Good old days - Oct. 1, 2009

125 years ago, Oct. 3, 1884

A Lively Fracas At Palouse City, In Which Charley Newell Lays Out Geo. Little With A Poker:

On last Saturday afternoon, just before supper time, Cash Cole’s saloon at Palouse City was the scene of a row which may yet result fatally to Geo.

Little, who had his skull crushed during the melee.

As the particulars are related to us, Little was under the influence of liquor, very quarrelsome, and had had several rows during the afternoon with several different parties.

At the time mentioned, he was bullying it around the saloon, and approaching a table where Charles Newell, an eighteen or twenty year-old lad was handling a deck of cards, without a word of warning, slapped young Newell a stinging blow on the side of the face.

Newell arose from his chair, and as he did so, dealt Little a right hander full in the face and started to run, followed by Little.

Bystanders caught hold of Little, and Newell picked up a poker, declaring he had run far enough and would run no more.

Little in the meantime was heaping abuse upon the lad, and threatening him great harm. Finally he broke away from the men who were holding him and made a spring for Newell, where upon the boy raised the poker and struck his assailant a heavy blow upon the head which felled him to the floor in an unconscious condition. Examination revealed the fact that Little’s skull was badly fractured, and the doctors were compelled to cut away large pieces of bone in dressing the wound. The report of the physicians is that Little is in a very dangerous condition, and his recovery is extremely doubtful. Persons who saw the fracas say that young Newell acted simply in self-defense.

At last accounts, Little had improved and some hopes were entertained of his recovery.

The supreme court of Washington Territory has decided that the wife’s right of power in her husband’s lands was abolished by implication in the statute governing property rights of husband and wife, passed at the session of 1869, that married women are qualified grand jurors under our laws. In this case, a dissenting opinion was read by Judge Turner. It was also decided the game law constitutional, that the Olympia city council has unlimited power over the subject of liquor licenses within its limits, and that the city is liable for injuries caused by failing to keep sidewalks in repair.

100 years ago, Oct. 1, 1909

Monday evening, while engaged in playing football on the grounds in the north end, David Goff, son of H. W. Goff, had the middle and lower third bones of the right arm broken, which will prevent his playing the game for some time to come. How was it done? Presumably it was another case of all piling on one, but as no skulls were broken and brains allowed to ooze out, such a trifling thing as breaking the arm in a couple places is fun, therefore doesn’t count.

The healthful and inspiring game of football will continue as usual until the fad runs out, which many high in the councils of the sporting world say is beginning to show signs of appearing.

75 years ago, Oct. 5, 1934

This sketch is written in memory of the pioneers of the late 1870s and given from memory.

As I recall, it was on October 23, 1876, that I followed a band of 73 head of horses through Colfax and on Oct. 25 that we struck camp at the old ford on Pine creek, about one-half mile below the present site of Pine City.

We were camped there a few days, until my father bought a place from Graden and Lawrence at the mouth of Thorn creek. Things went along nicely for me until the horses commenced thinking of their old home and started to rove. I had to saddle my horse and round them up.

This whole country was covered with bunchgrass, as fine as ever laid out doors. About the first of November it began to rain. I don’t think I ever saw so much rain in November. I was riding every day and would come in at night soaked to the hide. Every man wore boots those days and every night my boots were filled with water. I would take them off, pour the water out, stand turning round and round before the fireplace until my clothes were dry.

That old fireplace was made of rocks, four feet wide and about two feet deep, and it certainly took lots of wood to heat the place.

Then came the fun. The horses were bound to leave this country so we began corralling them every night. We would turn them out at 4 a.m. and after breakfast I would go out to round them up, and I would find their tracks and be gone sometimes two or three days.

The first time I failed to come in for dinner my brother went after me. A man had told me he had seen some horses up Pleasant Valley and was sure they were mine, but when I found them at the end of the day, they were not mine.

I went up to Mel Jeffries place, where St. John is now located, and stayed all night. I found the horses in the morning and my brother caught up with me. After that, the home folks always waited for me to get back alone.

50 years ago, Oct. 1, 1959

Just to keep the records straight, there is a 13-year-old boy in Colfax who rates a tie with the Graffis baby written about in last week’s Gazette as the smallest baby ever born at St. Ignatius hospital.

He is Jack Reynolds, the son of Mr. and Mrs. Jack Reynolds of Colfax. When Reynolds was born, he also weighed just two pounds, 10 ounces, but Mrs. Reynolds was never told what his minimum weight was until a few days after his birth.

(Jack Reynolds, a member of the 1964 class of Colfax High, now resides in the Salt Lake area. He is the brother of Joe and Bob Reynolds of Colfax and Dennis Reynolds of Steptoe.)

25 years ago, Oct. 4, 1984

Kevin Coe, tracked by the media blitz which followed his release from the state penitentiary in Walla Walla, made a two-hour luncheon stop in the Whitman County jail at Colfax Thursday. Coe’s stay here could have been extended several days if pre-trial motion and decisions had taken an alternate route in Spokane superior court.

“There was the potential that he could have been here a couple of days,” Sheriff Cleve Hunter commented. He explained the stop for the Coe entourage was part of an exchange of obligations between the Whitman County sheriff’s department and the Spokane department.

10 years ago, Sept. 30, 1999

Although Tuesday’s telecommunications forum focused regional attention on the Port of Whitman’s push to “wire” the county with high-speed telecommunications infrastructure using approximately $1.5 million of taxpayer money, county commissioners, who must make the final decision, haven’t stopped thinking about it since the Port first broached the idea in June.

Commissioners, who are required by law to seek input from the port and other municipalities about how to use the increased share of sales tax revenues directed to rural counties for economic development, have certainly done their share of thinking about the idea.

Two student teams, one from the FHA and one from the FFA, gave presentations at the Tekoa School Board meeting Tuesday night.

Emily Layton and Rose Scaroni, both seniors at Tekoa high school, won gold medals at the national FFA convention in Boston this summer with their presentation called “Kitchen Smarts.” The acronym stands for Smart Minds All Reaching Toward Safety.