Rick Just's Blog, page 93

Castle Rock (tap to read)

When a people have no written history, it is difficult to establish what happened where. Such is the case of Castle Rock near the Old Idaho Penitentiary in Boise. The Shoshone, Bannock, and Paiute tribes had an oral history about the place, which they called Eagle Rock. They had used the site, which includes a hot spring, for many years before the first white man came to the area. It was a place of healing and a place where they cared for their dead.
 
A developer in the late 1980s owned the land and thought it would be a great place for some high-end view properties. The tribes sued to stop the project.
 
The developer paid for an archaeological survey which found no trace of a gravesite. How could the Indians prove it was sacred ground when they didn’t have a written history?
 
No historian in Idaho at that time commanded more respect than Merle Wells. It was his opinion that the site had been used for many years by the tribes. He also had something written. An 1893 article in the Idaho Statesman described the “grinning skeletons” that had been uncovered near Table Rock and the Sho-Ban beads associated with the graves.
 
After six years of litigation over the issue all the parties were tired of fighting. The Boise City Council agreed to purchase a key piece of the Castle Rocks property for $500,000 to keep it from development. The developer made some concessions regarding rooflines and setbacks for the remainder of the project.
 
Today the area is known as Castle Rock Reserve and is managed by Boise City Parks and Recreation. The city has planted some 3000 native plants on the hillside. A hiking trail loops through the area, but well away from the sacred pools.
 
From the Boise Parks and Recreation website: “Betty Foster approached Boise's Parks & Recreation Department in 2006 with a project to raise the awareness of Castle Rock's historical significance. She raised funds and helped design the Castle Rock Reserve tribute stone near the Bacon Drive entrance. Betty is a dedicated wife, mother, former school librarian, active volunteer, and continues to share her knowledge with our community.

“The Castle Rock Reserve tribute stone is a poignant reminder that the rocks jetting out of the hillside that touch the sky are an important part of Idaho's Native American history. Visitors will appreciate the peaceful surroundings, expanse of open sky, views of the Boise Valley area, and the river that lies below. Let them also be filled with a sense of the past, present and future converging in a moment of time. Listen closely and you may hear a faint whisper on the breeze saying… tread gently for you are on sacred ground.”

The Sheriff was a Weasel (tap to read)

In 1865, Ada County—which at the time included what are now Payette and Canyon counties—was in the market for its first sheriff. D.C. Updyke, who lately started a livery stable in Boise seemed like a good choice to the electorate. They might have had second thoughts if they’d been aware that Updyke was planning to use the playbook of Henry Plummer when he pinned on the badge.
 
In 1863, Plummer had been elected sheriff of Bannack, which was a part of Idaho Territory for a brief time. By the time local citizens figured out that Plummer was also the main instigator of local crime, Bannack was part of Montana Territory. Migrating borders were not nearly as concerning to the citizens of Bannack as providing for public safety. Plummer and two associates were hanged by local vigilantes in 1864.
 
But now it was 1865, and surely Ada County citizens would not make the same mistake as their counterparts in Montana. They elected D.C. Updyke and he took over as sheriff in March. There were a few items of official business that made the Idaho Statesman that year with Sherriff Updyke’s name attached. His name made the paper more often as one of the proprietors of D.C. Updyke and C.H. Warren’s stables.
 
A spot of trouble revealed itself that September when the sheriff was arrested for keeping money he collected that was meant for the county. Graft was not enough for Updyke, though. It turned out that he had probably been involved in other crimes, including stage robbery and murder. I say probably, because justice for Updyke came not in a court of law where such charges could be argued, but at the hands of vigilantes.
 
Sheriff D.C. Updyke and an accomplice were found hanged at Syrup Creek, not far from Rocky Bar, in April 1866. Pinned to Updyke’s body was a note that read:

DAVID UPDYKE,
The aider of Murderers and Horse Thieves.
XXX
 
The perpetrators elaborated by posting a card on Main Street in Idaho City a few days later. In the same handwriting as the above note, the card read:

DAVE UPDYKE
Accessory after the fact to the Port Neuf stage robbery.
Accessory and accomplice to the robbery of the stage near Boise City in 1864.
Chief conspirator in burning property on the Overland Stage line.
Guilty of aiding and assisting West Jenkens, the murderer, and other criminals to escape, while you were Sheriff of Ada County.
Accessory and accomplice to the murder of Raymond.
Threatening the lives and property of an already outraged and suffering community.
Justice has overtaken you.
XXX
 
Generally speaking, Ada County has had better luck with sheriffs ever since.

