One of the first settlements in the Coast Range, Scottsburg was founded in 1850 at the head of tidewater on the Umpqua River by legendary pioneer Levi Scott, who started a homestead here. For more than 20 years before that, Hudson Bay Co. trappers had been regular visitors to the lower Umpqua Valley, trading for furs with the local Umpqua tribes. Scottsburg grew quickly and became the busiest shipping port in Southern Oregon during the territory’s gold rush years, but the Great Flood of 1861 obliterated the lower part of town, and Scottsburg never regained its prominence. The descendant of the first store, built by Cyrus W. Hedden, continued into the middle of the 20th century, and still stands in what was then called Upper Town.