Rick Just's Blog, page 62
April 19, 2023
Comet, Idaho (tap to read)
Halley’s Comet spent just a few weeks visible in the sky in 1910. Its namesake (probably), Comet, Idaho, didn’t last much longer.
Not every place that had a post office was an actual town. My own family ran the Presto, Idaho, post office for 14 years from their isolated home along the Blackfoot River. It seems that the Comet Post Office had a similar, shorter history.
A reader asked if I knew anything about the town of Comet. I didn’t, partly because it wasn’t really a town. Partly because I’d never heard of the place. I found that there was a post office at Comet so that made researching it much easier. I just asked Bob.
Bob Omberg is the acknowledged expert on Idaho post offices. An attorney by trade, Bob no longer lives in Idaho, but he retains a fascination with post offices, postal marks, route maps, and such. He supplied me with some information about Comet, including a copied page from "Sagebrush Post Offices: A History of the Owyhee Country" by Mildretta Adams (copyright 1986; third printing 2003 by the Owyhee Publishing CO., Homedale Idaho).
From that book, I learned that John McVann, a local rancher, established the Comet Post Office on February 7, 1910, in Owyhee County. It was near present-day Bruneau, on the south side of the Snake River across from where Canyon Creek enters. The post office operated until January 31, 1913.
Comet is listed as one of the “drowned towns” in The Atlas of Drowned Towns, BSU Professor Bob Reinhart’s project that helps identify the many places that once existed on dry land but are now under reservoir waters.
So, was Comet a town? Probably not, but the post office site is now under the C.J. Strike Reservoir, so it does qualify as drowned.
A letter postmarked from Comet, Idaho, courtesy of the the Bob Omberg collection.
Not every place that had a post office was an actual town. My own family ran the Presto, Idaho, post office for 14 years from their isolated home along the Blackfoot River. It seems that the Comet Post Office had a similar, shorter history.
A reader asked if I knew anything about the town of Comet. I didn’t, partly because it wasn’t really a town. Partly because I’d never heard of the place. I found that there was a post office at Comet so that made researching it much easier. I just asked Bob.
Bob Omberg is the acknowledged expert on Idaho post offices. An attorney by trade, Bob no longer lives in Idaho, but he retains a fascination with post offices, postal marks, route maps, and such. He supplied me with some information about Comet, including a copied page from "Sagebrush Post Offices: A History of the Owyhee Country" by Mildretta Adams (copyright 1986; third printing 2003 by the Owyhee Publishing CO., Homedale Idaho).
From that book, I learned that John McVann, a local rancher, established the Comet Post Office on February 7, 1910, in Owyhee County. It was near present-day Bruneau, on the south side of the Snake River across from where Canyon Creek enters. The post office operated until January 31, 1913.
Comet is listed as one of the “drowned towns” in The Atlas of Drowned Towns, BSU Professor Bob Reinhart’s project that helps identify the many places that once existed on dry land but are now under reservoir waters.
So, was Comet a town? Probably not, but the post office site is now under the C.J. Strike Reservoir, so it does qualify as drowned.
A letter postmarked from Comet, Idaho, courtesy of the the Bob Omberg collection.
April 18, 2023
The Payette Lake Leviathan (tap to read)
No self-respecting lake monster should go without a name. At least, that’s what A. Boon McCallum, editor and publisher of the Payette Lakes Star thought.
Sightings of some sort of creature that seemed out of place in Payette Lake had been going on for years when the newspaper in McCall decided to run a contest, in 1954, to give the poor beast a name. More than 200 people entered the contest. The suggestions ranged from the pseudo-scientific to variations on monster names. They included:
Boon
Fantasy
Nobby Dick
Humpy
Watzit
McFlash
High Ho
Peekaboo
Snorky
Neptune Ned
…and on and on. The winner, as you may know, was Sharlie. Le Isle Hennefer Tury of Springfield, Virginia walked away with the $40 prize for that one. Lest Idahoans grump too much about an out-of-stater winning the contest, it was pointed out that she had at one time lived in Twin Falls.
