Prospectors Discover Gold in the Owyhee Mountains [otd 05/18]

O.H. Purdy. Commercial Directory.

On the morning of May 18, 1863, a band of twenty-nine men broke camp and marched south and west from Reynolds Creek over a regional divide.

Early that month, the group had set out from Placerville, in the Boise Basin. They were chasing rumors that Oregon Trail emigrants in the Forties had observed gold signs in southwest Idaho. After crossing the Snake River, they followed along it to the mouth of Reynolds Creek (which they named) and turned into the mountains.

According to the account given later by party member Oliver Hazard Purdy, scouts had observed “what appeared to be a large stream, judging from the topographical formation of the mountains, which were well timbered.”

Purdy, born west of Rochester, New York, had been a Forty-Niner in California at the age of twenty-five.  After several years of indifferent success there, he taught school in Oregon. In 1863, he follow the rush to the Boise Basin, where he joined the Reynolds Creek band.

The explorers picked their way south through rough country and over a succession of small streams. Finally, about 4 o’clock, they curved eastward into the broad base of a canyon that narrowed as it cut deeper into the high country. Leaders decided the shallow bowl at the mouth of the canyon offered a better camping spot than anything they might find further up.

Most of the men began to unpack their mules. One man, however, saw some likely-looking gravel and scooped a batch into his gold pan. Excitement exploded when his pan showed something like a hundred “colors.” Everyone dropped what they were doing and spread out along what they called “Discovery Bar.”

Further prospecting along Jordan Creek, named for one of their party, confirmed that they had found more than an isolated pocket. The men spent ten days following the creek deep into the mountains and locating claims. Then they got together and organized a mining district. That settled, they returned to Placerville. (Over a month would pass before Major Pinkney Lugenbeel picked a site for Fort Boise, which sparked the founding of Boise City. [blog, July 4])

Their finds set off a major stampede into Idaho’s Owyhee Mountains. A letter-writer in Placerville commented (Evening Bulletin, San Francisco, July 17, 1863), "The rush this spring to the Boise mines was frantic … But violently as it raged, it was but a small matter compared to the rush from Boise to Owyhee."

By mid-summer, hopeful miners had scattered all over the area, and two rough towns had already sprung into being. One of them, Ruby City, almost immediately became the county seat for Owyhee County. Then, before the end of the year, entrepreneurs founded Silver City.

Early Silver City. H. T. French photo.

They called it that because prospectors discovered that the real wealth of the Owyhees was not gold. It was silver, with lodes said to be richer than any others known except the best of those around Virginia City, Nevada. Silver City grew rapidly and supplanted Ruby City as the county seat less than four years later.

The presence of so many miners quickly sparked a vibrant stock-raising industry in the area. Michael Jordan, for whom the creek was named, started one of the first ranches. He was, unfortunately, killed by Indians in 1864. (O. H. Purdy was also killed by Indians, in 1878.) When the mining furor died down, cattle and sheep ranching became the life-blood of the Owyhees.
                                                                                 

References: [French], [Illust-State]

A Historical, Descriptive and Commercial Directory of Owyhee County, Idaho, Owyhee Avalanche Press (January 1898).

“The Owyhee country,” Reference Series No. 200, Idaho State Historical Society.

Second Major Fire Devastates Idaho City [otd 05/17]

The Illustrated History (published 1899) observed, “The second great fire of Idaho City, on the 17th of May, 1867, did not spare St. Joseph's as the first had done.”

The statement referred to the St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, which survived a fire that devastated Idaho city in 1865. Fathers Toussaint Mesplie and A. Z. Poulin had been sent by the Roman Catholic Archbishop in Portland to establish a presence in the mining camps. Originally from France, Mesplie had spent years as a missionary among the Indians of Oregon. The Canadian-born Poulin had been associated with the Diocese of Montreal before being sent to the West.

Gold miners with riffle box. Library of Congress.

The Fathers had arrived less than nine months after prospectors established the first mining camp in the Boise Basin. Workmen started construction of the church during the summer of 1863.

