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GENEALOGY COLLECTION
SPOKANE AND THE SPOKANE COUNTRY
PICTORIAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL
De Luxe Supplement
VOLUME II
1912 THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY SPOKANE
CHICAGO
PHILADELPHIA
1411105
hon George Turner
A MONG Spokane's citizens who have figured in na- tional affairs Hon. George Turner is prominent. His public service has rested upon the firm basis of a wide and thorough knowledge of the law and he has never regarded a public office as a personal asset to be used for the promotion of individual interests but rather as a trust to be sacredly guarded for the benefit of his country and his constituents. While in the courts he has been an important factor in the interpretation of the laws and in congress he has aided in formulating the legal principles which constitute the stable forces of the nation. It would be difficult to point out that period of his life which has been of greatest benefit to his fellowmen, for as supreme court justice of Washington during territorial days, as a member of the constitutional convention of the state, as a mem- ber of the United States senate and in diplomatic service his work has all been fruitful of good results.
Judge Turner was born in Edina, Knox county, Missouri, Feb- ruary 25, 1850, a son of Grenville Davenport and Maria (Taylor) Turner. His parents in 1825 had removed from Kentucky to Mis- souri and had cast in their lot with the pioneer settlers of the latter state, where they maintained their residence until called to their final rest. The father, who was a cabinetmaker by trade, came of English and Dutch ancestry, while his wife, a daughter of George and Maria Taylor, was representative of a family of Scotch-Irish origin that had settled at an early period in the part of Virginia which is now West Virginia.
About 1859 Grenville D. Turner removed with his family to Lebanon, Laclede county, Missouri, and his son, George, then a lad of nine years, became a pupil in the public schools, but his education was interrupted owing to the fact that the schools were obliged to be closed when Missouri became the scene of conflict between contending armies in the Civil war. His father and all of his brothers promptly espoused the cause of the Union and served with the volunteer sol- diers in the northern army. Judge Turner also proved his worth to his country in that trying hour for, although but thirteen years of age, he became a military telegraph operator in his home town of
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Don. George Turner
Lebanon, continuing at that work until the end of the war. He was in the south during the reconstruction period and passed the examin- ation for admission to the bar at Mobile, Alabama, in 1868, although but eighteen years of age. The same year he entered upon the active practice of law in Mobile in connection with a friend, Charles E. Mayer, and displayed such ability in the conduct of cases that in 1874 the republican party of Alabama named him as its candidate for the office of attorney general of the state. Such was his personal popu- larity and the confidence reposed in his ability that he polled a very large vote, being defeated by only a small majority. Again and again at different periods in his life he has been called from private practice to public service. From 1876 until 1880 he filled the posi- tion of United States marshal for the southern and middle districts of Alabama and in the latter year and again in 1884 he was chair- man of the Alabama delegation in the republican national convention, giving his support in 1880 to General Grant as the presidential nom- inee.
Judge Turner's identification with Washington dates from 1884, in which year he was appointed associate justice of the supreme court of this territory. He was assigned to the fourth district, which in- cluded the greater part of eastern Washington, and had first made his home in Yakima but in 1885 removed to Spokane, where he has since resided. He proved himself the peer of the ablest members who have sat upon the supreme court bench of this state, but in 1887 he resigned his judicial position to enter upon the private practice of law as a member of the firm of Turner, Foster & Turner. That asso- ciation continued until 1890, when he became senior member of the firm of Turner, Graves & Mckinstry, so continuing until his election to the United States senate in 1897. He is now practicing in the firm of Turner & Geraghty, a foremost one in the ranks of the legal profession in the state. His opinions while on the bench showed great research, industry and care and expressed a solidity and an exhaust- iveness from which no members of the bar could take exception. While well grounded in the principles of common law when admitted to practice, he has continued through the whole of his professional life a diligent student of those elementary principles that constitute the basis of all legal science. He has been connected with few busi- ness interests outside the strict path of his profession, yet was one of the men largely interested in the celebrated Le Roi mine in British Columbia.
