In 1863, the Oregon Steam Navigation Company was running boats from Portland to Lewiston, over four hundred miles, having short railroad portages at the Cascades and The Dalles. That was the most active era of the mines in Idaho. Rates from Portland to up-river points were as follows: freight from Portland to Wallula, $50.00 per ton; to Lewiston, $90.00; fare from Portland to Wallula, $18.00; to Lewiston, $28.00. (The rates had been much higher a year or two earlier.) From Wallula to Walla Walla, freight was hauled by prairie-schooners at from $10.00 to $12.00 a ton, thirty miles. Needless to say, the company piled up a fortune. Dr. Baker saw the possibilities of the region and, almost unaided, with every difficulty and discouragement, constructed a narrow gauge, with wooden rails, on which strap-iron was fastened. An astonishing amount of business was soon developed, steel rails were substituted, and the business made a fortune for its builder. It was absorbed by the Oregon Steam Navigation Company. But Dr. Baker's strap-iron road may be considered the true progenitor of the railroads of the upper Columbia. During these first years of the twentieth century, the shores of the River have echoed with the sound of whistles on many a new road, but the distinguishing mark has been the construction of electric roads. The lower Willamette Valley, centring at Portland, has become fairly swarming with electric roads. Spokane has become almost an equal centre of electric lines, while Walla Walla is following close behind her larger sisters in the procession. When lines already constructed from Spokane southward are joined to a system projected from Walla Walla northward and westward, there will be a complete system of independent electric lines from all parts of Eastern Washington and North-eastern Oregon to steamboat connections on the River, and thence to tide-water. The significance of this as a commercial fact cannot be realised as yet. [Illustration: A Logging Railroad, near Astoria. Photo. by Woodfield.] CHAPTER XII The Present Age of Expansion and World Commerce Population and Productions of the Region on the River and its Tributaries--Extent of its Navigability--Improvements Needed--Kinds of Traffic--Local Traffic--Transcontinental Traffic--World Traffic--Advantages of the River Route for these Kinds of Traffic--The Bar--The Competition of Puget Sound--The Combination of River Route and Sound Route. We have traced the successive eras which have brought the land of the Oregon from a wilderness to a group of powerful young American States, abounding in resources and filled to the brim with hope and enthusiasm. We have followed the River through its eras of canoe, bateau, flatboat, sail-ship, and steamboat, and we have seen railroads built along its banks. It remains only to cast a brief final glance at the River in its present age, and to forecast something of what seems its sure future.