USA > Washington > Spokane County > Spokane > History of the city of Spokane and Spokane County, Washington : from its earliest settlement to the present time, Volume I > Part 75
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The first building in Ritzville was constructed in 1881. "This was an eight room house built by William McKay," quoting from a local history. "At that period the railroad graders on the Northern Pacific were working in this vicinity. Mckay's place was utilized as an improvised hotel for the accommodation of these laborers and the transient trade connected with them. The arrival of the railroad in the summer of 1881 brought more people to the country. About the same time Mr. MeKay erected the second building in the extremely youthful town and put in a small stoek of dry goods and groeeries. The third building on the townsite was the depot, ereeted in the autumn of 1881. O. H. Greene, who came with his family to Ritzville in 1882, has said that at the time of his arrival there were seareely fifty people in the place. School was eondueted in a 'Ican-to' on some generous man's house. Every one drew water from the same fountain-the railroad tank- and it was not thought that water could be obtained by digging. The only meeting house was the dining room of the hotel, and the hotel was the depot. This apartment also served as a dancehall, and occasional theatrical exhibitions were given thercin."
Dr. G. H. Atkinson, home missionary for the Congregational churches of Ore- gon and Washington, held the first publie religious services in the town. April 2, 1882, twenty-three persons attending; and the same day organized the First Con- gregational church with six members-Mr. and Mrs. George Sinelair, Mr. and Mrs. William MeKay and Mr. and Mrs. J. G. Bennett.
The aet creating Franklin county designated Ainsworth as the temporary county seat, and named J. W. Schull. C. M. MeBride and D. W. Owen county commission- ers, with authority to appoint other county officials. The old construction town of Ainsworth is now a memory and nothing more, but when Villard was the railroad king of the Pacific northwest, and with driving energy was rushing construction work on the Northern Pacifie and the O. R. & N., for a connection at old Wallula, Ainsworth was the most talked of town in the whole "upper country." Two years
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later, when railroad construction was over, the steel bridge across the river com- pleted, and Ainsworth's payroll had scattered afar, the county seat was transferred to Pasco.
Captain W. P. Gray, a veteran pilot and river captain who navigated the upper Columbia and Snake in the placer rush of the early 'Gos, became impressed with the conviction that some day an important city would rise at the point where the waters of these great rivers commingle. After the decadence of river navigation in the early '80s, Captain Gray claimed a homestead adjacent to the present town- site, and he and a number of other aggressive spirits "boomed" Pasco in the latter '80s with a vigor and individuality that excited widespread interest. They coined the phrase. "Keep your eye on Pasco," and through all the intervening years, in the dark and discouraging days when it almost seemed that Pasco had forever faded from the map. a few faithful spirits clung bravely to the old slogan. In these later times of rapid growth and prosperity. when Pasco is ambitiously reach- ing out for jobbing territory, the old motto is made to do renewed serviee.
Distinctly the writer reealls a banquet. given in Pasco's early booming days, by the townsite proprietors to a company of newspaper men and other guests from towns in Oregon and Washington. Their hospitality was dispensed at Freeman's restaurant in Portland, and Freeman had a slogan too, as well as Pasco. His catchphrase was "Leave it to Freeman." They left it to him, and sat ereet when the bill was presented for $1,800. As there were fewer than forty guests. it fig- ured out that the average consumption was five quarts of champagne, two of whisky and 100 cigars for cach guest. It was a convivial evening, but not so bad as that. The townsite owners compromised with Freeman for $900.
Construction of the Great Northern across the Big Bend country in 1892 led to the development of extensive new areas of grain lands and the building of a number of prosperous and progressive towns; but these developments were not immediate. The panic of 1893 and resulting depression retarded immigration, and an erroneous belief that the new line penetrated a grazing rather than farming region was another retarding influence. In time, though, it was seen that large areas formerly given over to the stock industry, and partly abandoned even by stockmen as the bunch-grass was eaten away. would yield bountiful grain erops, and as homebuilders bought the cheap lands and put them under cultivation, numer- ous places that had been but flag stations quickly developed into thriving trading centers.
The author regrets that limitations of space prohibit a more extended review of the rapid rise of these various towns, with all their attendant interest and stirring incidents. Entertaining chapters could be written on the beginning and growth of towns like Wilbur, Sprague, Harrington. Odessa, Almira, Creston, Downs. Ed- wall and Reardan in Lincoln county; Ephrata, Coulee City. Hartline, Krupp, Quincy. Wilson Creck and Winchester in Grant; Lind, Othello, Washtuena, Ilat- lon and Cunningham in Adams; and Connell, Eltopia and Kahlotus in Franklin.
