In the early 19th century, the river landing at the mouth of Oswego Creek served as a convenient camping place and relay station for explorers, fur traders, pioneers, and boats traveling between Astoria and Champoeg. In 1850 Albert Alonzo Durham and his wife Miranda filed a Donation Land Claim on 640 acres that included the landing and the creek. Durham built a sawmill on the upper part of the creek, shipped lumber from the landing to San Francisco and the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), and founded a town on the bluff above the river, naming it after Oswego, New York. The lake's waterpower and the landing's access to shipping later made the site an ideal location for an iron furnace. The landing remained the town's transportation hub until the end of the steamboat era, and for the next 60 years the beach was an unofficial park where people launched boats, fished, swam, and picnicked. Every spring, between 75 and 250 Gypsies or Romani camped beside the river for two or three weeks. In 1945 the City purchased the twelve-and-a-half-acre site for a municipal park, and in 1952 named the park after City Councilman George Rogers for his efforts to develop and maintain the grounds.