English explorer Sir Francis Drake sailed the Pacific in 1579, sacking Spanish galleons and stealing treasure, at least until his boat sprang a leak.

That’s when he found what he called a “Fair and Good Bay” in which to make repairs.

For years, Californians have claimed he landed on their shores. But a scholar at Portland State University says documents in the British Museum show the bay might well have been somewhere along the Oregon coast instead.

Whale Cove near Depoe Bay is a natural harbor with a protected little beach where a ship could be careened — that is, emptied and tipped sideways to expose the hull so sailors can pack gaps in the wooden planks with cotton and tar to stop leaks.

For decades there have been whispers that that’s exactly what Drake did in 1579.

“There are just these little pieces that seem like very tenuous threads,” said retired publisher Rick Beasley, who has heard all the tales.

“There’s a skiff or small boat that is buried in the sediment on the Salmon River,” he said. “There are ballast stones that are out there that divers have found.”

A boy is said to have found an old Spanish coin in his mum’s garden in Newport in 1948. But it was dated after Drake’s landing. Beeswax keeps washing up in the area too. But that’s from a Spanish galleon wrecked off Nehalem.

Exactly where Drake landed on the West Coast in 1579 has been hotly debated for decades. A Wikipedia page lists more than 40 possible locations, from Alaska to Mexico.

California has perhaps the biggest claim, based on findings of old pottery and other artifacts at Point Reyes. The National Park Service even named one area Drakes Bay.

But Melissa Darby, a research scholar in the anthropology department of Portland State University, says her reading of an old document in the British Museum indicates Drake likely landed in Oregon, not California.

The manuscript, from a collection known as the “Hakluyt manuscripts,” was written shortly after the voyage by Richard Hakluyt, one of the queen’s scribes.

“Scholars have been looking at it since the 1850s,” Darby said. “But they’ve been looking at a printed version that was published in 1855. And I went to England and looked at the manuscript itself.”

In her book “Thunder Go North,” Darby says the manuscript indicates Drake sailed as far as 48 degrees north latitude, then landed at 44 degrees for repairs. That puts him somewhere like Whale Cove, near Depoe Bay, instead of Point Reyes, California.

Marco Meniketti, a professor of archeology at San José State University, said people get quite animated about this issue.

“A lot of it has to do with bragging rights, ‘We were the first!’” Meniketti said.

Personally, Meniketti thinks Drake’s descriptions of local tribes match the coastal Miwok tribe in Point Reyes, but there’s room for debate.

“[The debate] is still alive because the evidence is not 100% bulletproof,” Meniketti said.

Drake Navigators Guild points out there are about 30 websites offering what it calls fringe and conspiracy theories on the location of the bay.

Claiming land around ‘Fair and Good Bay’

Back in 16th century England, one way to make a fortune was to gather a few friends together, build a ship and send it out to privateer — that is, steal from Spanish or French ships then divide the spoils with the English crown.

So it was in 1577 that a handful of the most powerful people in England sent Francis Drake out in the Golden Hind and four other ships to sail around South America into the Pacific Ocean.

The voyages proved unbelievably successful, mainly because the Spanish were not expecting English privateers in the Pacific.

“[The Spanish] were caught unawares and unguarded. They had no cannon pointing towards the ocean,” Darby explained. Drake “just went from treasure house to treasure house along the coast. And harried all the shipping.”

Drake’s biggest haul came from a ship called the Cacafuego.

“It took a day and a half just to download all the silver bars and chests of gold,” Darby said.

But Drake couldn’t simply head home with his spoils. In addition to being a privateer, he was a spy. Queen Elizabeth I had charged him with finding the Northwest Passage, a sea route explorers hoped would connect the Atlantic and the Pacific.

Drake headed north. But the Golden Hind was full of plunder and sprung a leak. He had to find a protected bay to careen the ship.

In the official record of voyage, Drake landed at a “Fair and Good Bay” where the crew remained for six to 10 weeks, trading with locals and claiming the land.

Europeans had four requirements for a land claim back then. A flag or plaque had to be placed; a religious ceremony held; the claim had to be published; and the explorer had to have an official discussion with the Indigenous leader explaining the claim.

Darby thinks Drake misread the traditional tribal offering to important visitors.

“They gave Drake this feathered headdress and he said: ‘Oh, well they’re giving me the crown of the country.’ Well, that was a total misconception,” Darby said.