Central Washington alone has rich historie interest to fill a volume; and the stirring story of Okanogan and Chelan should have adequate expression in other volumes.
CHAPTER LXXXI
THE PALOUSE COUNTRY-ITS SETTLEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT
ORIGIN AND SIGNIFICANCE OF THE NAME-GRAZING REGION FOR INDIAN HERDS-FIRST EXTENSIVE SETTLEMENT IN 1869-SITE OF COLFAX LOCATED IN 1870-COUNTY CREATED IN 1872-FIRST STORE AND SCHOOLIIOUSE-EARLY DAY GRAIN SHIPMENTS -PIONEERS ALARMED BY NEZ PERCE WAR-SETTLERS SEEK REFUGE IN BLOCKHOUSE AT PALOUSE-FIRST NEWSPAPER AND TELEPHONE LINES-STAGE LINES AND STEAM- BOATS-TIIE FIRST RAILROAD-MRS. CHASE'S REMINISCENCES-STATE COLLEGE LO- CATED AT PULLMAN-ITS START AND DEVELOPMENT.
F OR a grassy expanse, the French have the word pelouse; and, a century ago, when French-Canadian voyageurs of the fur companies beheld in spring- time the wide tumult of bunch-grass hills north of Snake river, they called it the pelouse country-the grass lands-and with a slight alteration in spelling, the Palouse country it remains today; and the Palouse country it will be for- evermore.
When Clark's expedition penetrated the interior in 1812, to establish at the mouth of the Little Spokane a branch trading post of John Jacob Astor's estab- lishment at Astoria, they left the Snake river at the mouth of the Palouse (the Pavilion the French named it), and putting their canoes and bateaux in custody of the chief of the Indian village at that point, purchased horses from the natives, and packing their supplies and merchandise, traversed leisurely this beautiful open region, which then lay wild and unpeopled, for even the Indian tribes utilized it as open range for their large herds of caynses, preferring to pitch their tepees within the shelter of adjacent forests.
Recognition of the country's rich agricultural possibilities came slowly. The bunch-grass hills were regarded as grazing lands, and neither the fur traders, the missionaries, the miners, nor even the first settlers who came north of Snake river, thought it worth their while even to test the hillsides for agriculture. Their feeble beginnings they confined to the lowlands.
W. D. Muir of Winona informs the News that George Pangburn was the first settler in Whitman county, and that Ben Seissom, perhaps the second settler, con- ceded Pangburn's priority. Pangburn rode out of Walla Walla in 1862 in search of land, and took a squatter's claim on unsurveyed public land that is now a part of the Mansfield farm eight miles southeast of Winona. He returned to Walla Walla for the winter, and in the spring of 1863 came back with a packhorse to his claim. In his pack were six apple trees, five of which grew. Mr. Muir says that
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some of these trees were still bearing a few years ago, and he believes that they are alive today. Pangburn farmed a little and raised chickens and hogs, which he sold in Lewiston; and he cured bacon and marketed it in the placer camps of Idaho. He was unmarried and long solitude made him eccentric. It is related that he buried his money about the place, and contracted the habit of conversing with inanimate objects. On one occasion he became angry with a neighbor, and naming a fence post for his enemy, extracted satisfaction by roundly abusing it. In a great rage one day he struck the post and broke a knuckle bonc. His death occurred about nine years ago.
The first considerable settlement within the area of present-day Whitman county came in 1869, when several families located on Union Flat. A year later, in July, 1870, James A. Perkins and Thomas J. Smith took elaims at the forks of the Palouse, site of the present Colfax, and promptly set about the task of eutting bunch-grass hay for the winter and assembling logs for the first house; but Mr. Smith decided to move to Union Flat, and Mr. Perkins was left alone to complete it. A. C. Harris occupied for a little while the abandoned Smith claim, but he moved away and Mr. Perkins was again without a neighbor, until the spring of 1871, when he persuaded H. S. Hollingsworth of Waitsburg to take up the twice abandoned claim.
Settlers were now entering the country in a thin stream, and a demand arose for Imber which Perkins. Hollingsworth and Anderson Cox of Waitsburg met by erecting a small "muley" saw. The following year, in February, 1872, they employed A. L. Knowlton to survey a townsite, and a few months later Belcher & Whitcher of Waitsburg opened the first general merchandise store.
