About Oregon

         
           Before the Oregon Country was obtained by the United States, the United States shared the Oregon territory with Britain for ten years. During this period of time, thousands of American settlers moved to the Oregon Country by the Oregon Trail. The United States eventually negotiated with Britain, resulting in the US taking over this land from Britain in the year 1846.
          The first Americans to move to the Oregon Country were fur traders. They trapped beavers to use their skin. Many worked in fur-trading companies. In the early 1840s, the "Oregon Fever" had gone through the Mississippi Valley and American settlers called "emigrants" came by the thousands through the Oregon Trail. The journey on the Oregon Trail was long and treacherous, but people living through the Mississippi Valley were suffering a depression called the Panic of 1837. They would do anything to escape this despondency. People came for the farm land, the fur-trading, and in general, economic success.
          The motivation behind this action was Manifest Destiny, which was the belief that the United States had the God-given right to extend all the way to the Pacific, spreading the idea of freedom and democracy through westward expansion.

The Oregon Trail