Crawford crossed the
Great Plains with the
Elijah White wagon train and arrived in the
Willamette Valley in late 1842. He first settled in
Salem where he taught at the
Methodist Mission’s school for nine months. In 1843, he married Adalene Brown, whom he met on the trip to Oregon. They had five children; Medorem, Jr., Mary, Henrietta, John, and Frederick. Medorem, Jr. was the first white American male born on the west side of the Willamette River when delivered in January 1844. Also in 1843 he bought part of
James A. O'Neil’s land claim at
Wheatland downriver from Salem. The Crawford family remained on the farm there until the fall of the next year. Crawford moved to
Oregon City in April 1845 where he worked portaging goods around
Willamette Falls for seven years. He moved to a farm on Joe McLoughlin’s old land claim at the mouth of the
Yamhill River in 1852 and filed and received a
Donation Land Claim on the property. Crawford retained his farm near
Dayton in
Yamhill County until his death. In 1861, he returned to New York to visit his father, and on his way back to Oregon was pressed into service by the
United States Army to assist Captain William Murray Maynadier in escorting emigrants to Oregon over the Oregon Trail. Crawford returned to the east in 1862 and received a commission from President
Abraham Lincoln of captain. Assigned as an assistant quartermaster, he organized a 100-man unit under orders to protect emigrants over the Great Plains. Upon completion of the task that year, the unit disbanded in October at
Walla Walla in the
Washington Territory. Crawford did this one final time in 1863. Crawford resigned from the Army after the last escort and received appointment by the President as collector of internal revenue for Oregon. He served in that office from 1864 until 1869. President
Ulysses S. Grant appointed him as
Portland’s appraiser of merchandise in 1871, where he remained until 1876. ==Political career==