James A. Perkins, J. H. Logsden and Mr. Lueas, a committee authorized by the legislature to locate the county seat of the new county of Whitman, reported in February, 1872, that they had selected the "Forks of the Palouse." The lands were still unsurveyed, but a town was platted and called Colfax, in honor of the vice-president of the United States. Walla Walla, 80 miles away, was the nearest trading point, and Waitsburg the nearest postoffice. The first stock of general merchandise was stored in a eave cut in the hillside, with hewn logs for shelves, a dry goods box for a counter, and canvas for a store front. Then came the post- office, with mail once in two weeks, and in the fall a hotel was built by Captain Nosler. In 1873 a livery stable was added, two store buildings constructed, and several residences erected. Main street was partly graded, and the town lighted by two street lamps.
Meanwhile the needs of education had not been overlooked, for a schoolhouse was built in 1872, a primitive frame structure, 20 by 36 feet. The site was cho- sen by D. S. Bowman, George Hall and James Cooper, and E. II. Orcutt was the first teacher. The district comprised all of Whitman and Franklin counties and a part of Adams.
The first marriage ceremony performed in Colfax, and the second or third in the county, says Lever's History of Whitman county, was on April 6, 1873. and united James A. Perkins and Miss Jennie Ewart. Rev. A. W. Sweeney of Walla Walla was the officiating clergyman. The first white girl born in the county is said to be Miss Nina Keith, who afterward became Mrs. W. S. Thompson, on
WHITMAN COUNTY COURT HOUSE. COLFAX, WASHINGTON
C. B. KEGLEY
Master of Washington State Grange, Palouse
E. A. BRYAN
President of State College of Washington, Pullman
STEPHEN J. CHADWICK of Colfax, Justice of State Supreme Court
THE NEN CFA PUBLIC LIBRARY
TILGEN ULUILA UNE
The NEW YORK ,PUBLIC LIBRARY 1
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Union Flat, May 23, 1872. Miss Minnie Perkins (Mrs. L. L. Tower) was the first white child born in Colfax, April 18, 1874.
Mrs. C. G. White, still a resident of the town, was the first white woman in Colfax, arriving in 1870. August Paulsen married her daughter.
The adaptability of the hills to wheat growing had slow demonstration, but shipments of about 10,000 bushels were made to Portland in 1876, from the steam- boat landing of Almota on Snake river. The late H. H. Spalding, son of the noted missionary, is authority that there were shipped from Almota this year 300 tons of produee, and that four threshers, three sulky plows, three reapers, three headers, fifteen new wagons and 100 tons of merchandise were unloaded there. Thirty passengers eame from down the river to Almota.
Gilbert estimates Whitman county's population at the date of organization at about 200, and says that in 1875 it had inereased to 1,465, and in 1877 to 2,247. But these 2,200 settlers were scattered over a wide area, and the Nez Perce upris- ing brought alarm to all and wild terror to many. Unfounded rumors ran over the country that the Palouses, Spokanes and Coeur d'Alenes had taken to the war- path, and that Chief Moses was marehing south to join Joseph's warriors on Camas prairie. "Reason seemed to have temporarily surrendered her eitadel and wild fancy ruled," says Lever. "Farms were deserted, and the stoek which happened to be in corrals at the time was left without food or drink. A camp meeting was in progress on the banks of the river near Palouse, when a messenger arrived an- nouncing that the hostiles were coming. The meeting broke up in disorder, and the people rushed pellmell for Colfax. Wagons were driven down the steep hills leading to the county seat at a gallop. Many of the fugitives dared not trust even Colfax or Palouse for protection, but pushed on to Walla Walla or Dayton. A blockhouse was built near Palouse City, 125 feet square, and this served 200 people for several days as a protection against imaginary dangers. Gilbert says that 480 loads of poles entered into the construction of this fortifieation."
Seouting parties sent north and south to gather trustworthy information re- turned with reassuring reports. They found no evidence anywhere of massacre or pillage, and in the Spokane valley the Indians themselves were alarmed over the feverish activity of the settlers, their hasty arming and building of fortifica- tions. and in turn were apprehensive that the white people were preparing to march upon them with hostile intent.
