Daniel Waldo

Daniel Waldo (March 22, 1800 – September 6, 1880) was an American legislator in the Provisional Government of Oregon, the namesake for the Waldo Hills near Salem, Oregon, and the father of two prominent Oregon politicians. He was also a member of the Oregon Rangers militia and fought in the Cayuse War. Early life Waldo was born in 1800 in Harrison County, Virginia to Jedediah Waldo and Mary Polly Porter. (Harrison County became part of West Virginia during the American Civil War when a portion of Virginia joined the Union as a new state.) After turning 19 years of age Waldo migrated to Missouri where he entered the lumber business. Then in 1825 he married Malinda Lunsford and they moved to St. Clair County, Missouri. He was descended from a Wiltshire, England family who migrated to Massachusetts in the American colonies in the 17th century. Oregon In 1843, the Waldo family traveled the Oregon Trail to Oregon Country. They traveled with their neighbors the Applegates, including Jesse Applegate. Daniel spent most of the trip in a carriage on the journey due to poor health, but the group reach the Willamette Valley in 1843 and settled east of Salem, Oregon in an area now known as the Waldo Hills. The following year Daniel was elected to serve as a legislator in the Provisional Government. Waldo was a member of the provisional government when Oregon's controversial black exclusion laws were enacted. Later life and family With the Cayuse War in 1848, Waldo fought against the Native Americans in Eastern Oregon. Earlier he had been a member of the Oregon Rangers volunteer militia. His second oldest son William Waldo would later be president of the Oregon State Senate, and another son, John B. Waldo, would serve on the Oregon Supreme Court.