Oregon Territory

Lat/Long: 44.0000, -120.0000

Officially organized on August 14, 1848, after the resolution of territorial disputes between the United States of America and Britain, the Oregon Territory included all or part of the modern states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming. Congress reorganized the territory in 1853 and designated the uppermost portion as the Washington Territory and again in 1859 when the western half of the remaining portion became the state of Oregon. The capital moved several times during this period. Originally located in Oregon City, it moved to Salem, then Corvallis, and back to Salem where it remained through statehood.

John B. Horner, Oregon: Her History, Her Great Men, Her Literature (Corvallis: Press of the Gazette-Times, 1919); "An Act to Establish the Territorial Government of Oregon," 14 August 1848, Statutes at Large of the United States 9 (1862):325-31; "An Act to Establish the Territorial Government of Washington," 2 March 1853, Statutes at Large of the United States 10 (1855):172-79.