Rev. H. T. Cowley. protestant missionary at Spokane, wrote under date of June 30 to James Ewart and J. C. Davenport: "I hasten to give assurance of the paeifie disposition of the Spokanes ; also of the Snake river, Palouse and Nez Perce Indians eamped here. In public couneil held last Monday at the Falls, they unani- mously deelared their friendliness towards the whites, and we have found them thus far unusually careful to avoid giving offense. The Spokanes have, of course. been somewhat alarmed, both of the gathering of whites at Colfax and at the Falls, but now that all have returned to their homes everything has quieted down."
D. S. Bowman and James Tipton, hearing that Father Cataldo, the Catholie missionary. was held a prisoner at Coeur d'Alene mission, went there to investigate. and found the Indians alarmed by fears of an attack by the white people. They explained the pacific attitude of the settlers, and in turn bore baek to Colfax eer- tificates of peaceful intentions from the chiefs which were proeured by Father
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Cataldo. Thus reassured the settlers regained their composure and the memorable Indian seare of 1877 passed into history.
The period immediately following the Nez Perce war was one of rapid growth. A census taken by F. Duff in June, 1879, gave Whitman county 5,213 population ; Colfax nearly 600.
The year of the Nez Perce war brought the first newspaper into the broad region north of Snake river. the Palouse Gazette, whose initial number was printed in Colfax, September 29, 1877, by Charles B. Hopkins and E. L. Kellogg. Mr. Kellogg subsequently withdrew from the firm and was sueceeded by Ivan Chase.
To Mr. Hopkins belongs the chief credit as pioneer builder of telephone lines in the Inland Empire. In 1884 he and his associates bought the old government telegraph lines between Almota and Colfax, and this, says Lever's history, "formed the beginning of a system which was extended with great rapidity, its phenomenal growth being largely due to the wonderful energy of Mr. Hopkins." Extensions followed to Palouse, Pullman, Moscow, Garfield and Farmington. "In 1886 W. S. Norman built an exchange at Spokane, bought the government line between Spo- kane and Fort Sherman, and established exchanges at Coeur d'Alene City, Wallace, Mullan, Murray and Burke. In the fall of 1888 Hopkins and Norman bought the government telegraph line connecting Spokane Falls and Fort Spokane. touch- ing all the principal points in the Big Bend region."
After the Spokane fire in 1889, Norman and Hopkins consolidated their inter- ests into the Inland Telephone & Telegraph company and built a line to The Dalles, where connection with the Oregon line of the American Bell company gave them an entry into Portland. Up to this period they had been operating with instruments leased from the American Bell, but on completion of the Portland line they formed a combination with that company, and later sold their interests to it. "The Bell company," Mr. Norman informs me. "operated for several years under the name of the Inland company, and subsequently changed to the Pacific States."
The first barbed wire telephone line in the Palouse country was completed at Pullman, February 25, 1901. It connected True's hotel with the farms of J. S. Klemgard, John Metsker and J. M. Klemgard, and was nine miles in length, and ineluding instruments, cost only $100. Mr. Metsker caught the idea from a similar line operated out of Heppner, in eastern Oregon. The system became instantane- ously popular, spreading lo all parts of the Palouse country. the farming sections of northern Idaho and the Big Bend region. Some of these primitive systems de- veloped later into strong independent telephone lines, strung regularly on poles and owned by groups of progressive farmers.
For fifteen years after the carliest agricultural settlement of the Palouse com- try the pioneers were without railroad connection, and were dependent on the water- ways and stage lines. "In 1871," says the authority previously quoted, "an extensive stage line began to operate throughout this region. This was the Northwestern Stage company. It connected the Central Pacific railroad at Kelton, Utah, with The Dalles, Pendleton, Walla Walla, Colfax, Dayton, Lewiston and Pomeroy. It used 300 horses, twenty-two stages, 150 employes, and annually fed ont 365 tons of grain and 112 tons of hay. Local stage lines also operated in all directions, con- meeting with each other all the principal points of the county, and transporting passengers and freight to Snake river landings, to be there loaded on the boats.
E
LEACH & COMPANY.
Y GOODS
BOOTS-SHOES
STREET SCENE, GARFIELD, WASHINGTON
STREET SCENE, CITY OF MOSCOW, IDAHO
PUBLIC LEBARY
FLUIHIS NOST ONO
NEW YORK LIBRARY
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"The first railway to enter the county was in part construeted in 1883. It was built by the Oregon Transcontinental Railway company (the Villard holding com- pany which then controlled the Northern Paeifie and the O. R. & N.), was known as the Columbia & Palouse Railway, with which it connected at Palouse Junetion. Its construction was temporarily suspended after the Villard erash, and the ensu- ing two years were a period of relative inactivity in the Palouse country. In 1885, however, work was resumed on the road, and the Palouse section again took up the forward march with renewed vigor."