Following Government Explorers (Tap to read)

Time for one of our occasional Now and Then features.
 
Today we’re seeing private business beginning to find ways of making money in space. First, NASA sent explorers into orbit and to the moon. Now, we have SpaceX, Boeing, and other business ventures following the path of government explorers. At some point in the future settlers might follow.
 
This was the same model of exploration used in the West. Lewis and Clark led the way with their Corps of Discovery from 1804 to 1806. Other government sponsored explorations followed, mostly in an effort to survey and describe the land. Businesses tried to make a buck in the new land not long after Lewis and Clark’s successful journey.
 
David Thompson established the first fur trading post in Idaho in 1809 for the Northwest Company. In 1813 John Reid established a post at the mouth of the Boise River where it enters the Snake. Reid’s venture died with him shortly after at the hands of the natives. Donald McKenzie, with Thompson’s North West Company, established a post on the same site in 1819. Indian opposition to same led to its quick abandonment.
 
Thomas McKay, with the Hudson’s Bay Company picked the site again in 1834 for a post he called Fort Boise. It was in response to a new trading post built the same year near the Snake River about 280 miles to the east by Nathaniel Wyeth. Hudson’s Bay bought out Wyeth’s fort in 1837.
 
When settlers began making their way west, Fort Hall became an important supply point for Oregon Trail travelers. Fort Boise would serve the same function for many years. Francois Payette built a bigger, better Fort Boise for the Hudson’s Bay Company a few miles away in 1838. It operated until 1854 when flooding and continued Indian hostilities closed it.
 
The Fort Boise that helped kick-start the town of Boise was built by the military in 1863, about 40 miles east of the original fort.
 
Meanwhile, (condensing a lot of history) back at Fort Hall, things weren’t going that well for the Hudson’s Bay Company, either. The fort was abandoned in 1856. The military built a new Fort Hall on Lincoln Creek in 1870, about 25 miles away from the Hudson’s Bay site.
 
Government involvement in exploration and forts was interwoven with the efforts of businesses and entrepreneurs (fur trappers) in the early days of the new frontier. Much the same is happening today with space exploration. You won’t be able to take your Conestoga wagon to Mars, or even your Tesla. Settlers are unlikely to encounter hostile natives on those first trips into the new frontier. Their challenges will be more basic: food, water, and breathable air.

The First Community Bomb Shelter (tap to read)

Today we’re featuring a guest post written by Cameron Dickie. Cam served as a history intern from BSU during the spring semester, helping me with research on a variety of topics.
 
The first communal bomb shelter in the United States was constructed in Boise in 1961, during the height of the Cold War.
 
Designed to be multifunctional, the Boise Bomb Shelter provided young adults within the community with a center of recreation, hosting youth activities while simultaneously remaining equipped to provide the citizens of Boise with protection during a national emergency regardless of its magnitude.
 
Funded by the Federal Civil Defense Agency, which contributed $122,000 to the project, the groundbreaking ceremonies in December of 1960 were a regional spectacle with notable attendees including Idaho Governor Robert E. Smylie, Col. James Keel, State Civil Defense Director Norman Jones, and Boise Mayor Robert L. Day. The two-story structure, built with steel-reinforced concrete, came equipped with a technologically advanced laundry room, speaker system, and air filtration systems. The inclusion of a diesel generator, kitchen, dormitories, and decontamination showers provided an architectural phenomenon within the Boise Community.
 
Reserving a place in the shelter cost $100 per family, causing some controversy. As the shelter's construction solely housed 1,000 people in the event of atomic warfare, citizens of Boise felt that they had already funded the structure with their tax dollars, therefore, deserved their position guaranteed within the survival of nuclear fallout. These disagreements caused tremendous strife between members and non-members, as the members of the bomb shelter, felt justified in their protection while shaming non-members for their ill sentiment and further chastising them over their refusal to fight the spread of Communism on the home front.
 
The Boise Bomb Shelter remained empty throughout the 1960s, with its primary use as a host for communal events and activities. The Boise Independent School District purchased the shelter in 1972. Until the early 2000s, the school district used this facility for administrative offices and as an archival structure holding surplus furniture and school records, eventually clearing out the nuclear-centric portions of the structure.
 
