Words used in this guide, references and picture sources
Words used in this guide
These are the words printed in bold in the chapters, with a few more that turn up in records and offices.
Acreage. How big a piece of land is, in acres. The assessor, a surveyor and an old patent may each give a different figure for the same land.
Aerial photograph. A photograph taken from an airplane, usually looking straight down. In Oregon they begin in the 1930s.
Archaeological site. A place where people of the past left traces, such as tools, hearths or graves. Digging at one in Oregon needs a state permit.
Assessment roll. The county's yearly list of taxable property, with owners and values.
Assessor. The county officer who maps and values land for property taxes.
Base line. The east-west line from which townships are counted north and south. Oregon's starts at the Willamette Stone in Portland's West Hills.
Bearing. A direction given as an angle east or west of north or south. "S 51½° W" means: face south, then turn 51½ degrees toward the west.
Bearing tree. A tree a surveyor marked near a corner and described by its kind, size, bearing and distance, so the corner could be found again. Also called a witness tree.
Cabinet card. A studio portrait mounted on stiff card, common in the late 1800s.
Census. The federal count of the people, taken every ten years since 1790; its pages open to the public after 72 years.
Cession. Land a tribe gave up to the United States by treaty.
Chain. A surveyor's measure of 66 feet, divided into 100 links. Eighty chains make a mile.
Chain of title. The list of a property's owners, in order, from the first patent to today.
City directory. A yearly list of a town's residents and businesses.
Claim file. The papers behind a land claim or entry, such as the settler's sworn statements and proof of living on the land.
Corner. A point a surveyor marked where lines meet, with a post, stone or mound and, where possible, bearing trees.
Correction deed. A deed recorded to fix a mistake in an earlier deed. It is not a new sale.
County clerk. The county officer who records deeds, mortgages and plats and keeps their indexes. Some counties call the office Records.
County surveyor. The county officer who keeps filed surveys, plats and corner records.
Deed. A document that passes land from one owner to the next.
Deputy surveyor. A surveyor working under contract for the government to run township lines, section lines or claim boundaries.
Donation land claim. Land granted free to early settlers of Oregon under an act of Congress of 1850. Claims could not be started after 1855.
Easement. A right that lets someone else use a piece of land for a purpose, such as a road, a spring or a power line.
Enumeration district. The area one census taker was assigned to cover.
Fallow. Cropland left unplanted for a season or a year; in dry country, so the soil can store water for the next crop.
Farm schedule. A census page, used from 1850 to 1880, that lists each farm's acres, livestock and crops.
Field notes. The written record a surveyor kept while measuring land: distances, corners, bearing trees, and remarks on soil, timber and houses.
Finding aid. A guide to an archive's collection that describes what is in it, often box by box.
Fire insurance map. A detailed town map made for insurance companies, showing each building's outline, height and material. The best known are the Sanborn maps.
Formation. A named body of rock of one kind and age, such as the Tyee Formation.
General Land Office. The federal agency that surveyed and disposed of the public lands from 1812 until 1946, when it became part of the Bureau of Land Management.
Government lot. A numbered piece of a section that is not a regular quarter, often a scrap left between a section line and a claim line or a river.
Grantee. The person who receives land in a deed; the buyer.
Grantor. The person who passes land to another in a deed; the seller.
Herbarium. A library of pressed, labeled plants. Each sheet records what was collected, where, when and by whom.
Historical index. The Bureau of Land Management's list of every entry, sale and patent in a township, including the entries that were cancelled.
Homestead. Federal land granted to a settler under the Homestead Act of 1862, after five years of living on and farming it.
Land grant. A grant of public land by Congress to a railroad, a wagon road company or a state, to pay for building or for schools.
Landslide inventory. A map of the landslides geologists have found. Oregon's is SLIDO, the Statewide Landslide Information Database for Oregon.
Legal description. The wording in a deed or survey that says exactly which land is meant.
Legend. A map's key, which explains its symbols and lines.
Lidar. A laser survey made from an aircraft. With the trees and buildings taken out, it shows the shape of the bare ground.
Link. One hundredth of a surveyor's chain: 7.92 inches.
