Praying for Those in Authority: Wasco County

Rowena Ridge, Wasco County, OR

I will magnify Myself, sanctify Myself, and make Myself known in the sight of many nations; and they will know that I am the Lord. Ezekial 38:23

Wasco County, created in 1854, was once the largest county in Oregon. It was made up of the parts of Linn, Lane, Marion, and Clackamas Counties that were east of the Cascade Mountains, stretching all the way to the Rocky Mountains, encompassing what became part of Idaho and Montana. The northern border is the Columbia River. Now it has an area of 2,396 square miles and is home to 26,670 people. The county seat is The Dalles.

Wasco County, Oregon

The Dalles has been occupied for over ten thousand years by Native Americans, and since the 1930s by European settlers and trappers, and is in fact one of the oldest permanently occupied locations in the state. Before pioneers arrived, the tribes gathered here to fish and trade. Several different tribes came from the interior to get in on the Salmon harvest and to trade goods with other tribes.

We have covered a lot of the history of Wasco County elsewhere. The Dalles was the site of the second mission Jason Lee, the Methodists pioneer missionary, established, staffing it with his nephew Daniel and the Reverend Henry Perkins at Wascopam. This was where a revival took place among the Native Americans of the local region in 1839-40.

The exact location of the mission is unknown, but somewhere near The Dalles Methodist Church and a feature called Pulpit Rock. At its height, the compound had a two-story house, chapel, school, barn, and Indian church building. The language spoken by many tribes was Sahaptin and Henry Perkins had learned the language, enough to preach in it, and had written a speller as well as translated part of the Bible into Sahaptin. His work is now lost, but similar translations by Daniel Lee into the Kiksht language have survived.

Perkins, although already on the mission field, had a conversion experience after an encounter with a visiting preacher, Benjamin Wright, on October 28, 1839. Perkins then converted the local shaman, Tumsowit, who began spending time alone in the hills (the spiritual custom of the Native Americans) to pray. Tumsowit began to convert others, and word began to spread. In the following weeks, the missionaries at Wascopam and the local native leaders held meetings in villages along the Columbia and soon reported 250 converts from their first efforts. They continued from village to village with Perkins preaching and teaching as far as the Cascade Mountains. In January of 1840, they continued upriver and then in April turned toward the interior to the Klickitat villages. They held a camp-meeting downstream from The Dalles where 1,000 to 1,200 attended in an area whose total population was only 1,600. Although their home-base in the Willamette Valley was skeptical of the spiritual outpouring, this was the most successful missionary endeavor of this period of Oregon history.

In 1847 Wascopam was sold to the Presbyterians (Marcus Whitman) just two months before the Whitman Massacre. The mission was closed and the site was used as a militia base during the Cayuse War that followed the massacre.

Other points of interest in Wasco County include the town of Shankio, once a hub of sheep production and now a ghost town. Antelope, a small town in the Central Oregon region south of The Dalles, is known for the commune established by the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, and the attempt they made to control the county politically and the group's later deportation and indictments.

 While all the counties in Oregon are unique and valuable in the state, Wasco County is one that deserves a special prayer focus. As a meeting place along Oregon’s major river, as a crossroads for centuries of travel, communication, and commerce, it has long held special significance to the people of Oregon.

Pray for the leaders. The County Clerk is Lis Gambee. The County Commissioners are Scott Hege, Steve Kramer, and Phil Brady.

The County Sheriff is Lane Magill. Over three years ago, the Sheriff’s Office and many other local organizations, began developing the plans for a 40+ bed regional mental and behavior crisis center that would benefit the counties of Hood River, Wasco, and Sherman. The Columbia Gorge Crisis Resolution Center is now completely funded and will be breaking ground in January of 2024, with the facility scheduled to open in June of 2025.