After the Boise Independent School District built new offices in 2001, the historic bomb shelter was sold to engineer Jon P Farren. The building is now used as an engineering office, indoor storage, and for music rehearsal studios.
For more photos and additional history visit https://www.boisebombshelter.com/ The grand opening of the Boise Bomb Shelter attracted quite a crowd.

Idaho Territory's First Marriage (tap to read)

Do you know who the first non-native couple married in Idaho was? It could be difficult to track down. Still, I have a nomination. Let’s see if you know of a couple who were married in Idaho earlier.
 
I’m talking about a place officially named Idaho, so the first candidates would have to have been married on or after March 3, 1863, when Idaho became a territory.
 
My candidates are Niels and Mary Christofferson Anderson who were married in Morristown, July 30, 1863. Morristown lasted only a few years and became known as Soda Springs.
 
The year before, 15-year-old Mary Christofferson had been struck in the face by a cannonball, the beginning shot fired in what would be known as the Morrisite War, that took place at Kington Fort, Utah. Joseph Morris and his followers were holed up there waiting for the Second Coming when a group called the Mormon Militia came to demand the release of a prisoner they were holding. Morris had formed the breakaway Church of the Newborn when Brigham Young refused to acknowledge the prophecies of Morris.
 
In the siege that followed several Morrisites were killed, including their leader. About half of the followers of Morris were escorted into the newly formed Idaho Territory in May, 1863, where they founded Morristown.
 
Mary Anderson did not let her disfigurement—her jaw was shot off—ruin her life. She and Niels raised a thriving family. Many of their descendants live in Idaho today.
 
This was the shortest possible telling of the story of the Morrisite War. I give a one-hour presentation about the war to interested groups. You can also watch my YouTube video about it. The best book available on the subject is Joseph Morris: and the Saga of the Morrisites Revisited , by C. Leroy Anderson.
 
So, do you know of another non-native couple who were married in Idaho earlier?
Mary Anderson. Idaho Territory's first bride?

Edgar Miller (tap to read)

Edgar Miller was born in or near Idaho Falls a few weeks before the turn to the Twentieth Century. He was destined to become a major force in the art and design worlds in that century.
 
Miller knocked around with his brother exploring what there was to explore near his home growing up. They would go camping for days in the nearby hills, where Edgar drew. And drew. Creating pictures of wildflowers was a passion. One of his high school teachers saw his talent and got him accepted at the Art Institute of Chicago in 1917.
 
He took to the city the way he took to his art, eventually creating a live-work art community much of which exists still today. Most famous for his stained glass, he was a pioneer in graphic art advertising, and influential in architecture.
 
Miller loved growing up in Idaho. He saw a painting of Custer’s Last Stand when he was four and from that moment wanted nothing more than to be an artist. He began sketching everything he saw. Much of his work was inspired by his childhood in and around the frontier town.
 
For more on Edgar Miller, see this Time Magazine slideshow of his work. A comprehensive article about Miller is available from on the CITYLAB website. The Edgar Miller Legacy is a nonprofit dedicated to preserving the art and "handmade homes" he created. Finally, there is quite a lavish book called Edgar Miller and the Hand-Made Home: Chicago's Forgotten Renaissance Man.
 
Thanks to architectural historian Julie Williams of Idaho Falls for telling me about Edgar Miller.

A Drowned Spring (Tap to Read)

Reservoirs drown things. They put highways under hundreds of feet of water, as happened when Dworshak Dam was built. They drown falls as Cascade Dam did or change them so they are no longer recognizable, as happened with the American Falls Dam. And they sometimes eradicate natural features. This is why you may never have heard of Steamboat Springs.
 
The area around Soda Springs is well-known for its bubbling water. Ninety Percent Springs produced Idanha Water for many years and the mechanically timed geyser in the middle of town still brings in tourists. But we lost one once-famous feature, Steamboat Spring.
 
Oregon Trail travelers and early explorers frequently mentioned Steamboat Spring.
 