Map unit. An outlined area on a soil map, labeled with a symbol and usually named for its main soil series.
Master title plat. The Bureau of Land Management's map of a township showing the present status of the federal land in it.
Metes and bounds. A description of land that starts at a point and follows a series of bearings and distances around its edge, back to the start.
Oral history. A recorded interview with someone who remembers a place or a time, kept so that others can hear it later.
Partition plat. A survey map, filed with the county, that divides one piece of land into a few parcels.
Patent. The government's first deed to a piece of land, passing it to a private owner.
Peak flow. The highest flow of a stream in a year.
Plat. A map drawn from a survey.
Principal meridian. The north-south line from which ranges are counted east and west. Oregon's is the Willamette Meridian.
Quarter corner. The surveyor's mark halfway along a section line.
Quarter section. One fourth of a section, 160 acres, named by its direction, such as the NE¼.
Range. A column of townships, counted east or west of the principal meridian.
Repeat photography. Taking an old photograph's view again from the same spot, to show what has changed.
Research log. A running record of every source you look at: what it is, where you found it, its exact words, what you think they mean, and what to do next.
Reservation (in a deed). A right that a seller keeps back when selling land, such as the minerals, water rights or a right-of-way. It is written into the deed and usually carries on through later sales.
Reservation (tribal). Land set aside by treaty, law or executive order as a home for a tribe.
Revested land. Granted land that the United States took back into federal ownership. In 1916 Congress revested about 2.9 million acres of the Oregon and California Railroad's grant (Chapter 7).
Savanna. Grassland with scattered trees, such as the oak savanna of the Willamette Valley in the 1850s.
Scale. How much ground a map covers for each inch of paper. At 1:24,000, an inch on the map is 2,000 feet on the ground.
School lands. Sections 16 and 36 of each township, granted to Oregon at statehood in 1859 to support public schools.
Section. One square of the survey grid, about a mile on a side and about 640 acres. A township has 36.
Soil series. A named kind of soil, such as Jory, described once and mapped wherever it is found.
Soil survey. A study that maps the soils of a county and describes each one: its depth, texture, drainage and uses.
Splash dam. A temporary dam that held back a creek until loggers released the water to carry their logs downstream.
Springboard. The plank early loggers stood on to saw above the swell of a tree's trunk.
Stream gage. A station that measures the height and flow of a stream, often for decades.
Tax lot. A piece of land as the county assessor maps and numbers it for property taxes.
Topographic map. A map that shows the shape of the land with contour lines, along with streams, roads and buildings.
Township. A square of the survey grid 6 miles on a side, holding 36 sections.
Transcript. The typed record of a recorded interview.
Treaty. A formal agreement between nations, such as the treaty of 1855 by which the bands of the Willamette Valley ceded most of the valley to the United States.
Water right. The state's permission to use water from a stream, spring or well for a stated purpose.
Weight of evidence. The rule of choosing the answer that the most independent sources support, and changing it when better evidence appears.
Witness tree. Another name for a bearing tree.
References
Full citations, chapter by chapter. Each work is listed once, under the first chapter that cites it, and works are in alphabetical order within each chapter. The Notes at the very back give the source of every fact in short form, chapter by chapter, and point to the entries here. A History of the Land (2026) is the tree farm's own history, A History of the Land: The Story of the Sullivan Tree Farm near Pedee, Polk County, Oregon (October 2026). Web addresses were checked on October 10, 2026, unless an entry gives another date.
Front matter and Chapter 1
A History of the Land: The Story of the Sullivan Tree Farm near Pedee, Polk County, Oregon. Prepared for Dave Sullivan, October 2026.
General Land Office. Plat of Township 9 South, Range 6 West, Willamette Meridian. Approved at Salem, May 1, 1855. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office.
Hutchinson, Thomas H. 1855. Field notes of the donation land claim surveys, Township 9 South, Range 6 West, Willamette Meridian. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon land records, volume D0022.
Murphy, Daniel. 1854. Field notes of the subdivision (section lines) of Township 9 South, Range 6 West, Willamette Meridian. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon land records, volume R0029.
