The title of “first white child born in Jacksonville” has been a subject of debate for over 150 years given there are multiple claimants. The issue is clouded since “firsts” are usually awarded in retrospect and memories can be unreliable. Also most individuals reporting on the subject credited any event happening in southern Oregon to Jacksonville because that was the closest town, the name known to them, and subsequently the County Seat.
August 11, 1852, the earliest known birth date, belongs to Bruce Evans. In 1903 he applied for a passport and listed his birthplace as Jacksonville. There is a 2-year-old Bruce Evans listed in the 1854 Jackson County Territorial Census. However, the only Evans family on record at that time lived near what is now Rogue River. Beginning in 1851, Davis “Coyote” Evans operated a ferry on what became known as Evans Creek, a tributary of the Rogue.
A second claimant is Cornelius Jasper Armstrong, born February 24, 1853, to Robert and Minerva Armstrong. When the Armstrong family arrived in 1852, Robert and Minerva settled on a farm 4 miles north of Jacksonville at the base of the western hills. They did not move into Jacksonville until 1890.
A third claimant is James Clugage McCully, born August 27, 1853, to Jane and John McCully and named after James Clugage, one of Jacksonville’s “town fathers.” We do know the McCully’s lived in town, initially in a log cabin on the property at the corner of California and South 5th streets where the McCully House now stands.
In the 1850s, babies were born at home. So while Bruce Evans may lay claim to the title “first white child born in Jackson County,” we’ll give the title of “first white child born in Jacksonville” to James Clugage McCully.