Buell, Oregon Ghost Town

The town of Buell is located about 8 miles almost directly south of Sheridan Oregon, on Highway 22/Willamina-Salem Highway/Dallas Coast Highway in Polk County, Oregon.

In 1847 Elias Buell led one of the 26 wagon trains that left that year to Oregon. His Brother was also on the trip, along with his Wife, Sarah Hammond. Other members of the Wagon Train were the Bateman, Carey, Conner, Findley, Franklin, and Putman families.

The Buell family arrived at Fort Vancouver via the Columbia River, instead of the Barlow trail. Records show that they made it there on November 15th, 1847 and took out Land Claim #4165 for an area in Polk County. History of Oregon by William Henry Gray stats that Elias was a blacksmith. He went to California in 1848 as part of the Gold Rush, coming back with $2000 in gold. He used this money to start a saw mill and flour mill on Mill Creek, which runs through his land claim.

Today the “town” consists of a couple of houses, a grange hall, and the school house which has obviously been turned into a residence.

A small park next to the grange hall completes the town. From a map I have seen, it looks like the mill would have been located in the general area of the park.

For more information about the Elias Buell Family and relatives, see these threads on Ancestry.com:

http://boards.ancestry.com/surnames.buell/246/mb.ashx

http://boards.ancestry.com/thread.aspx?mv=flat&m=39&p=surnames.mckune

I have also been informed that there is further information about the Buell Family at the Polk County Historical Society. If any family members have a copy of Elias’ diary, or even copies by any other members of the family I would be interested in posting it here for all to see.