Robert Fulton
The first successful trial run of a steamboat had been made several years earlier in the United States by inventor John Fitch, on the Delaware River on August 22, 1787. Attendees included delegates from the Constitutional Convention, who were observing while taking a break from their summer-long sessions at Independence Hall. The steamboat was propelled by a bank of oars on either side of the boat. The following year Fitch launched a boat powered by a steam engine driving several stern-mounted oars. These oars paddled in a manner similar to the motion of a swimming duck's feet. With this boat he carried up to thirty passengers for hire on numerous round-trip voyages on the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Burlington, New Jersey.
Steamboats of the Willamette River
Steam powered vessels did not operate on the Willamette River above Willamette Falls until 1851. Other than the small "Hoosier", a converted ship's long boat with a pile driver engine, the first boat on the Willamette above the falls was the "Canemah", built at the town of the same name and launched towards the end of September, 1851. Her owner was Absalom F. Hedges, the founder of Canemah. "Canemah" proved to be a profitable boat, she got the contract for carrying mail upriver, and earned 20 cents a bushel hauling grain downriver from Corvallis to Canemah. A boat of her size could load 1,000 to 1,500 bushels a trip. "Multnomah", prefabricated back east and shipped out to Oregon, was apparently assembled at Canemah and launched about the same time as the steamer "Canemah". She operated on the Willamette and also on the Yamhill River as far up as Dayton. "Multnomah"'s draft was too deep for the upper stretches of the Willamette (where the real money could be made hauling cargo) and so in May 1852, she was portaged over the falls to operate in the lower Willamette and Columbia rivers.