The bent of Judge Turner's active mind has made him take a lively pleasure in the study of the science of government and because
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Jhon. George Turner
of this his labors have been particularly effective and beneficial in public offices to which he has been called. In 1889 he rendered valu- able service as chairman of the judiciary committee in the convention which was called to form the state constitution of Washington and left the indelible impress of his individuality upon the organic law of the state. In his political relations he acted with the republican party until 1896, when he supported William Jennings Bryan on the sil- ver issue. In the following year he was elected United States sen- ator from Washington and in that office served for the full constitu- tional term, retiring in 1903. Presidential appointment made him a member of the Alaska boundary tribunal, which met in London in the summer of 1903 and settled the Alaskan boundary dispute between the United States and England. In 1910 he received from Secretary of State Root the appointment as leading counsel of the United States in the northeastern fisheries arbitration at the Hague. Upon his retirement from the state department Mr. Root became a participant in the case, whereupon Mr. Turner insisted upon with- drawing as leading counsel in favor of Mr. Root. The case was opened for the United States by Mr. Turner, following Sir Robert Finley, who opened for Great Britain, each occupying eight days.
On the 4th of June, 1878, in Montgomery, Alabama, Mr. Turner was united in marriage to Miss Bertha C. Dreher, a daughter of George and Catherine (Scheiss) Dreher, the father a native of Sax- ony and the mother of Switzerland. They came to this country at an early day and were married in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and later removed to Alabama. His social and fraternal relations are with the Masons and the Elks, the Spokane Club, the Spokane Athletic Club, the Spokane Country Club, and the Metropolitan Club of Wash- ington, D. C. Association with him means expansion and elevation. He has throughout his life been a close student of men and affairs and his analytical power has brought him clear understanding of both. This same power has enabled him at all times to see below the surface of things in his consideration of vital state and national ques- tions and to correctly determine the possible outcome of a critical situation. The judicial trend of his mind has kept him free from personal bias or prejudice in his public acts and his course has at all times sustained the honor of state and country without the sacrifice of the rights of other lands. A gracious presence, a charming per- sonality and profound legal wisdom all combine to make him one of the most distinguished and honored residents of the state of Wash- ington.
Robl & Atschorn
Robert Edmund Strahorn
TARTING out in life with less opportunity or equip- S ment than the average American boy, but evidently possessed of an optimism and determination which enabled him to triumph over many adverse situations and discouragements, Robert Edmund Strahorn has followed the lead of his opportunities, doing as best he could anything that came to hand, and creating and seizing legiti- mate advantages as they have arisen. He has never hesitated to take a forward step when the way was open. Fortunate in possessing a degree of earnestness and frankness that have inspired confidence in others, the simple weight of his character and ability have carried him into important relations with large interests and he is now the presi- dent of several important railway and other corporations with head- quarters in Spokane. The North Coast Railroad project especially owes its inception and prosecution to him and is constituting a most important element in business activity throughout the northwest.
Mr. Strahorn was born in Center county, Pennsylvania, May 15, 1852. The family is of Scotch-Irish origin and the ancestry in America is traced back to the great-grandfather of our subject, who in colonial days came from Scotland to the new world and afterward aided in obtaining American liberty in the Revolutionary war. He continued a resident of Union county, Pennsylvania, until his death and his son, Samuel Strahorn, grandfather of our subject, also made his home in that county. The father, Thomas F. Strahorn, there born and reared, learned the trades of a millwright and machinist and in 1856 removed from Center county, Pennsylvania, to Freeport, Illi- nois, and nine years later became a resident of Sedalia, Missouri. In 1878 he crossed the Rockies, following in the footsteps of his son who had preceded him in 1870, and after residing for a time in Idaho and Montana, he became a resident of Los Angeles, California, where he passed away in 1883. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Rebecca Emmert, was born in Center county, Pennsylvania, and was of Dutch lineage, a daughter of John Emmert, who had come to this country from Switzerland. The death of Mrs. Strahorn occurred in 1861.
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Robert Comund Strahorn
Robert E. Strahorn spent the first four years of his life in the state of his nativity and was then taken by his parents to northern Illi- nois, where the period of his youth was passed in village and farm life where his work was of the hardest. His educational privileges were very limited, as he attended school only until ten years of age. Private reading and study, however, constantly broadened his knowl- edge and the studious habits of his youth have made him a man of wide general information. In the school of experience, too, he learned many valuable lessons which have proven of significant worth in his advancement in the business world. In his boyhood days, after his life on the farm, he first sold papers on the streets, and then began learning the printer's trade in Sedalia, Missouri, following that occu- pation for five years. Subsequent to his removal to Denver, Colo- rado, in 1870, he was engaged in newspaper work as reporter, editor and correspondent until 1877. During the Sioux war of 1875-6 in Wyoming and Montana, he was with General Crook as special cor- respondent of the New York Times, Chicago Tribune and Denver News, personally participating in the fighting in all of the engage- ments with the Indians, the secretary of war commending him for his gallantry and helpfulness to the government. Moreover, he wrote most interesting accounts of that frontier warfare, which was needed in quelling the Indians in their hostile resentment of the incoming civilization.
