Wiley Griffon 1867–1913

Employee of the University of Oregon

In the late 1890s he worked as a janitor at the men’s dormitory, Friendly Hall. Despite the exclusion laws in effect at the time, which forbade the presence of nonwhite American citizens in Oregon, Griffon had moved to Eugene from Texas in 1891. While he was neither the first nor the only African American to live in the area, Griffon was the first one to be mentioned by name as a resident. 

Prior to working at the university, he operated the town’s first streetcar service—a mule-powered trolley that ran on narrow-gauge tracks from the Southern Pacific railway depot to the university campus. According to the Eugene Morning Register, Griffon served numerous roles including driver, conductor, dispatcher, and “largely the motive power by persistently shoving along the ambling mule.”  

In 1909, Griffon purchased a home overlooking the Millrace on the site of what is now Eugene Water and Electric Board’s employee parking lot. At the time of his passing in 1913, he was working as a porter at the Elks Club. He was buried in the Eugene Masonic Cemetery, but his tombstone went missing at some point. When Eugene residents and students realized this unfortunate situation, funds were raised to erect historic monuments at the Lane Transit District and EWEB offices in 2017. 

Despite living in Eugene at a time when the community was nearly all-white and the political climate was unwelcoming to people of other races, evidence suggests that Griffon weathered those times with dignity, and in return was generally respected by his neighbors.