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Lewis & Clark stayed near present day Astoria during the winter of 1805-06, and built Fort Clatsop for shelter. Clatsop County was named for the Clatsop Indians, one of many Chinook tribes living in Oregon. Members of the Pacific Fur Company, owned by John Jacob Astor, arrived in March of 1811 and established Fort Astoria.
Several years later, the company failed, and the fort and fur trade were sold to the British in 1813. The fort was restored to the U.S. in 1818, though the fur trade would remain under British control until American pioneers following the Oregon Trail began filtering into the port town in the mid-1840's. In 1847, the first post office west of the Rockies was established in Astoria by James Shively. The first U.S. Customs house was established in Astoria in 1849.
In the late 1800’s, Astoria’s salmon canneries, forest and shipping industries turned the area into the liveliest boom town between Seattle and San Francisco. Immigrants came from Finland, Scandinavia and China, expanding the area’s culture as well as its economy. Captain George Flavel was one of the first licensed Columbia River Bar Pilots and Astoria’s first millionaire. He built the Flavel Mansion in 1885, now open to the public as the Flavel House Museum.
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