Columbia County, Oregon: History and Information

Columbia County, Oregon

Columbia County History, Geography, Demographics, Cities and Towns, and Education

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Columbia County Courthouse:
230 Strand St.
St. Helens, OR 97051
Clerk: (503) 397-3796
Courts: (503) 397-2327

Named: Columbia County, named for the Columbia River, was created in 1854 from the northern half of Washington County.

State & County QuickFacts:

History

Columbia County, named for the Columbia River, was created in 1854 from the northern half of Washington County. It covers 646 square miles and is bounded on the north and east by the Columbia River, on the west by Clatsop County, and on the south by Washington and Multnomah Counties. Columbia County was the sixteenth county created in Oregon and is the third smallest county in Oregon after Multnomah and Hood River Counties.

Lewis and Clark explored this area in 1805-1806. Early settlements were established by fur traders as early as 1810. As American immigration increased in the mid-1840s, lasting settlements began to appear. The Yakima Indian War (1855-1859) drove many Washington Territory residents south of the Columbia River and helped boost the populations of St. Helens and Columbia City.

The first district court met in 1854 in Milton, which served as the county seat until 1857 when it was moved to St. Helens. St. Helens was founded in 1848 and took its name from the nearby Mt. St. Helens. The present courthouse was built in 1906, and an annex was constructed in 1968. Most county offices are now housed in the annex. A new sheriff's office and jail facility were recently opened at another location.

Columbia County had a county court form of government until 1971 when a board of commissioners was elected. The 2000 population of 43,560 represented a 15.98% increase over 1990.

The primary industries of Columbia County are timber, fishing, water transportation, dairying, horticulture, and recreation. The extensive stands of old growth timber, which had attracted many of the early settlers to the area, were completely logged over by the 1950s. Second growth timber provides the raw material for local lumber and paper mills. The Trojan Nuclear Plant, located near Rainier, was in operation from 1975 to 1993.

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The history of our nation can be seen as a prolonged struggle to define the relative roles and powers of our governments: federal, state, and local. And the names we've given our counties, our most locally based jurisdictions, reflects the "characteristic features of our country!"

But age, size and colorful names of our counties isn't the only reason to explore counties' role in American history, or the history of county government itself. In fact, the story of county government reflects the larger meanings of American history.

Today's counties are the most flexible, locally responsive and creative governments in the US. They are the most diverse, varying in size, population, geography, and governmental structure. In their politics and policies, they express a 1990's political slogan "Think globally, act locally."

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