Sullivan Tree Farm Management Plan. 2012. Owner's files.
U.S. Bureau of Land Management. General Land Office Records. glorecords.blm.gov.
U.S. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office. Historical Index, Township 9 South, Range 6 West, Willamette Meridian.
U.S. Department of Agriculture. Aerial photographs of Polk County, Oregon, 1936, 1955 and 1978. Oregon State University Libraries, "Aerial Photos, Mid-Willamette," Oregon Digital, oregondigital.org.
University of Oregon Libraries. Aerial Photography Research Service, fees. library.uoregon.edu/aerial-photography-research-service.
Chapter 2
Polk County Surveyor. Partition Plat No. 1993-0029, June 24, 1993. Polk County survey CS 12769.
Chapter 3
Atwood, Kay. "Oregon Land Survey, 1851-1855." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Oregon Historical Society. Last updated May 25, 2022. oregonencyclopedia.org.
City of Scappoose. "Tax lot info is required on all permits." Revised September 2021. scappoose.gov.
General Land Office. Donation land claim plat, Township 9 South, Range 6 West, Willamette Meridian. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office.
Oregon-California Trails Association, Mapping and Marking Committee. "Public Land Survey System." Appendix 3 of the committee's mapping manual.
State of Oregon. "ORMAP: The Oregon Property Tax Map." Catalog entry, catalog.data.gov. Viewer at ormap.net.
U.S. Code, Title 43, section 751 (the rectangular surveys).
U.S. Geological Survey. "Public Land Survey System of the United States." National Atlas of the United States, 2010.
U.S. Geological Survey. Scientific Investigations Report 2007-5050, well and section location system. pubs.usgs.gov/sir/2007/5050/sectionlocation.html.
Vaughan, Champ Clark. "Willamette Stone and Willamette Meridian." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Last updated February 27, 2024.
Chapter 4
Whitlow, Leonard, II. 1988. Grande Ronde Indian Reservation, Yamhill County, Oregon: 1860 Census, 1888 Census, 1901 Family Register. Portland: Leonard Whitlow II.
Zybach, Bob. 1999. Using Oral Histories to Document Changing Forest Cover Patterns: Soap Creek Valley, Oregon, 1500-1999. MAIS thesis, Oregon State University. Whole thesis: nwmapsco.com/ZybachB/Thesis/Zybach_MAIS_1999.pdf. By chapter: nwmapsco.com/ZybachB/Thesis/.
Zybach, Bob. 2003. The Great Fires: Indian Burning and Catastrophic Forest Fire Patterns of the Oregon Coast Range, 1491-1951. PhD dissertation, Oregon State University. ir.library.oregonstate.edu/downloads/5x21tj35x.
Zybach, Bob. 2011. Tiller Pre-Contact Reference Condition Study. Final report, February 14, 2011. Oregon Websites and Watersheds Project, for Resource Management Services, Roseburg, Oregon. By chapter: orww.org/Reports/Tiller_Precontact_Conditions/. Whole report: orww.org/Reports/Tiller_Precontact_Conditions/Zybach_20110214.pdf.
Zybach, Bob, and Don Ivy. 2013. Coquelle Trails: Early Historical Roads and Trails of Ancestral Coquille Indian Lands, 1826-1875. Coquille Indian Tribe Cultural Geography Project, North Bend, Oregon. orww.org/Coquelle_Trails/. Volume I, Part 1: orww.org/Coquelle_Trails/References/Zybach-Ivy_2013/Volume_I/Part_1.pdf.
Chapter 6
General Land Office. 1855. Instructions to the Surveyors General of Public Lands of the United States ... Containing Also a Manual of Instructions to Regulate the Field Operations of Deputy Surveyors. Copy at the Bureau of Land Management.
U.S. Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office. Land records and survey index for Township 9 South, Range 6 West. blm.gov/or/landrecords/survey/ySrvy2.php?tr=00900S00600W.
Zybach, Bob. How to Research Your Land's History. Review draft, October 7, 2026.
Chapter 7
Act of February 14, 1859 (the Oregon Admission Act), 11 Stat. 383, section 4. As printed in Oregon State Legislature, "Oregon Admission Acts."
