History Corner

Late in the summer of 1897 the Signal reported that John Hancock was building a new hotel in Council.

The paper also said, “The Jew peddlers have been with us this week. They intend coming every ten days until they get all the goods sold that they bought of Haas & Swanstrom.” The “Jew peddlers” were Sam, Harry and Abe Criss. The Haas Brothers from Weiser were partners with Sam Swanstrom of Salubria (Carl Swanstrom’s father).

In late August, Calvin White told the Signal that he had been Meadows Postmaster for 19 years. This may have been a misunderstanding. Although Cal White served as a mail carrier between Meadows and Warren as early as 1878, he did not officially established a post office at Meadows until 1883. Official records indicate that White served as postmaster until 1896, and Bill Warr filled that position, starting that year (1896).

The September 2, 1897 issue of the Signal announced that Cal White was about to make a trip to Europe, reporting: “Cal has some brothers back east who are leading manufacturers of fine leathers and kids. They have recently induced Cal to accept a position with them to travel in Europe and buy up calf hides. With this in view he has rented the whole business, hotel, ranch, cattle and all to Wm. Warr and John McMahan. These gentlemen will conduct this famous stopping place and seek to make it as homelike as ever to the traveler.”

In that same report, the Signal said of Meadows: “The one store, blacksmith shop and saloon of the valley have naturally located here and each Sunday sees the people of the valley congregate to get mail and make needed purchases. Each Sunday, too, sees the young bloods racing their broncos for small purses.”

For most of the time after Cal White was postmaster, the post office was in the Jonathan McMahan general store. McMahan and M. E. Keizur were partners for a time, and then Bill Warr became a partner with them. Warr was the Meadows postmaster from 1896 until 1908 when the Warr family moved to Sweet, Idaho.

By 1897 Cal White was advocating that Packer John’s cabin be preserved as a historical structure. The Signal said: “The cabin is in a good state of preservation, but is not occupied and stands on government land. The locality is a favorite sot for campers and such parties use the building. Mr. White is anxious that the building be preserved, and in this he is right. If our historical society were able it should devise some way to prevent the cabin from being demolished.”

That same issue of the Signal commented on the road linking northern and southern Idaho, saying the best route would be via the Little Salmon River: “Instead a road goes up from Meadows to Payette lake, and thence as a state wagon road from the latter place to Florence and Camas Prairie, crosses the Secesh pass with an elevation of 6500 feet, goes down to an elevation of 1800 feet at the Salmon river, up again to 6200 feet at Florence, down again to 3000 feet or thereabouts at Camas Prairie. The ‘wagon road’ from Payette lake to Secesh Pass is a disgrace to the state. It meanders from one side to the other of the Payette river in a most primitive way, and there are ten fords of this torrential stream within a few miles, some of them rocky, ugly fords with water up to the hubs in the driest season.”

By late summer the Klondike gold rush was in full swing, and the Signal said, “Some of our neighbors have Klondike fever pretty badly.”

The October 24, 1897 Statesman mentioned a large boiler and donkey engine passing Weiser on its way toward the Seven Devils. The boiler and engine were loaded on wagons and sent to the Peacock mine near Helena. They were to be placed on the wagon road summit above Helena and the ore from the Peacock was to be drawn to the top of the hill “by cable and a car” and then hauled to the smelter. It seems likely to me that these may be one of the boilers, along with a steam-powered winch that still sit just above (south of) the Peacock Mine today.

Weiser Signal, 12-2-1897: “The smelter is now about ready to blow in and ...all preliminary construction and exploitation work is practically completed. The company is now employing between sixty and seventy men. The company has opened an assay office that does the work of all the miners in the Seven Devils free of charge.”

1897 saw William McKinley become president and Frank Steunenberg sworn in as Idaho’s 4th governor. Labor tensions were simmering in northern Idaho but had boiled over in Pennsylvania where a sheriff’s posse killed more than 19 unarmed miners during a labor dispute. Called the “Lattimer Massacre,” it became a major national scandal. Americans were becoming fed up with the vast wealth inequality and corruption of the Gilded Age.