Evan E. Filby's Blog: South Fork and More, page 114

Box Elder Treaty – Sesquicentennial

For this particular date, my regular "On This Day" article does double duty, being also relevant for the Sesquicentennial.

Chief Pocatello Signs "Box Elder" Peace Treaty [otd 07/30]

On July 30, 1863, Shoshone Chief Pocatello signed the Treaty of Box Elder. In return for promises of food and other compensation for the game and land preempted by whites, the Chief agreed to cease his attacks on Oregon Trail travelers and southeast Idaho settlers.

Chief Pocatello sculpture*.
[Portneuf] Valley Pride project.The man whom whites called "Pocatello" was born in 1815-1825 somewhere in the Grouse Creek area of Utah, 35-40 miles south of Oakley, Idaho. He grew up to become a strong-mi...

Newspaperwoman and Women’s Suffrage Advocate Abigail Jane (Scott) Duniway [otd 07/29]

On July 29, 1852, Oregon Pioneer Abigail Jane Scott wrote in her party's journal, "Three miles brought us to Goose Creek; There is grass enough here for a small party of cattle; The water is not very good, being warm and muddy."
“Emigrants Crossing the Plains,” Henry Bryan Hall engraving.
Library of Congress.
Goose Creek was an important watering place on the Oregon Trail, located near where Burley is today. Abigail's father, John Tucker Scott, had assigned her primary responsibility for keepin...

Cowboys Drive Cattle Across Idaho into Wyoming and Nevada [otd 07/28]

On July 28, 1876, cowboy cook William Emsley Jackson wrote in his diary, "Three emigrant teams passed us while in camp – are being rushed right along now. Five herds of cattle between here and Georgetown."
Working chuckwagon.
Georgetown, Idaho is located about 12 miles north of Montpelier, in the southeast corner of the state. Jackson's diary emphasizes the point that, by the mid-1870s, stockmen were driving large cattle bands east across Idaho. The drive for which William Emsley Jackson cooke...

Easterners Learn About General Patrick Connor’s Work in Idaho Territory

On July 27, 1863, many Eastern newspapers – like the Boston Herald – reported on the activities of General Patrick Connor in Idaho Territory. The items all began, “Gen. Connor has transmitted to the Headquarters of the Army an interesting account of his recent expedition.”

Of course, as we have seen earlier in our chronology, people in the West had already heard about the expedition. But now the information was reaching a wider audience. The account continued, “Among its results are useful les...

Methodist Minister Performs First Religious Service in Idaho [otd 07/27]

Nathaniel J. Wyeth, 1840.
Illustration for Harper’s Magazine,
November 1892.On July 27, 1834, Captain Nathaniel J. Wyeth was working at his new Fort Hall site [blog, July 14]. In his Journal he recorded that a Frenchman named "Kanseau" had been killed during a horse race.

Kanseau worked for the Hudson's Bay Company and, Wyeth wrote, "his comrades erected a decent tomb for him. Service for him was performed by the Canadians in the Catholic form, by Mr. Lee in the Protestant form, and by the India...

Reynolds Distributes First Issue of The Idaho Statesman, in Boise [otd 07/26]

Statesman inaugural issue.On Tuesday, July 26, 1864, the first issue of the Idaho Tri-Weekly Statesman, a small four-column publication, came off the presses in Boise City. The newspaper debuted that day because of some enthusiastic, and practical, advocacy by a team of Boise businessmen.

Statesman founder James S. Reynolds told an 1870 Census taker he had been born in New York State, in 1830. However, the Illustrated History of the State of Idaho had information that he was born in Maine, and...

Idaho is Rich in gold, but Reduced Water Flow Hampers Mining

The San Francisco Evening Bulletin reprinted several items published in the “up-country” on July 25, 1863. Thus, The Dalles Mountaineer reported that Augustus N. Grenzebach, “a well known citizen of The Dalles,” had recently returned from the Boise Basin. The article said, “His reports are like all other from that locality – rich mines and untold wealth, but a scarcity of the element without which it is impossible to separate the gold from the earth. At Placerville, mining has been measurably...

Long-Time U. S. Senator Frank Church [otd 07/25]

Senator Church. Library of Congress.U.S. Senator and third-generation Idahoan Frank Forrester Church was born July 25, 1924 in Boise. In 1942, he started school at Stanford University, but left to enlist in the U. S. Army the following year. After the war, despite a bout with cancer, he completed his education, obtaining a law degree from Stanford in 1950.

He opened a Boise law practice, but quickly embarked upon his real goal. He wanted to be a professional politician like his hero, William A...

Railroad Begins Narrow Gauge Track Conversion in Eastern Idaho [otd 07/24]

On Sunday July 24, 1887, multiple crews assembled at intervals along the 262 miles of narrow-gauge track between Pocatello, Idaho and Garrison, Montana. They worked for the Utah & Northern Railroad (U&N RR) Company. This event crowned a lengthy effort to prepare for the moment.
U&N RR train, Beaver Canyon, Idaho, ca 1885.
Idaho Museum of Natural History.
The U&N RR first completed its line across eastern Idaho and into Montana in 1879-1880. The company had made an early decision...