While pursuing the journalistic profession Mr. Strahorn became interested in and to some extent identified with the railway business, accompanying as correspondent several surveying parties and also performing publicity work for the Denver & Rio Grande, the Colo- rado Central and the Union Pacific Railroad Companies. This opened up to him the opportunity of entering into active connection with railway interests and he organized and conducted the publicity bureaus of the Union Pacific and Kansas Pacific Companies, during which period, from 1877 until 1884, he resided much of the time in Omaha and in Denver. He was also engaged in a confidential capacity in work relating to the extension of lines for the Union Pacific, this carrying hin by stage, horseback and on foot into almost every county of every state and territory west of the Missouri river and brought to him his wide knowledge of the conditions and the opportunities of the west. His next step in the business world brought him into intimate connection with town-site, irrigation and power enterprises in Idaho, Oregon and Washington and when six years had passed in that way he returned to the east, settling in Boston, Massachusetts, in 1890. Through the succeeding eight years he devoted his attention to the
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Robert Comund Strahorn
negotiation of municipal bonds but since 1898 has permanently re- sided in Spokane, where he again became actively interested in de- velopment projects, his special lines of operation being in connection with the construction and operation of waterworks, power and elec- tric plants and irrigation. Those interests still claim his attention and energies to a considerable extent and have constituted a signifi- cant force in the improvement and upbuilding of the districts in which he has operated. His enterprise and executive ability in recent years have, moreover, brought him into prominence in railway con- nections as the promoter and builder of the North Coast Railroad. He undertook to prosecute that project in the spring of 1905 with the result that in the fall of that year a company was organized and the engineering and construction work has since proceeded steadily. The system is designed to bring Seattle, Tacoma and Portland on the west into direct connection with Walla Walla and Spokane on the east and includes a new short line between Spokane and Walla Walla and another between Spokane and Lewiston, Idaho, and, with its branches, is to have a total length of seven hundred and fifty miles. Throughout practically the whole existence of the company Mr. Stra- horn has been its president and active manager. The value of the project is recognized by every business man of this section and its worth as a developing factor of Washington can scarcely be overesti- mated. In connection with this, Mr. Strahorn has organized the Spokane Union Terminal project which will center five railways in one grand passenger terminal and provide for their concentration along one central zone through the heart of the city, with all surface or grade crossings eliminated. In working this out he overcame ob- stacles which in the aggregate were almost appalling.
The North Coast Railroad project has sometimes been called the railway romance of our time and our subject, its central figure, the "Sphinx" and "Man of Mystery" because of the very unusual and unique manner of its financing and building, involving many mil- lions of dollars, without the identity of Mr. Strahorn's financial back- ers becoming known. The war made upon him by rival railway in- terests and others bent upon unmasking and defeating him has been a sensation of large magnitude in the Pacific northwest, and probably more than any other of Mr. Strahorn's undertakings has emphasized his fine poise, unfaltering pursuit of an undertaking once decided upon and his undying devotion to any trust imposed in him, as well as his modesty in success. Late in the year 1910, when the larger mat- ters desired had been accomplished, this ban of secrecy was removed and it developed that Mr. Strahorn had been the confidential agent
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Robert Comund Strahorn
of Mr. Harriman from the first and the North Coast Railroad enter- prise was consolidated with other Harriman lines in the northwest under the name of the Oregon-Washington Railroad & Navigation Company, and Mr. Strahorn made vice-president of the larger cor- poration.
