John Smith Griffin

John Smith Griffin (1807–1899) was an American missionary in Oregon Country who participated at the Champoeg Meetings that created the Provisional Government of Oregon in 1843. In Oregon he served as a tutor at Fort Vancouver and later organized a church on the Tualatin Plains in the Tualatin Valley.

Early life On November 23, 1807, John Griffin was born in Castleton, Vermont, to parents who immigrated from England. In New England and Ohio he received an education in both the schools and seminaries. He had planned on setting up a mission on the east side of the Cascade Mountains, but did not receive funds from the missionary board and instead set up a farm in the Tualatin Valley. Members of the church included Joseph L. Meek, George W. Ebbert, Joseph Gale, and Charles Richard McKay among others. This temporary government continued until the government of the Oregon Territory was formed in 1849, after the region south of the 49th parallel north became part of the United States. In 1848, Griffin took possession of the Oregon Mission Press and began printing The Oregon American and Evangelical Unionist. In 1851, Griffin invested in the Portland & Valley Plank Road Company, which began building a plank road from Portland to the Tualatin Valley.

Family

In 1839, Griffin was married in Saint Louis, Missouri, to Desiré C. Smith, who would die in 1884. He then married Lina Harvey Kenyon in Three Oaks, Michigan.