I confess to having my own “Sharlie” sighting once while standing atop Porcupine Point in Ponderosa State Park. With no boats in site for miles the water below in The Narrows started churning. It continued to churn for about two minutes. There was no creepy music accompanying the phenomenon, so I just chalked it up to space aliens.
Sightings of some sort of creature that seemed out of place in Payette Lake had been going on for years when the newspaper in McCall decided to run a contest, in 1954, to give the poor beast a name. More than 200 people entered the contest. The suggestions ranged from the pseudo-scientific to variations on monster names. They included:
Boon
Fantasy
Nobby Dick
Humpy
Watzit
McFlash
High Ho
Peekaboo
Snorky
Neptune Ned
…and on and on. The winner, as you may know, was Sharlie. Le Isle Hennefer Tury of Springfield, Virginia walked away with the $40 prize for that one. Lest Idahoans grump too much about an out-of-stater winning the contest, it was pointed out that she had at one time lived in Twin Falls.
I confess to having my own “Sharlie” sighting once while standing atop Porcupine Point in Ponderosa State Park. With no boats in site for miles the water below in The Narrows started churning. It continued to churn for about two minutes. There was no creepy music accompanying the phenomenon, so I just chalked it up to space aliens.
April 17, 2023
All in the Political Family (tap to read)
The Clark family was prominent in Idaho politics for many years, though probably only those with a passion for history remember them much today.
Barzilla Clark was the first of his family in politics. He was an engineer with an interest in making water work. He built the Blackfoot Reservoir, then, after being elected mayor of Idaho Falls, he was influential in building the municipal power plant. He became Idaho’s 16th governor in 1937, serving one two-year term before being defeated in the Democratic primary by C. Ben Ross. Ross lost the election to C.A Bottolfsen.
Chase Clark, Barzilla’s brother, ran against Bottolfsen for governor in 1940 and won. But Bottolfsen wasn’t through. He came back to beat Chase Clark in 1942. Both elections were very close. Clark was nominated to the federal bench by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He served there for many years.
A nephew of Chase and Barzilla Clark’s, David Worth Clark served in the US House of Representatives from 1934-1938. In 1938 he ran for U.S. Senate and won. Then, in 1944 he was defeated in the primary by Glen Taylor.
Chase had a daughter named Bethine. Bethine married Frank Church, who had a legendary career as a Senator from Idaho.
Barzilla Clark was the first of his family in politics. He was an engineer with an interest in making water work. He built the Blackfoot Reservoir, then, after being elected mayor of Idaho Falls, he was influential in building the municipal power plant. He became Idaho’s 16th governor in 1937, serving one two-year term before being defeated in the Democratic primary by C. Ben Ross. Ross lost the election to C.A Bottolfsen.
Chase Clark, Barzilla’s brother, ran against Bottolfsen for governor in 1940 and won. But Bottolfsen wasn’t through. He came back to beat Chase Clark in 1942. Both elections were very close. Clark was nominated to the federal bench by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He served there for many years.
A nephew of Chase and Barzilla Clark’s, David Worth Clark served in the US House of Representatives from 1934-1938. In 1938 he ran for U.S. Senate and won. Then, in 1944 he was defeated in the primary by Glen Taylor.
Chase had a daughter named Bethine. Bethine married Frank Church, who had a legendary career as a Senator from Idaho.
April 16, 2023
Pizza Patrol (tap to read)
So, in the interest of solid historical research, I sometimes type a random word in the search box of various newspaper archives. The word one Sunday was “pizza.” I thought it might be fun to find out when the first pizza, as we know it, arrived in Boise.
The first mention of what one might recognize as a pizza was a recipe that appeared in the Idaho Statesman in 1941. It was basically throwing some red sauce on Italian dough, grating some cheese over the top of it, and baking it for 25 minutes.
The next decade of pizza news in the capital city was dominated by Frank Pizza, who played a lot of amateur softball. He was in the news approximately ten to one over a scattering of other pizza recipes, including one for Maine Sardine Pizza. Yum?
