In 1857 he was a delegate to the Oregon constitution convention and upon admission of Oregon as a state was elected as a Democratic representative to the Thirty-fifth United States Congress serving from February 15, 1859, to March 3, 1859. He did not run for reelection in 1858, instead resuming his law practice and the manufacture of woolens.
He was elected Governor of Oregon in 1871 and served until 1877 when he resigned, having been elected to the United States Senate. Grover served from March 4, 1877, to March 3, 1883 serving in the Forty-sixth United States Congress as the chairman of the Senate Committee on Manufactures. Not a candidate for reelection in 1883, instead he resumed the practice of law and retired from public life. Grover died in Portland, Oregon, on May 10, 1911 and was interned in Riverview Cemetery.
Stephen F. Chadwick
Stephen Fowler Chadwick (December 25, 1825 - January 15, 1895), was an American Democrat politician who served as Governor of Oregon from 1877 to 1878. Governor Chadwick was the first person to obtain the governorship by way of the state's Line of Sucession.
Chadwick was a lawyer, admitted to the New York State Bar on May 30, 1850. He soon made his way to Oregon, setting up a law firm in the Douglas County settlement of Scottsburg in April of 1851. Chadwick served as the town's first postmaster.
After moving from Scottsburg to Roseburg, Chadwick ran for the newly created position of Judge of Douglas County. Later he would go on to represent Douglas County at the Oregon 1857 State Constitiutional Convention. In the 1864 and 1868 Presidential elections, Chadwick served as an Democratic elector.
Chadwick won the 1870 election to the position of Secretary of State, and was subsequently reelected in 1874.
In 1877, La Fayette Grover resigned the governorship after his election to the United States Senate by the State Legislature. Chadwick, as Secretary of State and second in the gubernatorial line of succession, was innagurated to fill out the remaining year of Governor Grover's term.
Although unconstitutional under Article V, Section 1 of the State Constitution, Chadwick also kept his position of Secretary of State. When signing official documents requiring the signatures of both the Secretary of State and Governor, he would sign first on the left side, then on the right.
The most notable policy of his administration was Chadwick's stand on the Nez Perce Wars raging in the northeastern part of the state. Chadwick was unhappy with the stalemated situation, going so far as to inspect the front lines first-hand. He aided white settlers during the conflict, and argued for much harsher punishments for rebellious and uncooperative tribal leaders than the Army's policies.
At the time of the 1878 elections, Governor Chadwick declined a second term and went back to practicing law. He died on February 15, 1895 in Salem, Oregon.
W. W. Thayer
William Wallace Thayer (July 15, 1827 - October 15, 1899), was a Democratic politician active in U.S. states of Idaho and Oregon. Most notably, he served as the sixth Governor of Oregon from 1878 to 1882 and Chief Justice of the Oregon Supreme Court from 1888 to 1889.
Thayer was born on a farm near Lima, New York on July 15, 1827. He recieved a public education before studying law in college. He was admitted to the New York State Bar in 1851. He then practiced law with his brother in Buffalo and later Tonawanda.
A mining boom in Idaho Territory caught Thayer's attention in 1860, prompting him to move west. He arrived in Corvallis, Oregon in 1861, where he joined another brother, Andrew, at his law firm. In 1863, he would finally move to Idaho, setting up his own law firm in Lewiston.
In 1866, three years after moving to to Lewiston, Thayer was elected District Attorney for the Third Judicial District of Idaho Territory. From 1866 until 1867, he moved to Boise to serve for a session of the Idaho Territory House of Representatives. He moved to Portland, Oregon shortly after leaving the legislature.
Upon returning to Oregon, Thayer establuished a sucessful law firm in the city of East Portland. At this time, he became an active member of the Democratic Party. During the 1876 Hayes-Tilden Presidential Election dispute, Thayer was a member of the legal team which challened the certification of J. W. Watts, a Republican elector for Rutherford B. Hayes. Although sucessful, this challenge did not help Samuel Tilden prevail in the Electoral College.
Still appreciative of his assistance in the Watts Case, the Oregon State Democratic Party nominmated Thayer for Governor in 1878. Thayer would win narrowly, by a margin of 59 votes.
Thayer's time in office is remembered as a fiscally conservative, anti-corruption administration, which sought to make the state bureaucracy more efficient. The State Board of Equalization, land law reforms, and the establishment of a State Mental Hospital were initiated under his leadership. He would completely eliminate the state's debt while in office.
Governor Thayer was often spoke out about the state's finances. Highly critized by Thayer was the process by which the State Legislature based its budget appropriations. He called for revenue projections to be based on actual revenues, not what was anticipated as the Legislature had often done in the past. He also refused to fund the completion of the State Capitol Building, stating that the building was too expensive and lavish for Oregon.
His lasting legacy was reforming the Supreme Court of Oregon into its present incarnation by statute. Previously, Circuit Court judges served also as Justices of the Supreme Court. After the statue change, Supreme Court positions were made a seperate, directly-elected office.
Thayer declined to run for a second term in the 1882 gubernatorial election. Instead, he successfully ran a campaing for Justice of the Supreme Court in 1884. Justice Thayer remained on the bench until 1889, the last two years of that term serving as Chief Justice.
Thayer died in Portland on October 15, 1899
Z. F. Moody
Zenas or Zena Ferry Moody, also known as Z. F. Moody (born May 27, 1832 in Granby, Massachusetts; died March 14, 1917) was Republican governor of Oregon from 1882 to 1887.
Rusch's tree frog
Rusch's tree frog ("Dendropsophus ruschii") is a frog that lives in Brazil. Scientists have seen it at about 800 meters above sea level.
Sylvester Pennoyer
Sylvester Pennoyer (July 6, 1831 - May 31, 1902) was a populist Democrat and served as governor of Oregon (1886 - 1894) and as mayor of Portland, Oregon (1896 - 1898).
Pennoyer was born in Groton, New York, and studied law at Harvard. After graduating, he moved to Oregon where he practiced law and ran local businesses. He was the petitioner in the Supreme Court case "Pennoyer v. Neff" which defined legal jursidictino over citizens in different cases.
As typical for that time, he acted in a stridently partisan manner while governor. He pointedly snuubed president Benjamin Harrison when Cleveland visited Oregon in 1891. He refused to use his resources to protect Chinese-Americans when asked by Grover Cleveland's Secretary of State on May 3, 1893. He again refused to intervene at the request of Cleveland when a group of unemployed workers, part of "Coxey's Army", hijacked a train to travel east and join a mass march on Washington, DC.
William Paine Lord
William Paine Lord (July 1, 1838 - February 17, 1911), was a Republican politician who served as Governor of Oregon from 1895 to 1899.
Born to Edward and Elizabeth (Paine) Lord in Dover, Delaware, Lord was partially deaf, and had limited speaking ability. He recieved his primary education at a Quaker school and through private tutoring. He subsequently studied law at Fairfield College, graduating in 1860. Before he could continue further into his studies, Lord volunteered for military service in the United States Civil War, advancing to the rank of Major in the Union Army.