Jason Lee House Salem, Oregon
National Register of Historic Places Data
The Jason Lee House has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places with the following information, which has been imported from the National Register database and/or the Nomination Form . Please note that not all available data may be shown here, minor errors and/or formatting may have occurred during transcription, and some information may have become outdated since listing.
- National Register ID
- 73001580
- Date Listed
- April 23, 1973
- Name
- Lee, Jason, House
- Address
- 1313 Mill St., SE
- City/Town
- Salem
- County
- Marion
- State
- Oregon
- Category
- building
- Level of Sig.
- national
- Years of Sig.
- 1841; c. 1965
- Areas of Sig.
- RELIGION
Raw Nomination Form Text
This is auto-generated text from the PDF, so it has no formatting, includes headers and footers, and may contain errors.
Form 10-300 (July 1969) UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR NATIONAL PARK SERVICE NATIONAL REGISTER OF HISTORIC PLACES INVENTORY - NOMINATION FORM (Type all entries — complete applicable sections) Oregon COUNTY: Marion FOR NPS USE ONLY ENTRY NUMBER COMMON: AND/OR HISTORIC: STREET AND NUMBER: 260 12th Street S. E. Oregon 2nd Congressional Distric A1 1T1 Iman CITY OR TOWN: Salem ORegon Marion (J47 iliillliiiiiliii CATEGORY (Check One) OWNERSHIP STATUS ACCESSIBLE TO THE PUBLIC District Building Structure D Object D Public EKPrivate Both Public Acquisition: Q In Process J Being Considered I I Occupied II Unoccupied 32Q Preservation work in progress Yes: $£$7 Restricted Jztzv Q Unrestricted D No PRESENT USE (Check One or More as Appropriate) Q Agricultural | | Commercial I | Educational I I Entertainment | | Government I | Industrial [I] Military 1CX Museum XX Park I | Private Residence O Religious D Scientific I I Transportation n Other (Specify) I | Comments OWNER'S NAME: Mission Mill Museum Association (Owner notified of proposed nomination llr»7r-72.^____ STREET AND NUMBER: 580 State Street, Suite 207 CITY OR TOWN: Salem (D 00 O COURTHOUSE, REGISTRY OF DEEDS, ETC: Marion County Courthouse STREET AND NUMBER: tei NATIONAL Cl TY OR TOWN: Salem REGiSTFP Oregon n O 03 H H- O 41 TITLE OF SURVEY: National Survey of Historic Sites and Buildings DATE OF SURVEY: Federal State | | County Local DEPOSITORY FOR SURVEY RECORDS: National Park Service STREET AND NUMBER: CITY OR TOWN: Washington STATE: District of Columbia 11 CONDITION Q Excellent •jS Altered D Good EKF°i- (Check One) ~] Deteriorated (Check One) O Unaltered •a D Ru 3 Moved g* ns 1 1 Unexposed (Check One) | Original Site Jason Lee*s house was originally sited in the midst of an oak grove on Mill Creek on Chemeketa Plain, It was the first duelling constructed at the location which would later become the mid^Willamette Valley town oFlfalem. As completed late in the spring of 1841, it was an 18 by SO^-foo ^Prs_tory building, 20 feet in height, with lath and plaster walls and lap siding. The original double^hung window sash contained nine lights ovef~ six; The panes measured 7 by 9 inches. The fraiifehouse had an 8-foot loft and a roof with a one-tor-one pitch. It was a quartered, rectangular box with stove chimneys, rather than fireplaces, and possibly an outside acce to the second story. The earliest dated pictorial rendering of the house appeared in the margin of a panorama of Salem lithographed in 1858 by San Francisco artists Charles Conrad Kuchel and Emil Dresel, It shows a Rouble porch, or "piazza,"extending across the face of the house, During the course of its long career as a multir-family dwelling, the most fundamental changes were made in the 1880s, when the house was occupi by a prominent local citizen, Judge Reuben P, Boise, who added fireplaces and carried out a variety of enlargements and alterations. In the 1960s the house was rescued from demolition as a result of a land-use conflict, and was moved onto the Thomas Kay Woolen Mill property along with the Parsonage, which was returned to its historic ground. Located on the eastern edge of Willamette University campus, the 4f5r-acre property is now known as Thomas Kay Historical Park. The objective of the nont-profit Mission Mill Museum Association is not to create an artificial district but to make the most of enforced circumstances by combining two historical interpretive themes in a park^like setting in the heart of the city. The mission houses are sited in casual relationship to one another on level ground of lower elevation to the. rear of the property. m z t/> H 70 C n o z h- U r- OO LLJ UJ PERfOD (Check One or More as Appropriate) [U Pre-Columbian I O 16th Century D 15th Century D 17th Century 20th Century 1841 Abor iginal D Prehistoric [~1 Historic t~[ Agriculture -E^" Architecture -&zv D Art |~| Commerce [ | Communications | | Conservation Q E ducati on f~l Engfneering [~~t Industry { | Invention ([ Landscape Architecture f~) Literature Q Military Q Music Political losophy [ | Science [ j Sculpture [ j Soc i a I/H uman - itarian Q Theater j j Transportation TATEMENT OF SIGNIFICANCE Oregon was the domain of men of the fur trade until 1834, the year in which the Reverend Jason Lee and his small band of Methodist missionaries established a station on the Willamette River, about ten miles north of present-day Salem, This mission to the Indians, the first to_be established anywhere in the Pacific Northwest, operated satellite stations The Dalles, Clatsop Plains, Oregon City and south of Puget Sound, In 1841 the mission expanded to Salem, and a house for Superintendent Lee and a parsonage for the Preacher-in-Charge and Director of the Indian Manual Labor Training School (forerunner of Willamette University) were erected. These whiter-painted frame buildings are the only structures to have remained from the mission period anywhere in the region. Their signiJ> icance locally relates to the founding of j3aleB~-an
