Butteville, OR

Butteville is a Marion County CDP on the Willamette River in north French Prairie, a place whose old shipping story is much bigger than its present size. Methodist Mission settlers established it in the 1840s, and steam-powered sternwheelers turned the river landing into a major port for wheat and hops headed toward Portland. The railroad arrived in 1905 and gradually took over the freight work. The Historic Butteville Store still stands as the town’s best-known holdover, and the community church and old river buildings keep the French Prairie chapter visible. Butteville is Oregon river-country with a port-town past, a store that refuses to become just history, and Aurora six miles southeast.