Softball Frank still led the pizza search (he also went to work servicing Maytags, by the way) in the early 50s, but in 1951 it finally happened. You could BUY a pizza at a restaurant in Boise (photo). The Villanova restaurant began offering pizza after 9:30 pm, by candlelight. Apparently, this was after the kids would be in bed, so it was safe.
Pizza recipes continued, often suggesting an English muffin as the solid foundation for your genuine Italian dinner at home.
Frank played softball.
In 1953, the Payless Drug Store on Tenth and Idaho moved pizza technology forward a notch by selling the Bake-King Pizza Pan, with which you could make pizza RIGHT AT HOME.
It was a major advancement in culinary news in May 1955 when the Howdy Partner Drive in Café, (on Hiway 30 Near the Fairgrounds) began advertising a new taste sensation, the Pizza Burger (Trade Mark Reg.). It was said to be all the rage on the West Coast.
Still, Frank Pizza’s amateur softball career was getting more mentions than anything pizza-like that you could have for dinner. He eventually switched to golf.
There were rumblings of what was to come, though. Classified ads started appearing, looking for various kinds of restaurant help, including those experienced in PIZZA MAKING!
Then, the breakthrough. On October 8, 1955 the first restaurant with pizza in its name opened in Boise. Pete’s Pizza Pie Restaurant on Vista Avenue next to Quinn’s Lounge advertised Real Italian Pizza. And so, it began.
Today, of course, there are 147,000 pizza restaurants in Boise, according to the number of search results I got back when I typed into Google “How many pizza restaurants are there in Boise?” Hold the anchovies.
The first mention of what one might recognize as a pizza was a recipe that appeared in the Idaho Statesman in 1941. It was basically throwing some red sauce on Italian dough, grating some cheese over the top of it, and baking it for 25 minutes.
The next decade of pizza news in the capital city was dominated by Frank Pizza, who played a lot of amateur softball. He was in the news approximately ten to one over a scattering of other pizza recipes, including one for Maine Sardine Pizza. Yum?
Softball Frank still led the pizza search (he also went to work servicing Maytags, by the way) in the early 50s, but in 1951 it finally happened. You could BUY a pizza at a restaurant in Boise (photo). The Villanova restaurant began offering pizza after 9:30 pm, by candlelight. Apparently, this was after the kids would be in bed, so it was safe.
Pizza recipes continued, often suggesting an English muffin as the solid foundation for your genuine Italian dinner at home.
Frank played softball.
In 1953, the Payless Drug Store on Tenth and Idaho moved pizza technology forward a notch by selling the Bake-King Pizza Pan, with which you could make pizza RIGHT AT HOME.
It was a major advancement in culinary news in May 1955 when the Howdy Partner Drive in Café, (on Hiway 30 Near the Fairgrounds) began advertising a new taste sensation, the Pizza Burger (Trade Mark Reg.). It was said to be all the rage on the West Coast.
Still, Frank Pizza’s amateur softball career was getting more mentions than anything pizza-like that you could have for dinner. He eventually switched to golf.
There were rumblings of what was to come, though. Classified ads started appearing, looking for various kinds of restaurant help, including those experienced in PIZZA MAKING!
Then, the breakthrough. On October 8, 1955 the first restaurant with pizza in its name opened in Boise. Pete’s Pizza Pie Restaurant on Vista Avenue next to Quinn’s Lounge advertised Real Italian Pizza. And so, it began.
Today, of course, there are 147,000 pizza restaurants in Boise, according to the number of search results I got back when I typed into Google “How many pizza restaurants are there in Boise?” Hold the anchovies.
April 15, 2023
The New York Canal (tap to read)
Prognostication in print eventually tends to make the prognosticator look foolish. Witness the regular predictions about the fantastic future filled with flying cars, jet packs, and moving sidewalks common in the early Twentieth Century.
