oberlin, was one of our college mates. We boarded at the same place and never a New Year goes by that we do not exchange friendly greetings. “‘Following our marriage we taught school six years and then went to Iowa State University, where in 1889 my husband was admitted to the bar. In 1890 we came to Oregon City and soon thereafter I wrote “McLoughlin and Old Oregon” and sent it to Harper’s. They received it cordially and said that if I would cut it into separate stories they would publish it in Harper’s Monthly and later in book form. But I couldn’t bear to mutilate my darling book by cutting it up into stories, so it was laid away in a bureau drawer, where it stayed for six years. About that time a college classmate visited us from Chicago and asked if he could take it east with him. He left it with his friends, the McClurg’s, of his home city. They accepted the story and published it immediately in May, 1900. My best friends have always been editors, who have given such kindly reviews of my four books: “McLoughlin and Old Oregon”; “The Conquest, The Story of Lewis and Clark”; “McDonald of Oregon, A Tale of Two Shores,” and “Stories of Oregon,” of which altogether many thousand copies have been sold.’” Sacajawea, the heroine of “The Conquest,” was hailed as a second Pocahontas, and the foremost sculptors of America have vied in chiseling statues to her honor. First Bruno Louis Zimm of New York city was commissioned by the Louisiana Purchase Exposition to prepare a statue for the St. Louis Fair in 1904. The noted sculptor spent a year in special preparation, visiting Wyoming and studying the Shoshone tribe, to which Sacajawea belonged. A second statue, cast in bronze, was designed by Alice Cooper, a pupil of Lorado Taft, after directions outlined by Mrs. Dye. This statue, erected by the women of the northwest in honor of the brave Indian girl and pioneer mother who led Lewis and. Clark through the mountains of the continent, was unveiled at the Lewis and Clark Fair in July, 1905, and now stands in Washington Park, Portland. A third statue, for which the legislature of North Dakota appropriated fifteen thousand dollars, was modeled by Leonard Crunelle, and unveiled in May, 1910, on Capitol Hill at Bismarck, North Dakota. Other statues have resulted from “The Conquest,” among them a fountain to Chief Paducah, by Lorado Taft, erected by the women of the Kentucky town, Paducah, after corresponding with Mrs. Dye on this subject; also one to Chief Mahaska, in Iowa, and several to George Rogers Clark and other leading figures in that epic in our national life. Wisely using the talents with which nature endowed her, Mrs. Dye has made valuable contributions to the world’s work and her career has been an inspiration not only to her own sex, but to all who aspire to a high level of accomplishment. The first ancestor of Charles H. Dye in America was a Dane who crossed the Atlantic on the ship Fire of Troy in company with the Dutch founders of New Amsterdam, and Dey street, New York city, was named for the family cow pasture on the island of Manhattan. A grandson, Andrew Dey, or Dye as it came to be spelled, went to Maryland and there married Sarah Minor, own cousin to the wife of George Washington, and Colonel Dye’s place became Washington’s headquarters, a fact recorded in Irving’s “Life of Washington.” At the close of the war, in lieu of money, the Revolutionary veterans were paid in Ohio lands and Andrew Dye migrated to that state, locating in Miami county. He was among the founders of the town of Troy, and died there in 1885. In 1839 Henry Dye went from Ohio to the newly opened Black Hawk Purchase in Iowa, which was then a wilderness. He settled on a farm near the present village of Hillsboro and later moved to a farm near Fort Madison and there his son, Charles Henry Dye, was born August 23, 1856. He completed a course in Denmark Academy, Iowa, in 1878 and then entered Oberlin College, in which he won oratorical honors. In 1878 he was graduated with distinction and a week later was married to Miss Eva L. Emery, one of his classmates. After six years of educational work as principal of a high school and an academy, Mr. Dye enrolled as a student in the law department of the University of Iowa, where he also taught commercial law. Graduating in 1889, he won the prize for the best thesis of that year. In 1890 Mr. Dye became identified with the legal fraternity of Oregon City and soon won recognition as a wise counselor and an able advocate. For nearly forty years now he has practiced continuously in Oregon City and the extent and importance of his clientele denotes his professional status. At one time he was deputy district attorney and also made an enviable record as city attorney. He was also president of the local bar association two years, and president of the Clackamas County Bar Association. Mr. and Mrs. Dye became the parents of four children. Emery C., the eldest, born in 1884, was graduated from Oberlin College in 1905 and was admitted to the Oregon bar in 1908. Trafton M., born in 1886, attended the public schools of Oregon City and for three years was a student at Pacific University. He was graduated from Oberlin College in 1906 and afterward was one of the editors of the law quarterly of Columbia University, from which institution he received the degree of LL. B. in 1910. After traveling in Europe for some time he began the practice of law in Portland, Oregon, where he has many friends, and in 1917 moved to Cleveland, Ohio. There he has since followed his profession and is still connected with the firm which he joined ten years ago. Recently a partnership was formed with James R. Garfield, a son of ex-President Garfield. Trafton M. Dye practically grew up in his father’s law office, operating a typewriter while still in knee pants, and acted as his father’s stenographer in the Oregon legislature, in which he was the youngest clerk. His mind is logical, analytical and inductive in its trend, and his professional colleagues unite in bearing testimony to his legal acumen and strength of character. Trafton Dye married Miss Mary Elizabeth Ward, a daughter of Mrs. Nancy M. Ward, of Portland, and they have two children. Everett W., the third son, was born in 1896 and in 1918 was graduated from the Oregon Agricultural College as a mechanical engineer. He served in the World war and is now connected with the American Steel & Wire Company at Cleveland, Ohio. The daughter, Charlotte Evangeline, born in 1897, also completed her education in the Oregon Agricultural College, from which she was graduated in 1919. Her husband, Richard Earl Hutchinson, went overseas with the Engineers Corps of the United States army in 1917 and at the present time is chemist in charge of the laboratories and compounding of the Los Angeles branch of the Firestone Tire & Rubber Company. With Judge H. E. Cross and others, Mr. and Mrs. Dye formed the Willamette Valley Chautauqua Association that grew out of a Chautauqua circle in the Dye home in 1894, developing into the largest and most popular educational assembly in Oregon, Mr. Dye serving on its board of directors for thirty-five years and as president and secretary for several terms. For some years he was president of the Oregon City Board of Trade, which was later merged with the Commercial Club, and is one of its influential members. In both of these organizations Mr. Dye was identified with the movement for good roads and projects for other public improvements. He championed the prohibition cause and since 1911 has been an active member of the public library board of Oregon City. In religious faith he is a Congregationalist and for thirty years was superintendent of the Sunday school, later teaching its Bible class for men. A stalwart republican, he is an ardent advocate of clean politics and believes that laws should be made and administered for the protection of the weak rather than to aid the strong. As a member of the state legislature he introduced a number of bills, one of which was an act known as the union high school law, and this is now in successful operation throughout the state of Oregon. Along fraternal lines he is identified with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Benevolent Protective Order of Elks and the Ancient Order of United Workmen. His life has been conspicuously useful and the respect accorded him is well deserved. Additional Comments: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Pages 290-295 Photo: http://www.usgwarchives.net/or/clackamas/photos/bios/dye357gbs.jpg File at:http://files.usgwarchives.net/or/clackamas/bios/dye357gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/orfiles/ File size: 15.7 Kb