Robert Newell | |
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Speaker of the Provisional Legislature of Oregon | |
In office December 2, 1845 – December 10, 1845 |
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Preceded by | Morton M. McCarver |
Succeeded by | Henry A. G. Lee |
In office December 7, 1847 – December 28, 1847 |
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Preceded by | Asa Lovejoy |
Succeeded by | Ralph Wilcox |
Member of the Provisional Legislature of Oregon | |
In office June 27, 1843 – December 28, 1847 |
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Constituency | Champoick District |
Member of the Oregon House of Representatives | |
In office September 10, 1860 – October 19, 1860 |
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Constituency | Marion County |
Personal details | |
Born | March 30, 1807 Zanesville, Ohio |
Died | November 24, 1869 Lapwai, Idaho |
(aged 62)
Political party | Democrat |
Spouse(s) | Kitty Newell Rebecca Newman Mrs. Ward |
Relations | Joseph L. Meek |
Occupation | fur trader |
Robert "Doc" Newell (March 30, 1807 – November 24, 1869), was an American politician and fur trapper in the Oregon Country. He was a frontier doctor in what would become the U.S. state of Oregon. A native of Ohio, he served in the Provisional Government of Oregon and later was a member of the Oregon State Legislature. The Newell House Museum, his reconstructed former home on the French Prairie in Champoeg, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Newell was born on March 30, 1807, in Zanesville, Ohio. In 1829, Newell joined William Sublette and his group on a party to trap beaver. Others in the group included Joseph L. Meek and Jedediah Smith. He trapped fur in the region west of the Rockies in the 1830s, and married Kitty, a Nez Perce woman in 1833. During his time as a mountain man, he became so skilled at basic surgery and healing, despite not having professional medical training, that he earned the nickname "Doctor" or "Doc" Newell that stayed with him the rest of his life.
In 1840, he moved permanently to Oregon Country with his brother-in-law Joseph Meek. They settled on the Tualatin Plains, arriving on December 25 on the plains with two cattle. This was the first time that a wagon completed the journey from Fort Hall to the Columbia River along the Oregon Trail. The following year, they brought the first wagon into the Willamette Valley.