In 1909 one prognosticator at the Idaho Statesman got it right, helped, perhaps, by his neglecting to establish a timeline for his predictions. The day following the dedication of Treasure Valley’s New York Canal on February 22, 1909, an article appeared titled “Power Behind the Dam.”
“Upon even the most thoughtless the real importance of the work, completion of which was yesterday celebrated will be forced to mind when thousands of acres of additional land is brought under cultivation when Boise bounds to 150,000 population; when farms supplant great stretches of barren land and the swaddling clothes of towns in this part of the state are tossed into the rubbish heap in exchange for municipal togs.”
Boise’s population in 1909 was about 17,000, so a city of 150,000 probably seemed ludicrous. It would hit that mark in the early 1990s and today is closer to 250,000.
The progression from desert to farm to town to city was also correct. Eagle with a Hilton? Who’d have thought that in 1909 or even 1979?
Diversion Dam also supplied electricity for the valley for many years, as well as irrigation water for farmland that, in more recent decades, has grown into sprawling housing developments.
The photo of the dedication of the New York Canal diversion is courtesy of the Idaho State Historical Society digital archive.
In 1909 one prognosticator at the Idaho Statesman got it right, helped, perhaps, by his neglecting to establish a timeline for his predictions. The day following the dedication of Treasure Valley’s New York Canal on February 22, 1909, an article appeared titled “Power Behind the Dam.”
“Upon even the most thoughtless the real importance of the work, completion of which was yesterday celebrated will be forced to mind when thousands of acres of additional land is brought under cultivation when Boise bounds to 150,000 population; when farms supplant great stretches of barren land and the swaddling clothes of towns in this part of the state are tossed into the rubbish heap in exchange for municipal togs.”
Boise’s population in 1909 was about 17,000, so a city of 150,000 probably seemed ludicrous. It would hit that mark in the early 1990s and today is closer to 250,000.
The progression from desert to farm to town to city was also correct. Eagle with a Hilton? Who’d have thought that in 1909 or even 1979?
Diversion Dam also supplied electricity for the valley for many years, as well as irrigation water for farmland that, in more recent decades, has grown into sprawling housing developments.
The photo of the dedication of the New York Canal diversion is courtesy of the Idaho State Historical Society digital archive.
April 14, 2023
Presidential Progeny (tap to read)
Charles Francis Adams Jr. was the grandson of President John Q. Adams and the Great Grandson of our second president, John Adams. In 1887, Charles Adams Jr. was the president of Union Pacific Railroad. He got to know Idaho well in that role and once said, “I regard Idaho as the most promising field of development.”
He put his money behind that statement in 1896, when he and other investors started the Lewiston Water & Power Company. Those same entrepreneurs developed property just across the Snake River in Washington State into something called Vineland. Vines soon grew there as vineyard began to produce grapes. Family farms and orchards soon came along. The company platted a town close by, calling it Concord after the city in Massachusetts where Adams had property.
But it was Adams himself that proposed changing the community’s name to Clarkston, seeing the symmetry in honoring the leaders from the Corps of Discovery with towns named for them on each side of the river. Adams joined the communities by building the first bridge between them across the Snake.
Adams was a towering figure in the two towns. His sons, Henry and John, moved to Lewiston in 1899. On 450 acres their father had purchased, they built a large home with a private polo field and views of the Snake River. John didn’t stay long in Lewiston, but Henry lived there for years overlooking his family’s business interests, which included the Adams building on Main Street.
My source for this story is a book I highly recommend, Inventing Idaho, by Keith C. Peterson. It was published by Washington State University Press in 2022.
Captain Charles Francis Adams Jr (in the rocking chair) with officers of the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry, August 1864. He would later become the head of Union Pacific Railroad and spark developments in Lewiston, Idaho and Clarkston, Washington.
He put his money behind that statement in 1896, when he and other investors started the Lewiston Water & Power Company. Those same entrepreneurs developed property just across the Snake River in Washington State into something called Vineland. Vines soon grew there as vineyard began to produce grapes. Family farms and orchards soon came along. The company platted a town close by, calling it Concord after the city in Massachusetts where Adams had property.