When Drake returned to England, he proved to be both a hero and a problem. His haul provided enough money for Queen Elizabeth to build a fleet of warships. On the other hand, England wasn’t at war with Spain, so the queen had to distance herself.

“The queen said, ‘Oh no. I didn’t send Drake out. He’s a pirate and we’re going to return the treasure to you [Spain].’ That was a ruse,” Darby said.

“The treasure never got returned.”

Most importantly for this story, Drake gave the queen the logs of his voyage, including how far north he’d travelled. The official account places the Golden Hind at 42-43 degrees north latitude. But Darby and others think the real latitude was kept secret because the country that found a Northwest Passage would make millions on a cheaper trade route to Asia.

Darby also thinks England placed the official latitude lower because it was trying to grab land.

“The boundary of New Spain was right around San Francisco. So I’m sure they looked at a map and said, ‘This is unclaimed land.’ Drake didn’t see this land because he was looking for the Northwest Passage. ‘Well, we can’t leave this open so let’s just say he was down there.’”

Debate about where he landed may be heated, but some wonder whether it matters in the current era, when colonialism is largely condemned.

Many people think so, because Drake was the first British explorer to contact Native Americans on the West Coast. Also, crew member Diego was possibly among the first Black people to set foot in the West Coast.

Why people believe Drake landed in California

Darby also thinks history gives insight to the present. For example, one of the reasons the California bay has the momentum as Drake’s landing spot is that a brass plaque was found there in 1937. It was dated 1579 and said in part: “I [Drake] take possession of this Kingdom whose king and people freely resign their right and title.”

Herbert Bolton, a University of California, Berkeley, professor at the time, proclaimed it to be authentic. But a metallurgy test in the 1970s showed the plaque was probably a hoax.

Darby thinks racism was at work.

“[Californians] didn’t like the fact that Spain was claiming a lot of the history of California. And so they wanted to make the history of California a sparkling white history and so Drake was their hero,” she said.

Archeology professor Marco Meniketti also thinks Drake’s landing spot is important, because it spurred the Spanish to push their interest farther up the California coast.

“That created an impetus for Spain to start moving the Mission system further north,” Meniketti said.

The oral histories of some Native American tribes in Oregon do refer to visiting ships and wrecks. But not 400 years ago.

Robert Kentta with the Siletz Tribe said Drake’s sailors probably did trade during the weeks they were fixing their ship, and there are stories of swords and coins being found in Oregon — but nothing decisive. And, Kentta said, the descriptions of some Indigenous artifacts in voyage accounts give him cause for doubt.

“Drake’s journals even talked about the basketry being decorated with feathers, which is a very Central Californian coastal tradition, which has never been practiced here as far as I know,” he said.

The actual location of Drake’s “Fair and Good Bay” may never be decisively confirmed. There is a rumor that the original voyage logs still exist somewhere among the British crown’s private papers. But the truth is probably that they were incinerated in 1698, when Whitehall Palace in London burned to the ground.

The biggest livestock farms would be prohibited from building or expanding in some of Oregon’s most polluted groundwater regions, under a proposed bill backed by environmental groups.

Those groups say it will keep nitrate pollution from getting worse in communities that rely on well water for drinking.

A coalition of environmental and sustainable farming advocacy groups is backing Senate Bill 80. Stand Up to Factory Farms argues Oregon should stop permitting new or expanding dairy farms and other big livestock farms from seeking a confined animal feeding operation, or CAFO, permit, in all of Oregon’s three groundwater management areas.

Those are areas with high levels of nitrate pollution in groundwater, and are designated by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.

Farm lobbying groups in the past have opposed attempts at a ban. They have argued it puts more unnecessary burdens on an industry they say is already over regulated.

It’s a move environmental groups say is common sense, especially in the Lower Umatilla Basin Groundwater Management Area, where nitrate pollution has been a known problem for the last 30 years, and where recent reports show it has become worse over the past decade. Nitrates can cause cancer and other illnesses if consumed in high quantities, and they’re especially harmful to infants.

Studies point to local large dairy and cattle farms, wastewater from food processing facilities, and farmers applying liquid manure as fertilizer to irrigated fields as the leading sources of pollution in the area.

“Our thought is, why make the problem worse when we can say, ‘Let’s not expand, let’s not add any more livestock to these areas,’” said Amy van Saun, a senior attorney at the Center for Food Safety’s Portland office, and a member of Stand Up to Factory Farms. “Because as strict as a permit may be, it’s only as good as whether it’s followed or enforced. And the problem we see is that the state still seems like they will always say yes to these operations as long as they’ve checked all the boxes.”