In 1839. Thomas Jefferson Farnham described it thus: “On approaching the spring, a deep gurgling, hissing sound is heard under-ground. It appears to be produced by the generating gas in a cavernous receiver. This, when the chamber is filled, bursts through another cavern filled with water, which it thrusts frothing and foaming into the spring. In passing the smaller orifice, the pent gas escapes with very much the same sound as steam makes in the escape-pipe of a steamboat. Hence the name.”
 
James John, wrote in his diary on August 10, 1841, that he had noticed 100 or so springs, "which are constantly bubbling and throwing off gas. Some sprout water to a considerable distance and roar like a steamboat."
 
John C. Fremont, writing in 1843 noticed an opening on the rock where “a white column of scattered water is thrown up, in form like a jet-d'eau, to a variable height of about three feet, and, though it is maintained in a constant supply, its greatest height is attained only at regular intervals, according to the action of the force below. It is accompanied by a subterranean noise, which, together with the motion of the water, makes very much the impression of a steamboat in motion; and, without knowing that it had been already previously so called, we gave to it the name of the Steamboat spring.”
 
Today, Steamboat Spring lies beneath about 40 feet of water in the Alexander Reservoir. On calm days you can see the surface bubbling a bit, marking the spot. In low-water years those who don’t mind tromping in the mud can still find the springs exposed. This image of Steamboat Spring is from the book Caribou County Chronology, by Verna Irene Shupe, published in 1930.

Presidential Roots in Idaho (Tap to read)

Presidents Benjamin Harrison, Theodore Roosevelt, and William Howard Taft shared Idaho roots. No, none of them were born here, and none of them lived here, but they all put down roots.
 
It started with President Harrison. When he visited Idaho in 1891 he planted a red oak in front of the southeast corner of the Territorial Capitol. A rock sugar maple was the next presidential planting. That came about in 1903 when President Theodore Roosevelt visited Boise and put his tree next to Harrison’s red oak. Finally, President Taft planted an Ohio Buckeye (yes, he was from Ohio) next to Roosevelt’s maple.
 
The trees thrived. The first two planted lasted over 100 years. They came down in 2006, not from some disease but by the chainsaw of progress. That was the year excavation began for the new underground wings at the statehouse. They couldn’t work around the trees.
 
One Legislator with a sense of history and a woodworking hobby took it upon himself to preserve some of the history of the Idaho presidential trees. Then Rep. Max Black (R), District 15, saved much of the wood from the trees.
 
According to a story Royce Williams wrote for Idaho Public Television, saving the presidential wood was a challenge. Although Black had arranged with a contractor to secure the wood, when the chainsaws came out, it was a different contractor doing the work. Some fast talking saved the wood. Black then had to scramble to find a place to store it temporarily, and find a longer-term storage site where it could cure. Black secured a portable sawmill and 20 volunteers to slice up the trees. He located kilns in Emmett, Boise, and Meridian where he could dry the lumber.
 
After curing the wood for 18 months, Black began delivering it to wood carvers around the state. Each carver got enough wood to make something for themselves, and a piece for public display. Those creations are on rotating display today in Statuary Hall in the renovated capitol building.

130 Years of the Columbian Club (Tap to read)

Boise’s Columbian Club started just as the hundreds of other Columbian clubs across the country did. The women’s clubs were formed to help assure that every state was well represented at the 1893 Columbian Exposition, the world’s fair in Chicago. Every county in Idaho formed a Columbian Club. The Boise Columbian Club would have a distinction that no other Columbian club in the country would have. It is the last Columbian Club, and remains active today.

The Columbian Exposition, often referred to as the “White City” because of its prevalent use of white plaster, inspired by classical building designs, was a commemoration of the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the New World, albeit a year after the actual anniversary.

Idaho was a newly minted state eager to show off its resources. Neoclassical architecture would not do. The concept for the Idaho Building was envisioned by Spokane architect Kirtland Cutter, who was chosen by a committee that included famed author and Boise resident Mary Hallock Foote. Foote had attended the Women’s School of Design at the Cooper Union in New York. Best known for her illustrations in popular magazines and books, Foote was also trained to draft. Foote led a committee in the Columbian Club that directed the design of the building and its furnishings. Of special importance was the Women’s Reception Room in the Idaho Pavilion with its early arts and crafts furniture.