FamilySearch. familysearch.org.
Genealogical Forum of Oregon. gfo.org.
National Archives. "Land Records" research page. archives.gov/research/land/land-records.
U.S. Bureau of Land Management. "History of the O&C Act" (flyer).
U.S. patent 865382 to Andrew J. Welch and Martha Welch, donation claim No. 41, Township 9 South, Range 6 West, May 31, 1922. Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records.
Chapter 8
Benton County Records. "Real Property Records" and "Records Requests and Fees." re.bentoncountyor.gov.
Oregon State Archives. Oregon Historical County Records Guide, including the Polk County inventory. sos.oregon.gov/archives/county-records-guide.
Polk County. Digital Research Room. apps2.co.polk.or.us/DigitalResearchRoom.
Chapter 9
"Among the Sawmills." Polk County Observer (Dallas, Oregon), May 26, 1905. Historic Oregon Newspapers.
Historic Oregon Newspapers. University of Oregon Libraries. oregonnews.uoregon.edu.
National Archives. Census research page, archives.gov/research/census, and 1950 census website, 1950census.archives.gov.
Polk County Pioneer Cemeteries. Taylor and Montgomery cemetery records, volunteer-compiled. polkcountycemetery.org.
Tedrow family note (McFall), as quoted at michaelkluckner.com.
U.S. Census of 1880, Polk County, Oregon, Luckiamute and Buena Vista precincts, enumeration district 107, page 24. National Archives microfilm T9, roll 1083.
WikiTree. "John Wilson Tedrow."
Chapter 10
Find a Grave. findagrave.com.
McArthur, Lewis A. Oregon Geographic Names. Entry for Pedee, read in the 1952 edition. Later editions published by the Oregon Historical Society Press.
Oregon Historical Society Research Library. Mss 3100, John Johnson residence plans (1934), Historic American Buildings Survey drawings. Catalog entry. Research library page: ohs.org/research-and-library.
Oregon Parks and Recreation Department. Oregon Historic Cemeteries Program. oregon.gov/oprd/OH/pages/historic-cemeteries-program.aspx.
Oregon Parks and Recreation Department, State Historic Preservation Office. Oregon Historic Sites Database. heritagedata.prd.state.or.us/historic.
Sanborn Map Company. Albany, Oregon, 1890, sheet 8. Library of Congress, Sanborn Maps collection, loc.gov/collections/sanborn-maps.
Chapter 11
U.S. Geological Survey. Topographic maps: Dallas and Corvallis quadrangles (1942); Falls City and Airlie North quadrangles (1974); Kings Valley and Airlie South quadrangles (1984). topoView, ngmdb.usgs.gov/topoview.
Chapter 12
U.S. Forest Service. Panorama from the Abbott Butte fire lookout, July 24, 1933. As printed in Zybach (2011), Figure 2.05.
U.S. Geological Survey. EarthExplorer. earthexplorer.usgs.gov.
University of Oregon Libraries. Aerial Photography Collection. library.uoregon.edu/aerial-photography-collection.
Chapter 13
Knezevich, Clarence A. 1982. Soil Survey of Polk County, Oregon. USDA Soil Conservation Service, with the Oregon Agricultural Experiment Station.
Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries (DOGAMI). Oregon Geologic Data Compilation, in the Oregon Geologic Map viewer, gis.dogami.oregon.gov/maps/geologicmap. Lidar viewer, gis.dogami.oregon.gov/maps/lidarviewer. HazVu, gis.dogami.oregon.gov/maps/hazvu.
Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries. Statewide Landslide Information Database for Oregon (SLIDO), release 4.5.
Oregon Department of Geology and Mineral Industries and the Oregon Lidar Consortium. Lidar of the Luckiamute valley, flown in 2011.
Taylor, S., B. Dutton and P. Poston. 2002. Field Guide to the Luckiamute River Watershed. Western Oregon University.
USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program. Photograph of the Luckiamute valley near Pedee, July 11, 2022.
USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. Web Soil Survey, websoilsurvey.nrcs.usda.gov (soil survey of Polk County, version of September 8, 2026). Official Soil Series Descriptions, soilseries.sc.egov.usda.gov.
Vokes, H. E., D. A. Myers and L. Hoover. 1954. Geology of the West-Central Border Area of the Willamette Valley, Oregon. U.S. Geological Survey Oil and Gas Investigations Map OM-150.
Chapter 14
Garono, Ralph J., Becci Dale Anderson, Kirsten Harma and Christine Buhl. 2004. Luckiamute / Ash Creek / American Bottom Watershed Assessment. Earth Design Consultants, for the Luckiamute Watershed Council.
NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information. Climate at a Glance, county time series, Polk County, Oregon, 1895 to 2025.
Oregon Water Resources Department. Well report query, apps.wrd.state.or.us/apps/gw/well_log, and water rights information, apps.wrd.state.or.us/apps/wr/wrinfo.
PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University. prism.oregonstate.edu.
Spatial Climate Analysis Service and Oregon Climate Service, Oregon State University. 2002. 103-Year High-Resolution Precipitation Climate Data Set for the Conterminous United States.
U.S. Geological Survey. Annual peak streamflow, station 14190500, Luckiamute River near Suver (retrieved October 7, 2026), and station 14190000, Luckiamute River at Pedee. Water Data for the Nation, waterdata.usgs.gov.
Chapter 15
Christy, John A., and Edward R. Alverson. 2011. "Historical Vegetation of the Willamette Valley, Oregon, circa 1850." Northwest Science 85, no. 2: 93 to 107.
Lee, Russell. Tractor-drawn combine, Whitman County, Washington, July 1941. Farm Security Administration photograph. Library of Congress.
Spillman, W. J. Camas specimen, Monmouth, Oregon, April 22, 1894. University of Minnesota, Bell Museum herbarium, MIN 89465.
Underwood and Underwood. Combine drawn by 33 horses near Walla Walla, Washington, 1902. Stereograph. Library of Congress.
U.S. Forest Service. Forest type maps of the 1930s, digital version (2023).
Chapter 16
Aikens, C. Melvin, Thomas J. Connolly and Dennis L. Jenkins. 2011. Oregon Archaeology. Oregon State University Press.
Boyd, Robert. 1990. "Demographic History, 1774-1874." In Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 7, Northwest Coast. Smithsonian Institution.
Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde. "Treaties" (read October 8, 2026) and Cultural Resources pages. grandronde.org.
Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians. Heritage page. ctsi.nsn.us/heritage.
Hajda, Yvonne P. 1976. Mary's River Kalapuyan: A Descriptive Phonology. MA thesis, Portland State University.
Jacobs, Melville. 1945. Kalapuya Texts. University of Washington Publications in Anthropology, vol. 11. Seattle.
Jette, Melinda. "Kalapuya Treaty of 1855." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Updated March 17, 2022.
Kappler, Charles J., ed. Indian Affairs: Laws and Treaties. Vol. 2, Treaties. "Treaty with the Kalapuya, etc., 1855," January 22, 1855, 10 Stat. 1143; ratified March 3, 1855; proclaimed April 10, 1855. Transcription in the Tribal Treaties Database, Oklahoma State University Libraries, treaties.okstate.edu.
Lewis, David. "Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Updated November 13, 2023.
Lewis, David G. "Luckimauke Band of Calapooia Indians Reservation 1855." The Quartux Journal, May 15, 2016. ndnhistoryresearch.com.
Mackey, Harold. 1974. The Kalapuyans: A Sourcebook on the Indians of the Willamette Valley. Salem: Mission Mill Museum Association.
National Archives. Ratified Indian Treaty 282: Kalapuya and Others, Dayton, Oregon Territory, January 22, 1855. National Archives Identifier 169820763.
Oregon Revised Statutes 97.745.
Oregon State Historic Preservation Office. Archaeology page, oregon.gov/oprd/OH/pages/archaeology.aspx; Archaeological Sites on Private Lands, Bulletin 1 (2019).
Royce, Charles C. 1899. Indian Land Cessions in the United States. Eighteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology, part 2.
