Good Old Days July 7

This picture of the Colfax courthouse is believed to have been taken before the flood of 1910. Contributed to Rural Heritage by Stan and Lynn McClintock.

School bus driver in Hooper. Note the dash mounted fuel tank and converted coachwork.

125 years ago

The Commoner

July 3, 1891

Business men on Main street owning the property on the west side between Wall and Spring have a grand building scheme under consideration.

From Kausse's block south to Spring street, the space is filled with wooden buildings.

The proposed buildings if built will replace all this wood with brick, and with Livingston & Kuhn's new block will make the entire block on the west side of Main, between Wall and Spring streets, solid brick.

Definite conclusions have not yet been arrived at, so far as to say just what will be done.

But a reporter for the Commoner in conversation with the property owners on the street who are making the move was assured that they mean business and some or all will build of brick this summer.

Colfax Hardware Company owns the corner at Main and Spring. They already have thirty feet front and are negotiating for the purchase of ten feet more. One of the directors of the company assured a reporter that the company is taking steps to build at once. A meeting of the stockholders was held on Wednesday and it was decided to move for the immediate securing of a full forty feet front, with a view to building the present summer.

The school board of district No. 1 met Wednesday evening. Sarah B. Wheeler, of Vermont, was elected a teacher at a salary of $60 per month. Miss Crum was employed at $55. This completes the list of teachers except the eighth place which Miss White, of St. John, is expected to fill.

The board at the meeting called an election for the selection of a site for the new high school building. The election is called for Monday, July 13th. The site to be voted on is the one comprising the Burch and Warmoth property in South Colfax.

100 years ago

The Colfax Commoner

July 7, 1916

The commissioners held a long session Monday and it was after five o'clock before the final business was transacted. A decision was reached to allow the Hayton change in the Palouse city road and R. T. Cox was awarded the sum of $324. The John McCance road was ordered established and James Jennings was awarded $35 damages. Mr. Jennings stated that this sum was not enough and the board later decided to institute condemnation proceedings through this piece of property. It is quite likely that this matter will be settled as all parties that are concerned in this road are well known Whitman County farmers.

The petitions in regard to the needs of F. M. Thompson, J. P. Kleweno and Geo R. Pierce, bonds in the sum of three hundred dollars were furnished in each case and waivers and claims for damages was ordered filed. The roads are located in different parts of the county and the county engineer was ordered to make an examination of the proposed roads.

The report of the county engineer of his plans for county bridges was presented and considered. The major portion of the day was spent in auditing the general bridge and road claims.

***

A new cash grocery, the Economy Grocery Store, will open for business this Friday morning at 7 o'clock. This store makes the fourteenth of a chain of stores that have been established in various places in this state. The new store is located one door north of the City Hall and will throw open its doors for business today.

***

Burglars visited Garfield Sunday night and broke into and robbed four stores of that city.

In all about thirty five dollars was taken by the thieves from the places that were entered.

Entrance was gained by the removing of back windows and rifling the cash registers.

The stores were reported to have been entered were the Overby Meat Market, The Roadman Bakery, The Evans Confectionery Store, The Allens Billard hall and the N. P. Depot.

All the places broken into suffered small losses except the depot where the burglars received nothing for their pains.

A short time ago La Crosse was visited and a number of places robbed and the impression prevails that the work is being done by an organized band.

A number of robberies and safes have been broken into during the past six months but the officers have been unable to find a clue that would lead to the arrest of those guilty of these crimes.

75 years ago

Colfax Gazette Commoner

July 4, 1941

In announcing that the gain in assessed valuation of personal property in Whitman County was $184,980 this year over last year Assessor Gladys Thomas said that the largest increase was to be found in the new bulk grain elevators which had been assessed as personal property because of having been located on railroad leased land.

As of the first of this year, personal property had an assessed valuation of $3,766,520 as compared to $3,581,540.

Miss Thomas stated that valuations of warehouses had been reduced on an average of about 50 percent because many of them had become idle since the handling of bulk grain in elevators has become more popular.

Nineteen new bulk grain elevators had been given a total valuation of $123,230, but a loss of $21,350 in fixing the valuations of warehouses, the net gain had been $101,880.

A loss in horses was more than offset by the gain in cattle, Miss Thomas said. This year horses of all classes numbered 7,071 and were assessed at $163,830. Last year the number was 8,168 with an assessed value of $186,760.

Cattle in all classes this year number 34,813 and had a valuation of $434,270. Last year's assessment showed 30,080, with an assessed value of $383,305.

50 years ago

Colfax Gazette

July 7, 1966

Advisability of building a local hospital will be discussed at a “town progress” meeting July 20 in the Tekoa High School multi-purpose room, beginning at 8 p.m.

Merlin Traylor, administrator of the hospital at Odessa (Lincoln county); Drs. Jim Anderson and Kenneth Gudgel of Odessa, and Marshall Roberts, pharmacists at Odessa, will tell of the success of the hospital and nursing home in Odessa and the campaign through which it was built. Roberts is the son of Mr. and Mrs. Mac Roberts of Tekoa.

Open discussion and a question and answer period will follow.

