In Search of Western Oregon by Ralph Friedman

These moral characteristics seem to have soaked deep into his bones, for when he left the Quakers and became a Missionary Baptist, he brought them with him - except for the plain-speaking part, the 1600s-style use of “thee” and “thou,” which in the mid-1800s was already starting to look a bit like an affectation. His was a Quaker family, and he was brought up in the classic manner of the plain-dressing, plain-speaking Society of Friends, bitterly opposed on Biblical grounds to the institution of slavery, the consumption of alcohol, and the treatment of black people and Indians as something other than fellow men and women. JOAB POWELL WAS born in 1799 in the hills of Tennessee - Claiborne County, north of Knoxville, close to the Kentucky state line. The main ones are these: He was the first chaplain in the state Legislature, in the year Oregon became a state and, of course, he led the lawmakers in offering up the Legislature’s first prayer.īut interesting as these little factoids may or may not be, they’re far from the most interesting part of Uncle Joab’s story. Uncle Joab is probably best known in Oregon today for a sequence of political “firsts,” not all of which would have met with his approval. Joab Powell, better known as Uncle Joab, stood over six feet tall, with a great barrel chest enclosing a pair of lungs whose capacity was already legendary when he arrived in the state via covered wagon in 1852. Horner’s book, Oregon: Her History, Her Great Men, Her Literature. But the man who led the congregation of Missionary Baptists who built Providence Church may have been the closest the world has come to producing one.Īn inset portrait of Uncle Joab Powell published in 1919 in John B. There will surely never be a second Jeremiah. That structure was built of logs back in 1854, and according to legendary Oregon pop historian Ralph Friedman, it “had an air of vigilant righteousness, as though erected by Jeremiah and maintained by avenging angels.”Īnd, as Friedman goes on to note, that’s not far from the actual truth. It’s old, but it’s not the original Providence Pioneer Church.

There is no stained glass, no icons or statuary - just four simple sash windows along each side, a steep roof, a simple belltower and steeple rising from the front. Just one look at it suffices to tell it’s an old-style church of the kind built 150 years ago by people who’d come to Oregon in covered wagons. The “pioneer” part of the name is somewhat superfluous.

(Part 1 of a 2-part series on pioneer preacher Uncle Joab Powell Part 2 is here)ĪBOUT HALFWAY BETWEEN Crabtree and Lacomb, tucked into the side of a gentle hill, stands an old and somewhat austere-looking little white building known as Providence Pioneer Church. Your browser does not support the audio element.

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In Search of Western Oregon by Ralph Friedman