But it was Adams himself that proposed changing the community’s name to Clarkston, seeing the symmetry in honoring the leaders from the Corps of Discovery with towns named for them on each side of the river. Adams joined the communities by building the first bridge between them across the Snake.
Adams was a towering figure in the two towns. His sons, Henry and John, moved to Lewiston in 1899. On 450 acres their father had purchased, they built a large home with a private polo field and views of the Snake River. John didn’t stay long in Lewiston, but Henry lived there for years overlooking his family’s business interests, which included the Adams building on Main Street.
My source for this story is a book I highly recommend, Inventing Idaho, by Keith C. Peterson. It was published by Washington State University Press in 2022.
Captain Charles Francis Adams Jr (in the rocking chair) with officers of the 1st Massachusetts Cavalry, August 1864. He would later become the head of Union Pacific Railroad and spark developments in Lewiston, Idaho and Clarkston, Washington.
April 13, 2023
The Other Idanaha (tap to read)
Boise is justifiably proud of its beautiful old Idanha Hotel. It was at one time the tallest building in the state of Idaho, and it boasts the state’s first elevator. It wasn’t first in one surprising aspect. It wasn’t the first hotel in Idaho that went by that name.
The original Idanha Hotel (photo) was built by Union Pacific Railroad in 1887, and it was located in Soda Springs. The name came from Idanha Mineral Water, which was bottled locally and sold all over the United States. The Idanha was a luxury hotel, with electric lights and natural gas heating. The Tri-Weekly Statesman quoted a gentleman who had seen the new hotel as saying “the structure was not only one of the most complete in the West, but for its size one of the finest in the world.” It had $18,000 worth of furniture. During the grand opening, railroad fares to Soda Springs were half price.
Advertisements for the Idanha in Soda Springs claimed that it could comfortably accommodate “several hundred guests.” If that seems a little hyperbolic, it’s nothing compared with the way the nearby medicinal springs were described for their “many remarkable cures.”
In May of 1895 the Idanha Bottling works burned. One may well speculate about how a water company burns, but it did. They were back up and running two years later, producing at one point a million bottles a year.
The hotel, however, did not come back from its own fire in 1921.
So, there were once two Idanha Hotels. There was once an Idanha Candy Company (not to be confused with the venerable Idaho Candy Company). And, there is an Idanha, Oregon, a couple of hours southeast of Portland. Like the first Idanha hotel, it was named after the famous mineral water.
The original Idanha Hotel once stood in Soda Springs.
The original Idanha Hotel (photo) was built by Union Pacific Railroad in 1887, and it was located in Soda Springs. The name came from Idanha Mineral Water, which was bottled locally and sold all over the United States. The Idanha was a luxury hotel, with electric lights and natural gas heating. The Tri-Weekly Statesman quoted a gentleman who had seen the new hotel as saying “the structure was not only one of the most complete in the West, but for its size one of the finest in the world.” It had $18,000 worth of furniture. During the grand opening, railroad fares to Soda Springs were half price.
Advertisements for the Idanha in Soda Springs claimed that it could comfortably accommodate “several hundred guests.” If that seems a little hyperbolic, it’s nothing compared with the way the nearby medicinal springs were described for their “many remarkable cures.”
In May of 1895 the Idanha Bottling works burned. One may well speculate about how a water company burns, but it did. They were back up and running two years later, producing at one point a million bottles a year.
The hotel, however, did not come back from its own fire in 1921.
So, there were once two Idanha Hotels. There was once an Idanha Candy Company (not to be confused with the venerable Idaho Candy Company). And, there is an Idanha, Oregon, a couple of hours southeast of Portland. Like the first Idanha hotel, it was named after the famous mineral water.
The original Idanha Hotel once stood in Soda Springs.
