The First Car to Government Camp: John B. Kelly’s 1903 Ascent

A drive that changed how Mount Hood was reached

Today, a trip from Portland to Government Camp takes about an hour. The road is paved, the grades are manageable, and the drive is routine. In 1903, it was anything but. The first car to Government Camp had a challenging trip.

That summer, John B. Kelly set out to do something no one had yet proven possible—drive an automobile up the Barlow Road to Government Camp. He wanted to drive the first car to Government Camp. At the time, the road was still a rough wagon route, built for ox teams and freight wagons, not machines powered by steam.

What followed was not just a drive to the mountain, but a test of whether the automobile had any place there at all.

Leaving Portland in a steam-powered machine

Kelly left Portland early in the morning on August 29, 1903, behind the wheel of a White steam-powered automobile, often referred to as a White Stanhope. His destination was Government Camp, where his wife and children had already been camping near the base of Mount Hood.

The distance was roughly 60 miles. Under normal conditions today, that’s a short trip. In 1903, it was an all-day effort across a road that had barely changed since the days of the Oregon Trail.

Kelly carried supplies, tools, and enough provisions to make the journey self-supported. The automobile itself was still a novelty—unproven on roads like this—and many along the route doubted whether it could make the climb at all.

Even the tollkeeper at the Barlow Road gate warned him. The road, he said, “was not built for such vehicles.”

Kelly went anyway.

A road built for wagons, not rubber wheels

The early miles out of Portland were manageable, but conditions quickly deteriorated.

Beyond Gresham, the road turned to hard-packed dirt broken by mudholes and stretches of corduroy—logs laid side by side across soft ground. In places, the surface was uneven enough to threaten wagons, let alone an automobile with delicate mechanical parts.

Farther up the mountain, the route became more punishing. The road narrowed. Large rocks filled the path. In some areas, crews had recently cleared timber, leaving debris and rough ground. There were even stretches where fire had burned along the roadside, with heat and smoke still present as Kelly passed through.

From the tollgate to Government Camp, the final stretch—about nine miles—was the worst of it. The grade climbed steadily, reaching elevations near 3,500 feet. The route twisted through dense forest, with sharp turns and obstacles that forced constant maneuvering.

This was not a road you simply drove. It was a road you fought your way through.

Mechanical limits pushed to the edge

Kelly’s automobile handled the climb—but not without consequences. At one point, while negotiating a stretch of loose rock, the braking system was damaged. The rocks rendered the brakes nearly useless, a problem that would become critical later.

The ascent itself was no easy task. On Laurel Hill—the steepest and most feared grade on the Barlow Road—the automobile was pushed to its limits. The climb was slow and difficult, the machine working hard over loose rock and uneven ground on a road never intended for anything like it. Progress came in short gains, with constant adjustments to keep the car moving forward.

Throughout the journey, obstacles had to be taken one at a time. In some places, rocks were too large to move and had to be climbed over. In others, the road narrowed to the point that meeting another team would have been nearly impossible. Despite it all, the machine kept moving.

Only later, on the return trip down Laurel Hill, would the damaged brakes force Kelly to rely on reversing the engine to control his descent—a risky but necessary solution on that steep grade.

A surprising welcome at Government Camp

After hours on the road, Kelly reached Government Camp. Word had traveled ahead of him.

Campers and travelers gathered to see what many had only heard about—a self-propelled vehicle making its way up a mountain road built for wagons. As Kelly arrived, he was greeted with what he later described as an impromptu celebration.

People waved whatever they had on hand—aprons, hats, coats, handkerchiefs—and cheered as the automobile came into camp. It was something entirely new.

One account noted that the “puffing” sound people had been hearing through the trees turned out to be the approach of this strange new machine.

Even the owner of a nearby boarding house offered Kelly a free stay, saying he was honored to host the man who had managed to bring an automobile up the mountain. Kelly declined and instead continued on to meet his family, who had been waiting for him.

The trip down—and what it meant

If getting up the mountain was difficult, coming back down presented its own challenges.

With damaged brakes, Kelly again relied on engine control to descend the steep grades safely. Despite the risks, he completed the return trip to Portland in roughly nine hours.

In his own words, the journey was both difficult and rewarding. He described the drive as a constant panorama of scenery, and despite the mechanical strain and rough conditions, he considered it one of the most enjoyable trips he had ever taken.

More importantly, he proved something.

Through the Tollgate at Rhododendron

The accomplishment wasn’t recorded until the return trip. On September 2, 1903, after successfully reaching Government Camp and making the journey back to the tollgate, Mrs. Kelly wrote a note documenting the first car to Government Camp. The tollgate keeper, John Moronay, signed it:

“This is to certify that I passed Mr. J. B. Kelly through the Toll Gate on Aug. 29th, 1903, and returned on Sept. 2nd, with his ‘White’ automobile, it being the first automobile to ever pass through the gate.”

By the time it was signed, there was no longer any question. News traveled fast. An automobile had gone up the mountain—and made it back.

For a road that had seen decades of wagon travel, it marked an important first. Within another decade, automobiles would rule the road.

The beginning of a new kind of travel

In 1903, the Barlow Road was still a wagon road. Thousands of travelers had used it for decades, but always with horses, oxen, and freight wagons. Kelly’s trip showed that the automobile could make the journey.

It didn’t mean the road was ready. It wasn’t. The route was still rough, narrow, and in many places barely passable. But the idea had taken hold.

Within a few decades, the road to Mount Hood would be improved, widened, and eventually transformed into the highways we know today. What had once been a difficult, days-long journey became something accessible to anyone with a car.

Kelly’s first car to Government Camp didn’t change the road overnight. But it changed what people believed was possible, which changed the future of the road to Mount Hood forever.

Sources

• The Oregonian, September 3, 1903
• The Oregon Daily Journal, August 30, 1904
• John Terry, “Early trips test drivers, conveyances,” The Sunday Oregonian, March 20, 2005
• Linda McCarthy, “Hurrahs hail Mount Hood first,” The Oregonian, May 6, 1999