Evan E. Filby's Blog: South Fork and More, page 2

Boise River Water Flows into the New York Canal [otd 06/20]

On June 20, 1900, a rude diversion structure turned water from the Boise River into the New York Canal. The diversion, though feeble, culminated nearly twenty years of effort to bring irrigation water to the higher benches paralleling the river.
New York Canal construction. Boise State University.Individuals and small cooperative groups began diverting irrigation water from the Boise River less than a year after the 1862 gold discoveries in the Boise Basin. With limited resources, ditch deve...

Boise Founder, Idaho Legislator, and Rancher Henry Riggs [otd 05/14]

Henry Chiles Riggs, one of the founders of Boise City, was born May 14, 1826 in Mount Sterling, Kentucky, about thirty miles due east of Lexington. At the age of twenty, he joined the First Missouri Mounted Volunteers and saw action during the Mexican War.
H. C. Riggs. J. H. Hawley photo.
In 1850, Riggs traveled by wagon train to California, where he operated a hotel. He returned to Missouri to get married in 1852, then brought his bride back to California two years later. From there, they m...

Mine Owner and Long-Time State Senator J. Howard Sims [otd 05/12]

Howard Sims, ca. 1955.
Beal & Wells photo.Mine owner and State Senator James Howard Sims was born May 12, 1904 in Salmon, Idaho. His father James came to Idaho from Texas in the 1880s, settling along the lower Wood River. In 1888, he moved north of Shoshone. Howard’s mother was born in Oregon; she and James were married in 1893 near Bellevue. Three years later, the couple moved to the Salmon area.

For over twenty years, James engaged exclusively in mining, and young Howard (he seldom used h...

Sportsman and Idaho Dentistry Pioneer Edward Maberly [otd 04/28]

Boise dentist Edward H. Maberly was born April 28, 1853 in England. Apparently his father and part of the family lived for a time in Illinois before 1855-1860. However, Edward did not arrive in the U. S. until about 1869. At that point the family lived in Mount Carroll, a northwest Illinois village near the Iowa border. His father, older brother, and Edward engaged in carriage painting and construction. They all moved to Ellsworth, Kansas, in 1878 – missing the earlier wild times when the town w...

Narrow Gauge Railway Tracks Reach Eagle Rock (Idaho Falls) [otd 4/11]

In 1879, the Engineering and Mining Journal contained the following brief item: "Ogden, Utah, April 11 – The Utah & Northern Railway has been completed to Eagle Rock Bridge, Snake River, Idaho, 210 miles north of this point. Regular trains will begin running there April 15th."
Western steam train. Library of Congress.A decade earlier, the eastern and western legs of the transcontinental railroad had worked their way toward each other. Even then, settlers in Montana began agitating for their ...

Investor and Mining Millionaire Amasa Campbell [otd 04/06]

Amasa Campbell. Illustrated History.Mining investor and executive Amasa B. Campbell was born April 6, 1845 in Salem, Ohio, about twenty miles southwest of Youngstown. In 1862, he took a clerk’s job at a firm engaged in grain and wool commission trading. After five years there, he worked two or three years in the west for the Union Pacific Railway.

During this period, Amasa developed an interest in Western mining prospects. For over a decade after 1871, he followed the industry in Utah, Col...

Novelist & Newspaper Columnist Vardis Fisher [otd 3/31]

Vardis Fisher.
Bonneville County Historical Society.Vardis Alvero Fisher, best known for his Western-themed novels, was born March 31, 1895 in Annis, Idaho. (Annis is about 4 miles north of Rigby.) He grew up in that area before going off to school at the University of Utah. After receiving his Bachelor's and Master’s degrees there, he earned a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1925.

From 1925 to 1931, Fisher worked as an English professor at the University of Utah and then New York U...

Gold Rush Fuels Murray Building Boom [otd 03/05]

The Lewiston Teller for March 5, 1885 published a glowing report from a correspondent in the new town of Murray, Idaho. The observer first noted that people in the entire mining district exuded confidence. At a settlement 3-4 miles west of Murrayville (Murray's original name), the reporter "counted eleven buildings under construction."
Placer mining, Murray area, 1884. Note miners in foreground.
University of Idaho Archives. Miners were running large placer rigs on streams throughout the are...

Idaho Territory Fends Off One Last Partition Attempt [otd 02/29]

On February 29, 1888, Congressional Delegate Fred T. Dubois sent the following telegram to Milton Kelly: “House committee on territories to-day reported unanimously against any division of Idaho. This ends the fight.”

Judge Kelly. Illust-State photo.Milton Kelly was the operator-editor of the Idaho Statesman, published in Boise. He was born near Syracuse, New York, in 1818. He became a lawyer in 1845 and practiced for many years in Wisconsin. Kelly moved to Placerville, Idaho in 1863. He th...

Six Miners Killed in Sudden Mining District Fire [otd 02/25]

On Tuesday, February 25, 1902, about three o'clock in the morning, the residents of the connected Standard Boarding and Lodging houses slept quietly. Most of them worked for the Standard Mine, located on Canyon Creek, about five miles northeast of Wallace, Idaho.
Standard Mine, ca. 1910. University of Idaho archives.

Placer miners prospected Canyon Creek for gold in 1884. However, as happened for many Coeur d’Alene strata, they failed to note the valuable lead-silver lodes buried in these ri...