This is at least the third attempt at a CAFO moratorium in Oregon. The last time, during the 2023 state legislative session, plans for a ban were scrapped by legislators following heated debate over the impact the law would have on Oregon’s livestock farms. Instead, they passed Senate Bill 85, a reform package that included stricter water use and construction requirements for CAFO facilities.

Michele Okoh, a law professor specializing in environmental justice at Lewis and Clark College, said that, while stopping mega-dairies and other large livestock farms from being built does keep pollution from getting worse, it can be easy for operators to find loopholes.

She said producers could just operate smaller farms. So instead of having one large farm with 30,000 dairy cows, they can operate 10 farms with 3,000 cows. She points to North Carolina, a state that passed a swine farm moratorium in 2007, yet the number of CAFOs has ballooned in recent years.

She added that, for communities like the ones in northern Morrow and northwest Umatilla counties to see a change in the level of pollution in their groundwater, state agencies need to step in.

“There needs to be more monitoring and education for well owners,” she said. “Because at the end of the day, if you find the contamination and you can’t do very much about it, then you can’t protect your own health. So what is the value of knowing there’s contamination, but you don’t have options?”

Last year, Oregon Gov. Tina Kotek laid out plans to reduce nitrate pollution in that area, but progress has been slow.

Van Saun said while the proposed SB89 is not a cure for the problem, it will at least help it from getting worse while groups work toward regulatory solutions.

“We really need action to stop pollution at the sources, and so preventing new sources of pollution allows us a little bit more time to address those existing sources rather than continuing to pile on,” van Saun said.

The Oregon Ducks have been in offseason mode since their loss to the Ohio State Buckeyes in the Rose Bowl, as the team has taken the first steps toward another potential championship-level run in 2025.

Things are already looking up in Eugene for next season, and On3 college football insider Steve Wiltfong agrees thanks to an elite Oregon transfer portal class, which he said is “by far” the best group of incoming transfers for any team in 2025.

“Oregon has by far, the most talented Transfer Portal class coming when looking at the On3 Industry’s average ranking per commit,” Wiltfong wrote. “From 3 terrific OLs, to 2 Indianapolis-area DBs, to landing the top RB in the portal, Dan Lanning and his staff cleaned up.”

Time will tell how all the transfers gel, but there’s no reason to think the Ducks won’t be in for another successful season given what Oregon coach Dan Lanning has done during his tenure.

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So, who are these new faces?

The Ducks have landed transfer commitments from running back Makhi Hughes (Tulane) offensive lineman Emmanuel Pregnon (USC), wide receiver Malik Benson (Florida State), offensive tackle Isaiah World (Nevada), defensive lineman Bear Alexander (USC), cornerback Theran Johnson (Northwestern), safety Dillon Thieneman (Purdue), offensive lineman Alex Harkey (Texas State) and tight end Jamari Johnson (Louisville).

With World and Pregnon, the Ducks secured two of the top offensive lineman available in the portal this offseason. Elsewhere on offense, Hughes is expected to be an immediate contributors next season. He finished the 2024 season at Tulane with 265 carries for 1,401 yards and 17 total touchdowns.

On defense, Thieneman is a name to watch in the secondary. He had six interceptions in 2023 and impressed Lanning in Oregon’s 35-0 win over Purdue on Oct. 18.

“I mean, obviously, 31 is a guy that can play sideline to sideline,” Lanning said. “They play their safety a little deeper than some teams traditionally, which allows him to really play, almost like a flat-footed read player back there who can see the ball and react to the ball. And he’s a really talented player who does a great job of doing that, and finds himself around the ball consistently.”

The Ducks have had a slew of transfer departures as well.

Oregon has had eight portal entrees this offseason with seven making commitments, as safety Tyler Turner (Baylor), quarterback Jaron Keawe Sagapolutele (Cal), cornerback Khamari Terrell (Texas State), offensive tackle JacQawn McRoy (Arkansas), edge rushers Jaxson Jones (Utah), Emar’rion Winston (Baylor) and Jaeden Moore (Pitt) have all found new homes.

Former Oregon receiver Ryan Pellum remains available in the portal. He was reportedly arrested earlier this month stemming from a “pistol-whipping” incident in California on Christmas Day.

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