Jesse Applegate

Jesse Applegate lived up the hill from here from 1849, on a claim he named Yoncalla for the Kalapuya people whose valley it was. The board covers his public life and leaves out how he lost the place. At the Republican conventions of 1862 and 1864 he nominated his friend Samuel E. May for secretary of state, and he signed May's bonds. In 1871 an investigation found May had embezzled more than $12,000. Applegate, as surety, was held for the loss, and in the fall of 1874 his land and house were taken. He died in Yoncalla in 1888.

What the plaque says

Oregon History Jesse Applegate Up the hill behind this marker was the home of Jesse Applegate, a captain of the first major wagon train to Oregon in 1843, traveling from Missouri with his brothers Lindsay and Charles. Jesse was a major force behind the Provisional Government of 1845, which held Oregon for the United States until admission as a territory in 1848. As a delegate to Oregon's Constitutional Convention of 1857, he was a vocal opponent to slavery in Oregon. Jesse also helped develop a new wagon road into southern Oregon known as the Applegate Trail. He befriended Indians, but also sided with settlers in the Modoc War of 1872-73. He and his wife Cynthia are buried in a nearby family cemetery.

Where it stands

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