In order to appreciate some of the accomplishments of this great railroad builder be it stated that several hundred miles of road sur- veyed and in part constructed have been paid for, to the extent of sev- eral million dollars, by the personal check of Mr. Strahorn. A thou- sand miles of surveyed lines, a hundred miles completed in the Ya- kima valley, trains operating on portions of road, are a few of the things that have been accomplished in an incredibly short time and in the face of tremendous odds and opposition. There has been built one bridge two thousand nine hundred feet long spanning the Co- lumbia; another over the Snake will be four thousand and seventy feet long and two hundred and seventy-five feet high, probably the highest over any large river in the United States, and this bridge will have ten million pounds of steel used in its construction. Mr. Stra- horn will erect in the city of Spokane alone one bridge one hundred and sixty-five feet high and three thousand feet long; another one hundred and seventy-five feet high and one thousand feet long, and both to be marvelous engineering feats.
More recently these interests have organized the West Coast Rail- way designed to do important construction across the Cascade moun- tains, with Mr. Strahorn as president, and also the Yakima Valley Transportation Company, which is building important electric rail- way lines under his direction. Among his many important personal enterprises are the Northwest Light & Water Company, owning wa- terpower, electric lighting and waterworks plants in various cities of Oregon, Washington and Idaho; the Yakima Valley Power Com- pany, which has built electric transmission lines one hundred and ten miles in length, connecting up and furnishing electric power to all the cities of the Yakima valley and Pasco; and the Pasco Reclama- tion Company, which is irrigating and otherwise developing large areas of orchard lands surrounding the city of Pasco. Besides finan- cing and being president and manager of these and other companies, Mr. Strahorn has found time to engage in many other activities in connection with commercial organizations throughout the northwest.
On the 19th of September, 1877, Mr. Strahorn was married to Miss Carrie Adell Green, a daughter of Dr. J. W. Green, of Mar- engo, Illinois, whose social graces and literary attainments (the lat- ter best evidenced by her authorship of the popular volume "Fifteen
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Robert Comund Strahorn
thousand miles by stage") are eloquent testimonials to the credit her husband so freely accords her for a large measure of his success.
Mr. Strahorn is a valued member of several social organizations, including the Spokane Club, Spokane Athletic Club, the Inland Club and the Spokane Country Club, and for several years he has been a trustee of the Spokane Chamber of Commerce, cooperating in all of its practical plans for the development of the city. His genial nature, ever-ready helpfulness and philanthropy have given him a large place in the hearts of his fellow citizens. Mr. Strahorn is a man of well balanced capacities and powers, without any of that genius which is liable to produce erratic movements resulting in unwarranted risk and failure. He is eminently a man of business sense, of well bal- anced mind, even temper and conservative habits, and possesses that kind of enterprise that leads to great accomplishments and benefits others more than himself.
Carrie Adell Strahorn
Mrs. Carrie Adell Strahorn
ARRIE ADELL (GREEN) STRAHORN, wife C of Robert E. Strahorn, of Spokane, is a native of Marengo, MeHenry county, Illinois, being the sec- ond daughter of Dr. John W. and Louise Babcock Green. Her parents were pioneers of northern Illi- nois, her father having removed in 1846 from Green- field, Ohio, of which place Dr. Green's parents were founders. These grandparents of Mrs. Strahorn, on her father's side, were descend- ants of prominent patriots of like name of the Revolutionary war. Her mother, who died in Marengo in 1899, was a native of Lavonia Center, New York, and was a descendant of Aaron Burr. Dr. John W. Green, Mrs. Strahorn's father, who died in Chicago in 1893, was for fifty years one of the most noted surgeons of the Mississippi valley. He was the first surgeon to administer an anesthetic west of Chicago. He served with great distinction during the war of the Rebellion, first as regimental surgeon of the Ninety-fifth Illi- nois, and later as brigade and finally as division surgeon with General Grant in the Army of the Tennessee. Mrs. Green accompanied her husband throughout the famous Red river campaign, sharing every danger of field and hospital.
Carrie Adell Green had the advantage of the public schools of Marengo, supplemented by a liberal education in the higher branches at Ann Arbor. Developing an ardent love for music, she studied to good purpose under some of the foremost American and European vocal masters, and thus, when wedded to Robert E. Strahorn, at Marengo, September 19, 1877, she possessed to an unusual degree the graces and refinements and all the wholesome attributes and practical helpfulness of the sensibly reared young womanhood of those days.