***

Colfax Volunteer Firemen voted Tuesday night to place an order for a new Cadillac ambulance and will take delivery in about three weeks, Fire Chief Don Maier told the Gazette Wednesday.

The volunteers will send a man to the ambulance plant in Ohio next week, and Maier believes the new vehicle will be “sitting in the fire station” at the end of three weeks “at the latest.”

The community will have about $14,000 invested in the new ambulance, which is about $2,000 more than has been received in the campaign started last year. “However, we're hoping for additional donations, and, if necessary, we will borrow and pay off the loan through revenue from the ambulance's use,” the fire chief added.

Maier said the new ambulance was one of only two 1966 models available to one of the dealers contacted. A second dealer was unable to promise any delivery date so firemen feel fortunate that they are able to get a new vehicle before fall.

The volunteers will keep the Oldsmobile that is currently being used as the “No. 1” ambulance and will sell the old Cadillac. The old machine has no trade-in value, but Maier is hopeful that the department can get $200 to $300 for it.

25 years ago

Colfax Gazette

July 4, 1991

An 18-year-old Bremerton man pleaded guilty last week to a charge of second degree reckless endangerment resulting from a smoke bomb planted in Martin Stadium before the 1990 Apple Cup game.

A 19-year-old Bothell man also plead guilty three weeks ago to second degree reckless endangerment and disorderly conduct arising from the incident.

The men were arrested for placing a radio-controlled device in a student section of Martin Stadium Nov. 18. After the bomb was discovered the Apple Cup game was delayed 30 minutes. Football fans were locked out of the area of Martin Stadium while the search was underway.

The plea agreement with the prosecutor's office includes a $500 fine (or 125 hours community service), 365 days in jail with 155 suspended, restitution of approximately $3,000 in investigative costs and court costs.

***

The late Donald (Pete) Christensen, member of the 1939 St. John class, was the first of the Codger players to appear on the Codger Pole at Colfax. Carver Jonathan LaBenne placed Christensen near the top of one of the five poles which will eventually carry the faces of 50 Codger players.

Christensen was the lone player to score in 1938 when St. John won the original Codger bowl. He resided for many years in Puyallup and returned to appear in the 1988 Codger bowl. Mr. Christensen died March 26, 1990.

10 years ago

Whitman County Gazette

July 6, 2006

Last August, Rosalia for the first time hosted a street bash for thousands who all were born to be wild, but it wasn't as rowdy as skeptics thought it would be. Coming up on Rosalia's second motorcycle rally this August, event promoter Josh Bryan said the naysayers seemed to have changed.

Bryan, who lives in Rosalia, said he recently got a marketing pitch from the Spokane Regional Convention and Visitors Bureau inviting him to nurture his brainchild in Spokane.

“I just thought the whole phone call was funny,” he said.

The irony, he said, was Bryan originally cast his net in Spokane to see if there was any interest in a motorcycle rally there, but the net came back empty. He said he could not even get a return call.

But he then found the help he needed in his own town with the mayor, council, parks board and volunteers, he said.

“We've got a lot of great people in Rosalia,” he said.

Last year the Rosalia event, called The Next 100 Years of Motorcycles, drew an estimated 10,000 to 12,000 people into the town of about 650 for a Saturday afternoon.

This year the rally will span three days, Aug. 18-20.

Bryan said the convention sales manager for the Spokane Regional Convention and Visitors Bureau said his Rosalia rally would outgrow the town and left the door open for him to bring it north.

Whether the rally would ever outgrow Rosalia is the “one million dollar question,” Bryan said, but as a Rosalia resident, he felt the rally has a good home.

Rosalia Mayor Ken Jacobs viewed the Spokane call as an attempt to steal Rosalia's thunder. He said Rosalia is the town that took the chance and made the rally a success; now Spokane is “jumping on the bandwagon,” he said.

***

The water at the Oakesdale swim pool smells different.

That is because it is a saltwater pool for the first time this season using a new method to clean the pool.

“You can't even smell the chlorine,” pool manager Michele Wright said. “Everyone seems to like it a lot better.”

For about $10,000 the park and recreation district purchased equipment that sanitizes the pool with chlorine extracted from common rock salt, which is added to the water.

Using rock salt, which is not as costly as chemical chlorine, the district expects to save about $2,000 in chlorine costs each season for its 144,000-gallon pool, according to board member Doug Hovde.

Hovde said the equipment should pay for itself in four to five years.

He said he learned about the system, called Pool Thing, when he saw it being installed in a hotel pool in Clarkston, and he subsequently researched the technology for the Oakesdale pool.

Hovde said there is no longer the need to test the chlorine levels every hour, but about every day instead, depending on how much water has evaporated or splashed out of the pool. For about every 1,200 gallons lost, another 50-pound bag of rock salt needs to be added, he said.

The new equipment was installed during the winter, and at the start of the operation this season, about $700 of rock salt was added to the water. Additional salt for the season should keep the chemical costs at around $1,000 this season, Hovde said.

The salt level in the water is like that of a human tear.

“It's not like the ocean or anything,” Hovde said. “Swimmers get used to it after they swim in it for a while.”