USDA Forest Service. Tribal Cession Lands, cession 352 (after Royce 1899). Retrieved October 8, 2026.
Wilkes, Charles. 1845. Narrative of the United States Exploring Expedition, vol. 5.
Zenk, Henry. 2006. "The Kalapuyan Presence in Oregon's Geographic Names." Kalapuya-Amin papers, orww.org/Kalapuya-Amin_2006/.
Chapter 18
National Archives. How to Preserve Family Archives. archives.gov/preservation/family-archives.
Oral History Association. Principles and Best Practices. oralhistory.org.
Smithsonian Institution. The Smithsonian Folklife and Oral History Interviewing Guide. folklife.si.edu.
Chapter 19
Homestead Act, May 20, 1862. 12 Stat. 392.
Chapter 20
Engeman, Richard. "Community of Airlie (Benton County)." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Last updated February 24, 2022.
Library of Congress. "Railroad Maps, 1828 to 1900." Online collection, loc.gov.
Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium and U.S. Geological Survey. Annual National Land Cover Database, 1985 to 2025. mrlc.gov. Retrieved October 7, 2026.
National Register of Historic Places. Ritner Creek Bridge, Polk County, Oregon. Listed November 29, 1979.
Oregon Railroad Commission. Eighth Annual Report of the Railroad Commission of Oregon to the Governor (1915); Public Service Commission of Oregon, Tenth Annual Report of the Public Service Commission of Oregon to the Governor (1917). As summarized in "Valley and Siletz Railroad," Wikipedia.
Oregon State University Libraries, Special Collections and Archives Research Center. "Local History in the Special Collections and Archives Research Center: Hoskins." guides.library.oregonstate.edu/localhistory/hoskins.
U.S. General Land Office. 1922. State of Oregon (map). Scan in the David Rumsey Map Collection, davidrumsey.com.
Wikipedia. "Ritner Creek Bridge" and "Valley and Siletz Railroad." en.wikipedia.org.
Chapter 23
Albany Regional Museum. armuseum.com.
Barganski, Jenna. "Moro." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Last updated April 15, 2026.
City of Albany Planning Staff. "National Register of Historic Places Inventory, Nomination Form: Hackleman Historic District." May 6, 1981.
Larson, Theresa. "National Register of Historic Places Inventory, Nomination Form: Chamberlain, George Earle, House." August 30, 1979. As summarized in "George Earle Chamberlain House (Albany, Oregon)," Wikipedia.
Oregon State University, Columbia Basin Agricultural Research Center. "Climate and Soils." agsci.oregonstate.edu/cbarc/climate-and-soils.
Oregon State University Libraries, Special Collections and Archives Research Center. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps of Oregon, 1879-1956. Collection guide, Archives West, archiveswest.orbiscascade.org.
Spence, Mark. "Albany." The Oregon Encyclopedia. Last updated November 3, 2022.
USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service. Cropland Data Layer, 2025. CropScape. Retrieved October 7, 2026.
USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program. Photographs of Sherman County, Oregon, July 1, 2022.
Chapter 25
Chapter 25 is itself a list of sources. Every office and website in it was checked on October 10, 2026.
Picture sources
One line for each figure: its number, a short title, who made it or holds it, and the terms on which it is used.