It is not too much to say that Carrie Adell Strahorn has well main- tained the lofty traditions of the sturdy, heroic stock of pioneers, patriots and state builders of her ancestry. A superb, home-loving, womanly woman always, yet she has had so much to do with the devel- opment of the frontier that her public life and accomplishments have been the inspiration and pride of many communities in the Rocky Mountain and Pacific coast states. It has been well said of her that she has "mothered the west."
Immediately after her marriage in 1877 she set out with her hus- band on the often dangerous and romantic, and always toilsome
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Mrs. Carrie Adell Strahorn
career (in a field covering nearly half our continent) the brighter aspects of which are so vividly portrayed in her famous book "Fifteen Thousand Miles by Stage," which was published in 1911 by G. P. Putnam's Sons.
Probably no other woman has so thoroughly experienced every phase of far west exploration and genuine pioneering. This, cover- ing a period of thirty-four years while the west has been in the mak- ing, has gone through all gradations from the wilderness haunts of the hostile savage along through the rudest camps of the miner and cowboy to zealous, practical participation in colonization, and town and city building in many waste places, often far in advance of the railways. This work was particularly noticeable and effective from 1877 to 1880 in Nebraska, Colorado and Wyoming, and from 1880 to 1890 in Utah, Montana, Idaho and Washington. From 1890 to 1898, while Mr. Strahorn transferred his activities largely to New England, Mrs. Strahorn pursued her musical and literary studies in Boston. During this period, however, the Strahorns spent a portion of each year in Spokane and vicinity, or elsewhere in the Rocky Mountains. Since 1898, when they located permanently in Spokane, Mrs. Strahorn has been everything in the life and growth of the city and state that might be expected from one so fully equipped and so ardently in love with the Pacific coast country and its institutions.
Being a frequent contributor to the columns of various eastern publications during all these years, she has made the most of many opportunities to faithfully portray the leading characteristics of far west life and development, never failing to award due praise to the heroic work of the pioneers, as well as to enthusiastically strive for wider recognition of the merits of western resources and institutions, and our climatic, scenic and other attractions.
The camp or home of the Strahorns has always been a landmark of hospitality and a rallying point for the creation and nourishing of public spirit and the strenuous promotion of every good cause. Not a few of the far west's foremost men in business, professional and political life, join her noted husband in gratefully ascribing much of their success to Mrs. Strahorn's untiring encouragement and general helpfulness in her home, social and public activities at the period in their lives when such help meant everything to them. She has also accomplished much in church building and in the founding and sup- port of educational and charitable institutions. Notwithstanding the success, financially and otherwise, of Mr. Strahorn, and her prom- inent place and hearty participation in the social life of Spokane, Mrs. Strahorn has not relaxed in her devotion to these more useful and serious things and is still actively engaged in literary pursuits.
William Pettet
William Pettet
T HE life history of William Pettet if written in detail would furnish many a chapter of thrilling interest and in the plain statement of facts should serve to inspire and encourage others, giving indication of what may be accomplished when a high sense of duty is coupled with determined purpose, energy and in- telligence. He came to Spokane as a pioneer of 1883. He was then sixty-five years of age, his birth having occurred in England in Sep- tember, 1818. He was born of wealthy parents, pursued his educa- tion in the schools of his native land and in 1836, when about eighteen years of age, crossed the Atlantic to New York. Two years later he removed to the south, settling in Mobile, Alabama, where in connection with two practicing physicians he established a drug store. The follow- ing year, however, his partners and two other business associates suc- cumbed to the yellow fever. He bravely faced this crisis in his affairs when it became necessary for him to close out the business and make a division of interests in behalf of those deceased, although he had scarcely entered upon manhood at that time. In 1841, then twenty- three years of age, he established a commission house in New York and in 1842 accompanied the Amon Kendall party as far as Galveston, Texas. On the 6th of May, 1846, he left Independence, Missouri, on the overland trip to San Francisco, whence he made his way to Yuba Bueno. When they passed through Kansas they experienced considerable trouble with the Indians and at different times had to reckon with the hostility of the red men, engaging with them in a se- vere fight on the Truckee river in order to recover stock driven away by them. When near Truckee lake they were overtaken by a snow storm at which time Mr. Pettet joined a party of six and started for the Sacramento valley, leaving behind their wagons and about sixty people who, refusing to proceed, camped near the lake. Mr. Pettet and his companions reached Sutter's Fort in safety, but those who re- mained all perished save four and these were insane when they finally secured assistance.
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