Archives West Finding Aid

Oregon pioneer patriarch Henry J. Taylor (1851-1934) and his first wife, Mary Susan Becket (1852-1884) left Missouri, for California, in 1873. William Frederick Taylor (Fred or W.F.) was born in California in 1874 to Henry J. Taylor (H.J.T.) and Mary Susan Becket. In 1879 H.J.T. moved his family to Pendleton, Oregon There he acquired 1,000 acres of land, grew wheat, and was a civic leader and an Oregon State senator. His oldest son, Fred, married Mary Louisa Kees of Weston and Pendleton, Oregon, whose maternal great grandfather, David Lenox captained a wagon on the Oregon Trail in 1843.

Mary's paternal grandfather Andrew Kees was another Oregon Trail pioneer who served as a trustee of the Whitman Seminary from 1865 to 1881. As the family transitioned away from farming, Fred and Mary's moved across Washington and Oregon. They lived in Pendleton, Pomeroy, Spokane, Walla Walla and then to Eugene and Newberg. In each town they were involved in community, church, and civic organizations and activities. Fred's hobby of photography, influenced by his association with photographer Lee Moorhouse, provides glimpses into the life and times of that period both at home and during his travels.

Edward Ernest Ruby (E.E.R.) was born in Indiana in 1874. He met Millie Blanche Blynn (Blanche) at Indiana University and they were married in 1899. In 1903, E.E.R. became one of twelve faculty members at Whitman College where he served until 1931. He was Professor of Latin (1904-14), Registrar (1906-1918 and 1920-1931), Dean of Language Groups (1913-1918), Clement Biddle Penrose Professor of Latin (1920-1931), Secretary for Correspondence (1920-1928), Secretary of the Board of Deans (1929-1931) and advisor to the Phi Delta Theta chapter. Oversight of the Whitman library was one of his duties and he used that experience to volunteer for war service with the American Library Association (A.L.A.). From 1917 to 1919 he took leave from Whitman and organized and supervised libraries at military facilities in Washington State, primarily at Fort Lewis and later in France and Germany. After resigning from Whitman in 1940, E.E.R. and Blanche lived in Menasha, Wisconsin, Oxford, Ohio, and Portland, Oregon. Each of their three children attended Whitman: James Tate Ruby '27, Katharine Elizabeth Ruby (Betty) '28 (who would marry LaValette Henry Taylor) and Edward Ernest Ruby (Bidder) '30.

LaValette Henry Taylor (Henry) was the only son of Fred and Mary Taylor. Born in Pendleton in 1907, he was known as "LaValette" until entering Whitman College in 1924 when he decided to drop his difficult-to-pronounce first name and be known as "Henry". At Whitman he met Katharine Elizabeth Ruby (Betty), daughter of Edward Ernest Ruby (E.E.R.) and Millie Blanche Blynn Ruby (Blanche). E.E.R. was instrumental in Henry's introduction to and subsequent enrollment at Whitman. Henry and Betty were Whitman class of 1928, married in Walla Walla in 1930 (where Henry taught for a year at Whitman), and began a life that would take them to Harvard University, Hartford, Connecticut, and through naval service in World War II and careers as a high school administrator and a homemaker.