page_title: Belle of Oregon City
section_title: Operations
hierarchical_section_title: Belle of Oregon City / Operations
caption_attribution_description: W.B. Wells, photograph
context_page_description: The Belle of Oregon City, generally referred to as Belle, was built in 1853, and was the first iron steamboat built on the west coast of North America.
context_section_description: Williams and Wells first used Belle on the Willamette River run between Portland and Oregon City, with passenger fares $2 each way. The boat departed the base at Willamette Falls at 7:30 a.m., was at the Oregon City dock by 8:00 a.m., stopping at Milwaukie at 8:30 a.m., and reached Portland at 9:30 a.m.
  At 2:00 p.m. Belle steamed back upriver, reaching the falls by 4:00 p.m.  (Because of a stretch of shallow water on the Willamette near the mouth of the Clackamas River known as the Clackamas Rapids, only smaller vessels could make this run.)  Belle also ran on the Cowlitz River and to Fort Vancouver.
  By July 1855, Belle was on the route from Portland down the Willamette and then also ran up the Columbia to the lower Cascades, making three runs a week, under Captain Wells, with J.M. Gilman as engineer and N.B. Ingalls as purser. (Ingalls would become one of the longest-serving pursers on the Columbia River, serving on many of the river steamers from the 1850s to his retirement in 1893).
  Passengers headed up river would disembark at the lower Cascades, travel on the portage road along the north bank, and then board the sidewheeler Mary upriver to the next head of navigation, The Dalles. Freight charges were high, $50 a ton on cargo from Portland to The Dalles, but Belle and Mary still could not handle the demand, and other steamers came on the routes, driving rates down to $30 a ton.
caption: William B. Wells (1822-1863), co-owner and captain of Belle of Oregon City
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