| Figure | Picture | Made or held by | Terms |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1.1 | The Sullivan tree farm from the air, about 2002 | From the owner's files | Used with the owner's consent |
| 1.2 | The first map of the place, 1855 | General Land Office; Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office | Public domain |
| 1.3 | Where the running example is | Drawn for this guide from U.S. Geological Survey, Census Bureau and Bureau of Land Management data | Public-domain data |
| 2.1 | How far back each kind of record reaches | Compiled for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 2.2 | One entry in a research log | Drawn for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 3.1 | A township and its sections | Drawn for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 3.2 | A modern survey that still uses the 1855 claims (detail: title, opening of the description, drawing) | Polk County Surveyor, survey CS 12769 | Public record |
| 4.1 | Alsea from the air, 1948 | Bob Zybach, The Great Fires (2003), Figure 2.03; photograph courtesy of the University of Oregon Knight Library | By the author, with the library's courtesy |
| 5.1 | The front page of Your Land History | YourLandHistory.org | Made for this guide |
| 6.1 | Daniel Murphy's field notes, 1854 | Bureau of Land Management, Oregon land records, volume R0029 | Public domain; outline added |
| 6.2 | The bearing trees of 1854 and 1855 | Plotted for this guide from the field notes and Polk County map layers | Made for this guide |
| 6.3 | Hutchinson's survey of the Tedrow claim, 1855 | Bureau of Land Management, Oregon land records, volume D0022 | Public domain |
| 6.4 | How a corner is found from its bearing trees | Drawn for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 7.1 | The donation land claims of T9S R6W | General Land Office; Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office | Public domain |
| 7.2 | A patent, the government's first deed | Bureau of Land Management, General Land Office Records, patent 865382 | Public domain |
| 8.1 | Three old rights listed on a modern survey | Polk County Surveyor, survey CS 12769 | Public record |
| 9.1 | The 1880 census, Luckiamute and Buena Vista precincts | National Archives microfilm T9, roll 1083 | Public domain |
| 9.2 | Logging news from Pedee, 1905 | Polk County Observer; Historic Oregon Newspapers, University of Oregon | Public domain |
| 10.1 | Albany on the fire insurance map of 1890 | Sanborn Map Company; Library of Congress | Public domain |
| 10.2 | Headstones at Providence Cemetery | Gary Halvorson, Oregon State Archives | CC BY 4.0 |
| 10.3 | Ballston School, 2014 | Gary Halvorson, Oregon State Archives | CC BY 4.0 |
| 11.1 | The first map of a whole township, 1855 | General Land Office; Bureau of Land Management, Oregon State Office | Public domain |
| 11.2 | Topographic maps around Pedee, 1942 and 1974 to 1984 | U.S. Geological Survey, through topoView | Public domain |
| 12.1 | The view from the Abbott Butte lookout, 1933 | U.S. Forest Service; place labels by Bob Zybach, Tiller study (2011), Figure 2.05 | Public-domain photograph |
| 12.2 | The tree farm in 1936 | U.S. Department of Agriculture; Oregon State University Libraries, through Oregon Digital | U.S. government photograph |
| 12.3 | The prairies of Abbott Butte, 1899 to 2010 | Bob Zybach, Tiller study (2011), page 32 | By the author |
| 13.1 | The rock under the Pedee country | Drawn for this guide from DOGAMI's Oregon Geologic Data Compilation | State data, credit DOGAMI |
| 13.2 | What lidar shows that a photograph hides | DOGAMI and the Oregon Lidar Consortium (2011); USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program (2022) | State data, credit DOGAMI; public-domain photograph |
| 13.3 | Soils around Pedee | Drawn for this guide from USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service data | Public-domain data |
| 13.4 | A slab of Jory soil | USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service; photograph by Chip Clark, Smithsonian Institution | Public domain |
| 13.5 | Mapped landslides around Pedee | Drawn for this guide from DOGAMI's SLIDO, release 4.5 | State data, credit DOGAMI |
| 14.1 | Rain in Polk County, 1895 to 2025 | Drawn for this guide from NOAA data | Public-domain data |
| 14.2 | Columbus Day Storm blowdown, 1962 | U.S. Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Region | Public domain |
| 14.3 | Yearly peak flows of the Luckiamute near Suver | Drawn for this guide from U.S. Geological Survey data | Public-domain data |
| 14.4 | A splash dam, 1924 | U.S. Forest Service, photograph by T. H. Gill | Public domain |
| 15.1 | Camas collected at Monmouth, 1894 | University of Minnesota, Bell Museum herbarium, MIN 89465 | CC0 |
