About The Mansion
This is a 17-room Italianate Victorian Mansion. Ezra was 60 years old and the house was build for he and his wife. Ezra Meeker took his wife, Eliza Jane, along on a hop selling trip to England. She was presented to Queen Victoria and became smitten with some of the finer things in life. Ezra was quite contented with his log-cabin life, but agreed that his wife could have such a house if she wanted--and could pay for--it. This is the house that Eliza Jane Meeker built and retained title to. The house was designed by Farrell and Darmer, Architects, of Tacoma. It took three years to build and was finished by 1890. The Meekers lived here about 20 years, until Mrs. Meeker died in 1909. After Mrs. Meeker died Mr. Meeker left the house.
The remarkable owner was a pioneer and leading citizen of Puyallup; first mayor, one-time Hop King, author...Ezra Meeker became the self-appointed champion of the Oregon Trail in 1906, when at the age of 76, accompanied by two oxen, a wagon, a driver and a dog, he made his way from his front yard to Washington D.C., by way of New York City. His purpose was to preserve and re-mark the Oregon Trail, which was being obliterated by civilization. He thought he could make his tripe once before he died, but this remarkable man lived to 98 and made this journey by ox team once more, then by automobile in 1915, and by airplane in 1924. The fact that you can see actual traces of the Oregon Trail is due almost entirely to Ezra Meeker.
The Meeker Mansion is listed as a site on the National Register of Historic Sites. The objective of the Historical Society is to return the home to the condition it was in 1891-the year after it was finished. This is complicated by the fact that there are no known records of the house aside from three letters Mr. Meeker wrote describing it.
Meeker Wagon Goes to Jackson County
The Jackson County, Oregon, 4-H has planned a reunion for the weekend of 13/14 June 2009 in the Jacksonville area, as part of the Jackson County celebration of Oregon's sesquicentennial. The Ezra Meeker Historical Society has been asked to bring the Meeker wagon.
While Ezra Meeker, an 1852 Oregon Trail traveler and the so-called "savior of the Oregon Trail," cannot be definitely documented as having traveled or marked the Southern or Applegate Road, he spent one quarter of his life preserving and marking the Oregon Trail as he knew it. The Ezra Meeker Historical Society has as its mission preserving our local history and its links to the Oregon Trail.
Prior to his 1906 Old Oregon Trail Monument Expedition, Ezra Meeker rebuilt several wagons out of parts of earlier ones. The actual wagon he took on his expedition is in the Washington State Historical Society Museum; we have the other.
To celebrate the centennial of the Old Oregon Trail Monument expedition, the Ezra Meeker Historical Society and the Oregon California Trails Association (OCTA) sent a joint expedition from Puyallup, Wa, to St Joseph, MO, where our arrival in St Jo coincided with the 2006 OCTA Convention. The expedition traveled the length of the Oregon Trail with 12 people, two oxen and a covered wagon. We stopped at 22 locations where we offered a program featuring the oxen and wagon, and presentations about and "by" Ezra Meeker. These events were viewed by hundreds of people, and many more crowded around our caravan wherever we stopped.
