Marion-Statewide County OR Archives Biographies.....Bishop, Charles P. September 23, 1854 - ************************************************ 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 Wakley iwakley@msn.com January 20, 2011, 12:23 am Source: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 717 - 718 Author: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company CHARLES P. BISHOP was born in Contra Costa county, California, September 23, 1854, and was the oldest of the family of Rev. W. R. and Elizabeth Jane Bishop. His ancestors were English and first appeared in North Carolina and went from there to Tennessee. His great-grandfather was killed in the war of 1812 and his grandfather first appears in Tennessee. He went from there to Alabama, to Indiana and from there to McLean county, Illinois, in 1836. Mr. Bishop's father came to California in 1850 and his mother in 1846. In 1856 they came to Oregon and first lived east of Lebanon, and in 1861 went from there up on the Calapooia river above Brownsville. Mr. Bishop's father was a minister of the Cumberland Presbyterian church and was a school teacher. During the early youth of Mr. Bishop his father was compelled to be away from home much of the time and, as he was the oldest of the family, naturally the responsibilities of the family came to him quite early. He stayed on the farm until he Was twenty years old and up to that time had had very scant opportunities for an education. In his early childhood he had a vision that he wanted to be a merchant, and at the age of twenty years took a position as clerk in the store of Kirk & Hume in Brownsville, at twenty- five dollars per month. This was in October, 1874. On the expiration of two years he went into the Brownsville Woolen Mills store in Brownsville as clerk and salesman. At the expiration of two years, Robert Glass and Mr. Bishop purchased a store in Crawfordsville, where Mr. Bishop went and where the store was operated until 1884. He sold his interest to Mr. Glass and went to McMinnville and started a clothing store there. This was in 1884. In 1889 he sold his interest in the business and, with the late Thomas Kay, organized and built the Thomas Kay Woolen Mills, of Salem, Oregon. In 1890 this company started at Salem what was known as the Salem Woolen Mills store, and in 1891 Mr. Bishop acquired this business and operated it as sole proprietor until 1924, at which time he incorporated it as the Bishop Clothing & Woolen Mills Store and sold it to his sons and R. H. Cooley. The popularity and prestige of the business has had a continual growth, until every few years additional space has been required to handle the increasing business, and it is now the leading clothing store between Portland and San Francisco. Mr. Bishop has given of his time to public affairs, having been elected mayor of Salem for three successive terms; he also served as state senator from Marion county in the sessions of the legislature in 1915 and 1917. His early alliance with the Brownsville Woolen Mills developed in him an interest in northwest manufacturing, and he has always taken a special interest in assisting in every way possible manufacturing projects, large or small, and always had a warm heart for the small manufacturer, who is trying to build up and establish a business. Mr. Bishop has been a member of the board of trustees of the Willamette University since 1897; likewise a member of the board of trustees of the Young Men's Christian Association of Salem since 1892, and has been a most liberal contributor to their development, in both time and money. On October 8, 1876, he was united in marriage with Fannie Kay, the daughter of the late Thomas Kay. To them three sons have been born, Clarence M. Bishop, Roy T. Bishop and Robert Chauncey Bishop. These sons were seemingly natural born woolen manufacturers. They learned the rudiments or beginning of the business under their grandfather, and they were then sent to Philadelphia, where they took a course in scientific woolen manufacturing, they having a large vision of the building up of the woolen manufacturing industry in the northwest. Mr. Bishop cooperated with them and encouraged them in every way, the result of which has been that they have built up the Pendleton Woolen Mills, of Pendleton, Oregon, the Washougal Woolen Mills, of Washougal, Washington, and acquired the Eureka Woolen Mills, of Eureka, California. Roy T. Bishop has built up the Oregon Worsted Company in the manufacture of worsted yarns, which are used on this coast by sweater and bathing suit manufacturers, approximating one million dollars annually. The Pendleton Woolen Mills has a nation wide reputation in the manufacture of what is known as the "Pendleton" Fancy Indian Blankets. They are used in every state of the Union. For the Washougal Mills, at the close of the World war, in 1919 Mr. Bishop developed a men's suiting line, and called it the "Washougal" suiting line, and so far as Mr. Bishop knows, this was the beginning of the manufacturing and featuring of what has since become known as "virgin wool fabrics" — which means made of new wool, no shoddy or re-worked wool in its construction. This fabric, within a year, had attracted the attention of clothing manufacturers in the east, and one manufacturer has been taking the entire output of the Washougal Mill of this suiting line, it finding a ready market throughout the east, and especially in New England, the cradle of the American woolen industry, which was a great surprise to all, and this year of 1928 there has been organized in Syracuse, New York, what is known as the Washougal Clothing Company, of which Mr. Bishop is the president. This organization will specialize in the manufacture of clothing out of these suitings. Mr. Bishop is by faith a Presbyterian and politically a republican. Mr. Bishop desires that special mention be made of four men with whom he was allied, that left their impress upon him and who he remembers with gratitude today, and who have long since passed away. First, was W. H. Baber, of Junction, who gave him the first inspiration as a young man that, if he would keep up the pace, he would make a merchant. The next was W. R. Kirk, of Brownsville, who was kind to him and overlooked his faults and imperfections and assured him that he had the capabilities of a merchant. Next was Robert Glass, of Crawfordsville, who from the year 1861 was a warm friend of the family, and whose high ethical standards were as a beacon light to the boy, the youth and the young man. Lastly, Mr. Bishop's wife's father, the late Thomas Kay, who died in 1900. His indefatigable industry, his more than broad vision of what a young man could do gave Mr. Bishop an inspiration that has had much to do with whatever success may have attended him. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/or/marion/bios/bishop1373gbs.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/orfiles/ File size: 7.3 Kb