The Rev. W. S. Turner came to Colfax in 1879, then a village of about 200 population. His Methodist Episcopal church started with seven members. In the second year of his pastorate it ambitiously and successfully entertained a confer- ence of sixty members. So generous was the hospitality of the frontier villagers, so well spread their tables. that the day after their adjournment the little weekly ran an amusing eartoon of the notable gathering of ministers. Two roosters stuck their heads through the fenee on opposite sides of an alley, and beneath the picture these lines were printed :
"And are we yet alive, And see each other's face?"
Mrs. Ivan Chase of Colfax has recorded a pleasing sketch of the town and its pioneer environment, as she found them some thirty years ago. "When there was a snowfall the whole town went sleigh-riding. The country home of James S. ('Cashup') Davis was a favorite resort. There was a fine floor in the large room above his store and stage station, where the merry-makers eould dance all night if they wished, being served at midnight, not with dainty refreshments, but a square meal-oyster soup, chicken, eakes, pies, hot biseuits. 'Cashup' Davis was a famous character in the old days. He was as aetive as the youngest of the daneers, although his hair was snow white, and he eould dance the sailor's hornpipe with perfect precision of step and with many a nautical flourish. An evening spent at his place, then called Steptoe station, always brought him to the front with one or more of these dances, and then he would form the guests for old Money Musk and the Virginia Reel, in which the older members of the party would shine.
"Let me bring from my memory the picture of the Ewart House as it was 35 years ago. Like all the buildings in town at that time, it was made of rough lum- ber-a box house battened. There were two gables toward Main street, connected by a long room running parallel with the street, the whole front being protected by a wide porch. The structure was a story and a half high and was whitewashed,
the house and its surroundings being serupulously well kept. Three doors opencd onto the street, the first one to the south into the parlor, the second into the dining room, and the third into the office. The dining room, which was spacious for those days. was always dainty with the whitest of table linen, the cleanest of bare floors, and the brightest of table ware. White muslin curtains swayed at the low win- dows, and all was homelike and beautiful. This pioneer hotel was the social center of the town and surrounding country, and its well loved host and hostess were an inspiration to all who eame to their hospitable home. It stood where the Fraternal bloek is now, and was soon replaced by a new Ewart house, a handsome three story building which was burned at the time of the great fire."
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Temptation is strong to linger with the many interesting details associated with the pioneers' task of developing the beautiful and rich region which we term the Palouse country; for it constitutes a stirring story-their quick conversion of a wild and savage region into a land of pleasant homes, of schools and institutions of higher learning, of churches, towns and cities, with all the refinements that grace an older land over which history has slowly penned a story that runs into the centuries or the ages. Lamentably, however, the limitations of a comprehensive history of the Inland Empire forbid extended treatment of a single county, and I must hasten to a close. Volumes could be written on the rise from homesteads of such flourishing towns as Palouse. Pullman, Elberton, Oakesdale, Farmington, Gar- field. Rosalia, Albion, Colton, Uniontown, Endicott, Thornton and a dozen others. Another volume would be needed for a history of the Whitman county press, and yet other volumes to tell in adequate way of schools and churches.
A history, however, of the Inland Empire that failed to touch the State College of Washington would be singularly incomplete. For while, by reason of location, the fine little city of Pullman may claim this superb institution as peculiarly its own, it belongs in a broader sense to the State and the Inland Empire, for it has exerted a profound influence on the culture of this broad region, and has been a potent factor in the development of the material resources of all Washington and parts of Idaho, Montana and Oregon.
The college was instituted, by an act approved March 28, 1890. as the State Agricultural College, Experiment Station and School of Science, but its title was subsequently changed to "the State College of Washington." Selection of the site was entrusted to a commission of three, and keen competition instantly developed between eastern Washington towns and cities, notably North Yakima, Walla Walla, Spokane, Colfax, Palouse and Pullman. As the institution was the beneficiary by grant of the United States government of 190,000 aeres of land, and an annual appropriation from the United States government of $10,000, aspiring towns realized that the prize was a great one, and the liveliest political rivalry arose be- tween them. Deep disappointment was felt by the losers when the award went to Pullman.
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