Befitting this frontier state, the Idaho Building was a rustic log chalet on a foundation of lava rock. The cedar logs and cedar shake roof were stained to give the impression that the three-story building was years older than it was. It was a showcase of Idaho resources. The four ground floor rooms were the Fir, Cedar, Tamarack and Pine rooms, each trimmed in the namesake wood. Gemstones from the Gem State encrusted the white Idaho marble fireplace, which featured andirons made from miner’s picks, shovels and hammers. The second floor, where the Women’s and Men’s reception rooms were located, was divided by a mica hall, featuring Idaho mica glazing. That floor extended into a balcony garden planted with Idaho wildflowers. A taxidermy and agricultural product display took up the third floor.

The state’s building was a popular attraction, with an estimated 18 million people taking it in. One postcard remarked, it was the “gem of the show.”

The furniture from the women’s reception room would come back to Boise after the conclusion of the exposition. The women of the Columbian Club, who gathered the first collection of books to benefit women traveling on the Oregon Trail, were working on Boise’s first public library. In 1895 they furnished that room in the basement of city hall with custom furniture from the Idaho Building. But that wasn’t the end of the club. They had a library to build, then ordinances to pass (no spitting on the sidewalks), the courthouse grounds to landscape, suffrage to right, a traveling library to establish, a curfew law to pass, money for a girls’ dormitory at the University of Idaho to raise, improvements to the Morris Hill Cemetery to make, more furniture for yet another Idaho Building for the Lewis and Clark Exposition to procure, a library bond election to pass, sewing classes to be introduced into public schools, and on, and on, into the next century, and then the next.

In recent years, the Columbian Club led the restoration effort for the O’Farrell Cabin, and funded 20 log benches along the Greenbelt. The club’s endowment provides annual scholarships to outstanding young students.

The club’s origin story is tied to that 1893 Chicago exposition, where the first moving sidewalk, first Ferris Wheel, first automatic dishwasher, first phosphorescent lights, first zipper, first spray painting, and first U.S. commemorative stamps and coins were featured. It was at the Columbian Exposition that products common today were first introduced, including Aunt Jemima pancake mix, Cracker Jack, Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit Gum, Quaker Oats, Cream of Wheat, Shredded Wheat, Hershey’s Chocolate, Pabst Blue Ribbon (which didn’t actually win one at the fair but was chosen there as “America’s Best”).
​
All those firsts and one important last: The last, and ever vibrant, Columbian Club.
  ​In June, 1899 the Educational Committee of the Boise Columbian Club attended a reception at the capitol celebrating the opening of their traveling library, one of many projects the club sponsored over the years. The image is from the Columbian Club Collection, MS356, courtesy of the Idaho State Historical Society. A member of the Boise Columbian Club provided the names of the women in the photo, from left: Margaret Roberts, Stella Balderson, Gertrude Hays, Mary Beatty, Eva Dockery, and Harriet French Steen.

Pop Quiz! (Tap to play)

Below is a little Idaho trivia quiz. If you’ve been following Speaking of Idaho, you might do very well. Caution, it is my job to throw you off the scent. Answers below the picture. If you missed that story, click the letter for a link.
 
1). The legislative riot of 1867 was a fight over what?
 
A. Signing a loyalty oath to the Union in order to get paid
 
B. Moving the capitol from Lewiston to Boise
 
C. Critical Race Theory
 
D. Furniture
 
E. All of the above
 
 
2). What is the mascot of Orofino High School?
 
A. The Cougars
 
B. The Russets
 
C. The Inmates
 
D. The Maniacs
 
E. The Wombats



3). Which of these women writers was born in Idaho?
 
A. Carol Ryrie Brink
 
B. Marilynn Robinson
 
C. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
 
D. Sarah Palin
 
E. All of the above

 
4). How many of the “Hello Girls” of WWI were from Idaho?
 
A. 1
 
B. 2
 
C. 3
 
D. 4
 
E. All of them
 
 
5) Hudson’s Hamburgers in Coeur d’Alene started when?

 
A. 1897
 
B. 1907
 
C. 1917
 
D. 1927
 
E. 1957  Answers (If you missed that story, click the letter for a link)
1, A
2, D
3, E
4, B
5, B


How did you do?
5 right—Why aren’t you writing this blog?
4 right—A true Idaho native, no matter where you’re from.
3 right—Good! Treat yourself to some French fries.
2 right—Okay! Eat more potatoes!
1 right—Meh. You need to read more blog posts.
0 right—Really, you should reconsider your recent relocation. ​