November 12, 2024 3:20 a.m.

The Douglas County Historical Society is hosting a program about Letitia Carson on Saturday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. at the Douglas County Museum.

Information from The Ford Family Foundation said Carson is a formerly enslaved woman who came to Oregon in 1845 and was one of the first Black settlers in Oregon. She and her husband, David Carson, settled on land in Myrtle Creek that is now part of OSU’s Soap Creek beef ranch. Because of Oregon’s exclusion laws and the whites only provision of the 1850 Oregon Donation Land Claim Act, Carson was forced off her land. She filed two lawsuits in the mid-1850s against the administrator of her late partner’s estate. Despite the Oregon Territory’s exclusionary laws, Carson won both suits.

A number of people connected to Letitia Carson are expected to be in attendance at Saturday’s event.

For more information about the Douglas County Historical Society, go to: https://douglascountyhistoricalsociety.org/