| 15.2 | Camas in bloom | George Gentry, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service | Public domain |
| 15.3 | Forest types of the 1930s | Drawn for this guide from U.S. Forest Service data (2023) | Public-domain data |
| 15.4 | An 1880 census farm schedule | National Archives microfilm M1794 | Public domain |
| 15.5 | A 33-horse combine, 1902 | Underwood and Underwood stereograph; Library of Congress | Public domain |
| 15.6 | A tractor-drawn combine, 1941 | Russell Lee, Farm Security Administration; Library of Congress | Public domain |
| 16.1 | The Willamette Valley cession, 1899 | Charles C. Royce, Indian Land Cessions in the United States; Library of Congress | Public domain |
| 17.1 | Old wide-crowned oaks near Coyote Point, 2010 | Bob Zybach, Tiller study (2011), Figure 3.01 | By the author |
| 17.2 | A springboard notch in an old stump | Walter Siegmund, Wikimedia Commons | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
| 17.3 | An old trail marker near Fish Lake, 2010 | Bob Zybach, Tiller study (2011), Figure 3.02 | By the author |
| 18.1 | A cabinet card | Wikimedia Commons | Public domain |
| 18.2 | The tree farm about 1997, with lines drawn by hand | The owner's files | Used with the owner's consent |
| 19.1 | How the kinds of evidence lead to one another | Drawn for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 20.1 | Polk County on the General Land Office map, 1922 | U.S. General Land Office; scan from the David Rumsey Map Collection | CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 |
| 20.2 | The Valley and Siletz Railroad by a log pond | Gerald W. Williams Collection, Oregon State University Libraries | No known copyright restrictions |
| 20.3 | The Ritner Creek covered bridge, 2010 | Gary Halvorson, Oregon State Archives | CC BY 4.0 |
| 20.4 | Land cover around Pedee, 1985 and 2025 | Drawn for this guide from the Annual National Land Cover Database | Public-domain data |
| 21.1 | One grid for every record | Bob Zybach, The Great Fires (2003), Maps 2.01 and 2.02, with A. Matzke, NW Maps Co. | By the author |
| 22.1 | One farm, five ways out of federal ownership | Drawn for this guide from Polk County map layers and BLM patent records | Made for this guide |
| 22.2 | The tree farm in 1955 | U.S. Department of Agriculture; Oregon State University Libraries, through Oregon Digital | U.S. government photograph |
| 22.3 | The tree farm in 1978 | U.S. Department of Agriculture; Oregon State University Libraries, through Oregon Digital | U.S. government photograph |
| 22.4 | The tree farm today | USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program, 2022, through the U.S. Geological Survey's National Map; lines from Bureau of Land Management survey data | Public domain |
| 23.1 | The Chamberlain House, Albany | Wikimedia Commons, 2009 | Released to the public domain by the photographer |
| 23.2 | Wheat and fallow around Moro, 2022 | USDA National Agriculture Imagery Program | Public domain |
| 23.3 | Crops around Moro, 2025 | Drawn for this guide from the USDA Cropland Data Layer | Public-domain data |
| 24.1 | A research log form to copy | Drawn for this guide | Made for this guide |
| 25.1 | Oregon's 36 counties | Drawn for this guide from U.S. Census Bureau boundaries | Public-domain data |
About this guide
Knowing Your Land: A Reference Guide to Researching Your Land's History, by Bob Zybach, PhD. First edition, version 1.1, October 2026. Published by NW Maps Co., Cottage Grove, Oregon.
The guide goes with the website Your Land History, at YourLandHistory.org. Your Land History is a project of Dr. Bob Zybach and Dr. Dave Sullivan. The research method comes from Oregon Websites and Watersheds; the idea began in the library of Oregon Advocates for School Trust Lands.
Many of the records were gathered, and the first drafts of the text were written, with the help of the computer tools named in the preface, working from Bob Zybach's outline and draft, his four studies and the public records named in the notes. Every fact in the book rests on a record named in the notes.
Web addresses, telephone numbers, hours and costs were checked on October 10, 2026.
This guide is historical research, not title research. It can tell you who owned a piece of land and what happened on it. It cannot tell you who owns the land now or where its lines run; for those questions, see a title company, a licensed surveyor or an attorney.
A Kids edition and a Professional edition are planned, with the same method and the same running example.
Corrections are welcome. If you find a mistake, a broken link or an office that has moved, say which chapter and which version you were reading. Send corrections and additions through the Your Land History site: the About page, or the "That's wrong" link beside any record.