Written by Mrs. Winnie McIntyre and recorded in 1930
Memories of the Old Barlow Road: A Pioneer’s Perspective from Brightwood, Oregon
Before paved highways and modern bridges crossed the Mount Hood corridor, the pioneers who settled this region faced rugged terrain, rough trails, and river fords. One of the most vivid accounts of those early days comes from Mrs. J.T. McIntyre, an early settler of the Brightwood area, who recorded her memories in the 1930 Welches P.T.A. History book.
Her firsthand description of the Barlow Road, the emigrant trail that became the main overland route through the Cascades, offers an irreplaceable glimpse into the challenges and triumphs of frontier life in Oregon. From Laurel Hill’s treacherous descent to the now-forgotten Rock Corral camp on the road to Marmot, Mrs. McIntyre’s writing captures not only geography but also the grit of the people who shaped what this area is today.
The excerpt below is transcribed exactly as she wrote it—personal, reflective, and rich with local details that still echo in this community today.
Long ago when the first settlers came into the Oregon country, roads were almost an unknown quantity. They were little better than trails. The first comers mostly made their way to The Dalles and then down the Columbia River, running The Cascades, and also a risk of their lives, in their hastily constructed flatboats.
A little later a group of men headed by Capt. Barlow cut a road through a pass in the mountains which has since been called “The Barlow Pass.” It followed the lines of least resistance meandering around following trails made by the Indians in their trips to the Willamette Valley for fish and berries.
It went straight up or down, crossing the Zigzag river five times in eight miles, went almost straight down Laurel Hill as is shown by the old tracks still visible to one tracing it out as I did in 1883.
Trees could be seen that had been cut half in two by emigrants taking half hitches with ropes and chains around them to ease the wagons down. I don’t know if they are still visible or not, but mean to fine out some day if I can.
Then the road came on down to Brightwood, just below the old store and onto the river flat, and went down through what is now Salmon river park and forded the Sandy just above the mouth of the Salmon river. Thence it went down the north side ofer the Backbone to what was later the Revenue bridge.
A very few years later the crossing over the Sandy was made back of and a little above the Murphy place, with two bridges, one to an island and the other to north bank, and was called the double bridges. The road then followed the north side throu what was then known (and still is to old timers) as Elk Flat.
It passed the Stover place, known now as the Hacket place, where a man named Stover had squatted and cleared out a few acres and catered to travel.
Boulder creek hill just below Brightwood is one sample of the straight up and down system of road making still to be seen.
About a mile below the Sandy Lumber Co. Mill on the north side, is an immense rock where once there was several acres cleared out, and a pole fence made with the rock in the center of the clearing, where the emigrants camped and corralled their stock for the night. The rock is still there almost hidden by the trees grown up around it, but the fence and emigrants are gone. The place was called rock corral.
A little way below is the old Philip Moore place, where the Moore’s welcomed the emigrants and let them rest their weary teams of oxen or horses. It is a modern farm place now, but the graves of the Moore’s are there keeping guard over the road still.
In 1891 Steve Coalman and Harvey Cross with others cut the road on down the south side of Sandy and then Stovers went away and the place became Hackett place, as Mr. Hackett filed on it when it was surveyed and opened to entry.
There also are the Santiam and McKenzie passes but none were used as much as the Barlow pass.
There is a grave on the Rowan place where a traveler was buried when the first road went that way.
Mr. McIntyre in 1884, found a chain hanging in a tree by a large hook which was buried in the tree by the wood which had grown completely over the hook.
The younger generation can scarcely imagine the difficulties which beset the earlier emigrants, the road had been greatly improved even before we came here in 1883. Only a sight of the old road as it could be seen then could tell one anything of it.
Mrs J.T. McIntyre