Kelley, Hall J.

Kelley, Hall J. (Jackson)

(1790–1874) teacher, Oregon propagandist; born in Northwood, N.H. A graduate of Middlebury College (1813), he became a Boston public school director (1818–23), turning to engineering in Palmer, Mass., after his dismissal. He organized the American Society for Encouraging the Settlement of the Oregon Territory (1831), abandoning his family in 1832 to make the arduous trek by land and sea alone, and arriving near death in Ft. Vancouver, Oregon, in 1834. Returning by boat in 1836, he spent the rest of his life as a hermit in Three Rivers, Mass., supported mainly by his neighbors. Although he was something of a fanatic, his "Memoir" (1839), printed in a Congressional report, influenced the eventual American occupation of Oregon.