April 12, 2023
Merci (tap to read)
Merci. It means “thank you” in French. The people of France gave a very big thank you to the people of the United States in 1949. France sent a Merci Train to the US as a showing of gratitude for the $40 million in food and supplies sent to France and Italy following World War II. Those supplies traveled in Europe on a “Friendship Train.” Each state and the District of Columbia got a box car from the Merci Train. Each car was loaded with artwork, correspondence, stamps, pamphlets, photographs, flags, and other memorabilia.
The box cars, formerly used for military transport, were called “Forty and Eight” cars because they could hold 40 men or eight horses. Idaho’s Merci Car is in storage at the old Idaho penitentiary and not currently on display.
One prominent item is on display. A replica of Winged Victory (Nike of Samothrace) is in Statuary Hall in the Idaho Statehouse. The original sculpture, housed in the Louvre, is one of the most famous in the world. It was found in 1863—the year of the creation of Idaho as a territory—on the Greek island of Samothrace.
The original statue is marble. The replica is plaster cast over an armature. It arrived in the state on February 19, 1949, and has been displayed in a place of honor ever since. It was displayed in the second-floor rotunda of the Idaho Capitol Building for decades. It was moved to the fourth floor after renovation of the building in 2009. Other items from the Merci Car were distributed to each Idaho county.
Do you know what items from the Merci Train are in your county and where they might be displayed?
The box cars, formerly used for military transport, were called “Forty and Eight” cars because they could hold 40 men or eight horses. Idaho’s Merci Car is in storage at the old Idaho penitentiary and not currently on display.
One prominent item is on display. A replica of Winged Victory (Nike of Samothrace) is in Statuary Hall in the Idaho Statehouse. The original sculpture, housed in the Louvre, is one of the most famous in the world. It was found in 1863—the year of the creation of Idaho as a territory—on the Greek island of Samothrace.
The original statue is marble. The replica is plaster cast over an armature. It arrived in the state on February 19, 1949, and has been displayed in a place of honor ever since. It was displayed in the second-floor rotunda of the Idaho Capitol Building for decades. It was moved to the fourth floor after renovation of the building in 2009. Other items from the Merci Car were distributed to each Idaho county.
Do you know what items from the Merci Train are in your county and where they might be displayed?
April 11, 2023
The Fosbury Flop (tap to read)
Idaho had a claim on a sport-changing Olympian. Or, maybe he had a claim on Idaho. When Dick Fosbury won the gold medal in the 1968 Olympics he hailed from Oregon. But in 1977, he moved to Ketchum. He and a partner established Galena Engineering in 1978. He ran for a seat in the Idaho Legislature in 2014 against incumbent Steve Miller, but lost that race. He later became a Blaine County Commissioner.
Winning an Olympic gold medal comes with its own notoriety. When you break the Olympic record and do so in a totally unconventional way, the notoriety is exponential. Fosbury’s sport was the high jump. His innovation, known today as the Fosbury Flop, was to go over the bar backwards, head-first, curving his body over and kicking his legs up in the air at the end of the jump, landing on his back. It was awkward looking. Maybe it even looked impossible, but it worked. Fosbury cleared 7 feet 4 ½ inches in Mexico City for a new Olympic record.
So, why hadn’t jumpers tried this before? Well, someone has to be first. Also, for decades preceding Fosbury’s innovation, a jump like that would have been dangerous, almost guaranteeing injury. What made it possible in Fosbury’s time was the widespread use of thick foam pads as a landing site. Prior to that, jumpers were landing in sawdust or wood chips.
Dick Fosbury passed away at age 76 in 2023.
The art used to illustrate this post is by Alan Siegrist (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...)], via Wikimedia Commons
Winning an Olympic gold medal comes with its own notoriety. When you break the Olympic record and do so in a totally unconventional way, the notoriety is exponential. Fosbury’s sport was the high jump. His innovation, known today as the Fosbury Flop, was to go over the bar backwards, head-first, curving his body over and kicking his legs up in the air at the end of the jump, landing on his back. It was awkward looking. Maybe it even looked impossible, but it worked. Fosbury cleared 7 feet 4 ½ inches in Mexico City for a new Olympic record.
