Cowlitz County Economic History

Cowlitz County derives its name from the anglicized version of the Indian term Cow-e-liske (the name of the local tribe), which is believed to mean either river of shifting sand or capturing the medicine spirit. Neighboring Wahkiakum County derived its name from the chief (and namesake) of a local Kathlamet Indian tribe. The Indian translation of the term is unknown. The two counties were among the first organized in April of 1854 by the newly-formed Washington Territorial Government. The enacting legislation was signed into law by Governor Isaac I. Stevens.

Of course, the region's history far pre-dates its organization. The area now known as Cowlitz County was inhabited by numerous Native American Indian tribes--chief among them the Cowlitz--all of whom were drawn to the region by plentiful salmon from the Columbia River. Also dependent on salmon from the Columbia were the Wahkiakum and Kathlamet, the largest Indian tribes in Wahkiakum. There is substantial evidence that these tribes traded extensively with those in western and eastern Washington. Consequently, they are considered the first regional inhabitants to engage in commerce. Unfortunately, the Indian population was decimated by the smallpox epidemic of 1829-30. And in 1855, the surviving Indians were removed to the Yakima Indian reservation in central Washington.

White exploration into the region is recognized as having begun in 1792, the year Lieutenant W.R. Broughton, in command of the British ship Chatham, sailed past the mouth of the Columbia and approximately 100 miles upriver to present-day Vancouver. Along the way, he discovered Puget's Island, which lies mid-river from what is now the town of Cathlamet in Wahkiakum County, and Mount Coffin, an historic Indian burial site in present-day Longview. (Note: the English brig Jenny may actually have been first since Lieutenant Broughton discovered it at anchor beyond the sand bar at the mouth of the river.)

The next explorers to venture through the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum region came the long way. Under orders from President Thomas Jefferson to chart a navigable commercial waterway from the Mississippi River to the Pacific Ocean, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark embarked on an expedition in 1805. They did not find the so-called Northwest Passage, but they did reach the Columbia River, which they eventually navigated to the Pacific. On November 5, 1805, they made camp where the Kalama River flows into the Columbia. They reached present sites of Longview and Cathlamet over the following several days.

By the 1820s, the British Hudson's Bay Company had established a lucrative fur trade in the region. The importance of Cowlitz to this enterprise was underscored after the company located its regional headquarters in Vancouver, Washington. Thousands of furs were sent down Cowlitz rivers to the Columbia, where they were loaded onto ships bound for ports around the world. By the late 1830s, though, over-hunting and changing fashion tastes brought an end to the fur trade. Still, many former trappers and fur company employees chose to remain in the area. They subsequently became the region's first white settlers. In fact, the first permanent white settler in Wahkiakum County was James Birnie, an employee of the Hudson's Bay Company, who in 1846 located his family in what is now Cathlamet.

During the 1850s and 1860s, white settlement of the region was well underway. Drawn by the promise of land ownership, most settlers homesteaded tracts of land along the Columbia River. Some ventured further inland, following any of a number of tributaries that fed the Columbia. In Cowlitz County, settlers were concentrated around the river valleys of Kelso-Longview. Settlements in Wahkiakum County sprang up first around Cathlamet and in the valley surrounding the Elochoman River. Later, they began appearing further west around the Grays-Deep River valley.

Numerous towns were organized during this period, the first of which was Monticello (near present-day Longview). It was there on November 25, 1852 that a group of prominent settlers from the Cowlitz and Puget Sound regions met to draft a petition to their Oregon Territory delegate in the District of Columbia calling for a separate territory north of the Columbia River. Three months later, the U.S. Congress formed Washington Territory.

Roughly 85 percent of Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties is forest land. Therefore, it is not surprising that the logging and lumber industries have been the foundation of the local economy since the pioneer days. In fact, nearly every town that sprang up in the late 1800s did so around a logging or lumber-milling operation.

The first commercial logging and lumber processing in the Cowlitz-Wahkiakum region was developed in the late 1840s to provide wood for homes and other buildings. Numerous other logging and lumber operations were established in quick succession. Logs were originally hauled from the forest on greased skids by teams of oxen and then floated downriver to sawmills for processing. By the 1890s, however, teams of oxen and greased skids were replaced by locomotive "steam-donkeys." Lumber output expanded as demand soared in the wake of a West Coast building boom. It is estimated that at the turn of the century, in excess of 1,000 workers were employed in Cowlitz County's logging and lumber firms. At that time, the largest operators were the Hammond Lumber Company, Inman Paulsen Company, Western Company, and Wisconsin Timber Company. The two largest logging concerns in Wahkiakum County were Olsen Brothers Logging Company and Deep River Logging Company.

Cowlitz County's wood processing industry rose to a position of even greater prominence during the latter half of the 1920s when the Long-Bell Lumber Company and Weyerhaeuser Company established processing facilities--recognized at the time as the world's largest and second largest, respectively--at Longview. The Weyerhaeuser plant employed 2,450 workers compared to 1,600 at the Long-Bell plant.

Many of the region's logging and lumber operations ceased during the Great Depression. However, those that survived were able to prosper during World War II as military demand for wood and pulp products soared. This prosperity continued during the post-war years as a housing construction boom got underway. Weyerhaeuser, for example, employed another 1,000 workers at its new plywood and pulp and paper plants in Longview. In the post-war period, employment in Cowlitz County's forest-related industries reached 1,600 in logging, 4,400 in lumber, and 2,500 in pulp and paper.

During the 1970s and into the 1980s, the combined lumber, wood, and paper and pulp industries accounted for more than 7,500 jobs in Cowlitz County. After weathering national economic recessions and efficiency measures during the front half of the 1980s, employment in these industries fell. That notwithstanding, forest-related industries currently account for roughly 6,500 jobs and lead all others as the county's major source of employment.

Other industries have also played significant historical roles in the economic development of Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties with fishing, food processing, agriculture, dairying, and aluminum reduction in the forefront.

The region's location on the Columbia River provided terrific incentive to establish a salmon fishing industry. Like the local Indians before them, the early settlers depended on salmon to sustain their diet. Though most eventually turned to logging pursuits, a good number of Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties' settlers remained fishermen. Salmon were plentiful during spawning season and tons were caught using traps, fishwheels, seines, gillnets, and trollers. Smelt fishing also became a lucrative seasonal industry during the height of the annual run.

Growth in the booming fishing industry spurred growth in salmon canning operations. These firms catered to both the heavy East Coast and Western European demand for packed salmon. The first was established in 1866 near Longview. In addition to being the first in the Northwest, it was the world's second largest. The first cannery in Wahkiakum County followed several years later. By the 1880s, there were 35 fish processing and canning operations along Cowlitz County's banks, as well as a number in Wahkiakum County.

Covering substantial portions of the region, river valleys and bottomlands in Cowlitz and Wahkiakum counties are abundant in rich and fertile volcanic soil. This, combined with ample rainfall (even during the summer) and mild temperatures, was yet another inducement to early settlers seeking to cultivate the land. The climate, though, proved less than conducive to certain crops, resulting in only modest vegetable and berry harvests. It was soon discovered that the climate was perfect for dairying crops (i.e, used to feed dairy animals).

Consequently, many of the region's early farmers turned toward livestock feed crops such as hay, grain, corn and pasture grass. These operations prospered as dairy-product demand from logging camps soared during the 1860s. The dairy industry continues to operate today, especially in Cowlitz County. The southern region around the town of Woodland has developed a substantial livestock and dairy industry that supplies much of Vancouver and Portland. Meanwhile, operations in Longview, Kelso, and Castle Rock supply milk to plants which produce cheese and cream for local and statewide distribution.