So, why hadn’t jumpers tried this before? Well, someone has to be first. Also, for decades preceding Fosbury’s innovation, a jump like that would have been dangerous, almost guaranteeing injury. What made it possible in Fosbury’s time was the widespread use of thick foam pads as a landing site. Prior to that, jumpers were landing in sawdust or wood chips.
Dick Fosbury passed away at age 76 in 2023.
The art used to illustrate this post is by Alan Siegrist (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/...)], via Wikimedia CommonsApril 10, 2023
FDR at Farragut (tap to read)
On October 3, 1942, the Kingston Daily Freeman printed the following, datelined Farragut Idaho. “No one knew the President of the United States was visiting the naval training station.
The two workmen looked up as a car went by.
Said one:
‘That almost looks like F.D.R. himself.’
Answered the other:
‘Yep, but he’s at the White House.’
They went back to work.”
It was FDR. He was on a secret nationwide tour of defense plants and military installations. The press was ordered not to cover his trip until two weeks after it was over. His stop in North Idaho took place on September 21, 1942.
The president’s relationship with the press during that time of war has received much analysis in later days. For one thing, the press seemed to shy away from any reference or photograph that might show FDR as anything less than at the top of his game. Pictures of him using a cane were rare. Even rarer were pictures of him in a wheelchair.
John Wood, well known for his history of railroads in the Coeur d’Alene mining area, shared with me a press photo of FDR on his visit to Farragut. He was going to PhotoShop out a few scratches, but when he looked closely at the picture he noticed someone had beaten him to it on the original. That is, the photo was altered in some interesting ways. First, someone seems to have dodged out a cigarette from FDR’s mouth. John also noticed that something was going on with the car’s visor on the right. It looks like there was a map clipped to it, most of which has been retouched to oblivion. When I looked at the photo I noticed one more little history-altering touch. Someone obliterated a hearing aid from FDR’s ear. In a way, it’s the most obvious alteration because it leaves a hearing-aid-shaped void.
For history buffs, this is interesting because it further illuminates to what extent the president’s public image was manipulated. To me the human frailties everyone was hiding only further emphasize the strengths FDR had.
The original photo showing FDR in the front seat, and Idaho Governor Chase Clark in back with a couple of Navy officials. 
A blowup of the photo shows that someone removed a cigarette and probably a hearing aid.
The two workmen looked up as a car went by.
Said one:
‘That almost looks like F.D.R. himself.’
Answered the other:
‘Yep, but he’s at the White House.’
They went back to work.”
It was FDR. He was on a secret nationwide tour of defense plants and military installations. The press was ordered not to cover his trip until two weeks after it was over. His stop in North Idaho took place on September 21, 1942.
The president’s relationship with the press during that time of war has received much analysis in later days. For one thing, the press seemed to shy away from any reference or photograph that might show FDR as anything less than at the top of his game. Pictures of him using a cane were rare. Even rarer were pictures of him in a wheelchair.
John Wood, well known for his history of railroads in the Coeur d’Alene mining area, shared with me a press photo of FDR on his visit to Farragut. He was going to PhotoShop out a few scratches, but when he looked closely at the picture he noticed someone had beaten him to it on the original. That is, the photo was altered in some interesting ways. First, someone seems to have dodged out a cigarette from FDR’s mouth. John also noticed that something was going on with the car’s visor on the right. It looks like there was a map clipped to it, most of which has been retouched to oblivion. When I looked at the photo I noticed one more little history-altering touch. Someone obliterated a hearing aid from FDR’s ear. In a way, it’s the most obvious alteration because it leaves a hearing-aid-shaped void.
For history buffs, this is interesting because it further illuminates to what extent the president’s public image was manipulated. To me the human frailties everyone was hiding only further emphasize the strengths FDR had.
The original photo showing FDR in the front seat, and Idaho Governor Chase Clark in back with a couple of Navy officials. A blowup of the photo shows that someone removed a cigarette and probably a hearing aid.