The Fathers actually built four churches in the Basin that summer and fall, St. Joseph’s being the first and the largest. Builders had the structures ready by Christmas, 1863. Father Poulin led Christmas masses in Idaho City while Father Mesplie hurried between the smaller churches in three other towns. There were no Protestant churches in the Basin at the time, so, according to newspaper accounts, the Catholic services “were filled to overflowing.”

The following spring, an Idaho City merchant and (apparently) part-time minister erected a Methodist church down the street from St. Joseph’s. The fire in 1865 torched that church and most of the town, but ad hoc firemen saved the Catholic church, a popular theater, and a few other structures. News reports said that people in Boise City could see the huge column of smoke from the fire.

That fire had started, reportedly, in a “hurdy-gurdy” house, which – in the American West, at least – featured girls who would dance with the patrons for a small fee. Accusations of arson flew about, but nothing came of that. Looting, however, was rampant. For years, prospectors continued to find stashes of stolen goods believed to have been hidden away after the fire.

Early histories gave no source for the 1867 fire. Flames were first seen on the roof of a saloon on Main Street, but that did not appear to be where it had started. Although townspeople had organized a Hook & Ladder company a month or so before the fire started, high (almost gale force) winds made their efforts almost hopeless.

In the end, the flames destroyed a major part of Idaho City, even more than had been lost in the 1865 fire. H.T. French noted that every hotel in town was burned to the ground. Yet the flames again spared the Jenny Lind Theater and the offices of the Idaho World newspaper.

St. Joseph’s church, Idaho City. Library of Congress.

In 1867, the Boise Basin placer mines were still highly productive. Owners who had managed to save part of their inventory were soon back in business. Locals also quickly rebuilt St. Joseph’s. A couple months after the fire, the Idaho World reported,  “It is not quite completed, but it already presents the finest appearance of any building in the city … ”

A few months later, newcomers might not even have known that the town had suffered through a big fire. Several structures build after this second fire are still in use today, including St. Joseph’s church.

Idaho City experienced another fire the following year, but the damage was not nearly so great.
                                                                                 

References: [French], [Illust-State]

Hubert Howe Bancroft, Frances Fuller Victor, History of Washington, Idaho, and Montana: 1845-1889, The History Company, San Francisco (1890).

Arthur A. Hart, Basin of Gold: Life in Boise Basin, 1862-1890, Idaho City Historical Foundation (© 1986, Fourth printing 2002).

“Idaho City in Ashes,” Idaho Statesman, Boise, Idaho (May 21, 1867).

Snake River Steamboat Shoshone Makes Trial Run [otd 05/16]

On May 16, 1866, the stern-wheel steamboat Shoshone made its first trial run on the Snake River. The Oregon Steam Navigation Company had built the vessel in a rough temporary shipyard near the confluence of the Boise and Snake rivers.

Shoshone look-alike.* Oregon Historical Society.

Unfortunately, Idaho at that time had virtually no manufacturing infrastructure. Every piece of machinery – boilers, engines, and so forth – had to be hauled from Oregon by freight wagon over the Blue Mountains. Their “shipyard” had no foundry, so a blacksmith hammered out all the small metalwork on a hand forge.

To make matters worse, there was no sawmill near the construction site. Loads of pine planks, some whipsawed by hand, had to be dragged out of the mountains. Work began in October 1865, but poor roads and bad weather caused long delays. Records suggest that all the delays and the freight charges tripled the final cost of the steamer. But finally, in May, the Shoshone floated on the waters of the Snake.

The Company intended to haul freight upstream from Olds’ Ferry, where the wagon road dropped out of the Oregon mountains to the Snake. (It’s also just above the constriction into Hells Canyon.) The Shoshone could carry the equivalent of 60 or more wagon loads, and save weeks getting freight to its most distant planned destinations. It seemed like a can’t-miss investment.

About a week after the trial run (May 24, 1866), the company ran an advertisement in the Idaho Statesman: “Steamboat Navigation on Snake River – the new steamer Shoshone … We can transport from 100,000 to 300,000 pounds per trip.”

However, the project experienced unexpectedly high expenses, starting with hefty labor costs to transfer goods on and off the ship. Also, supplying the boat with firewood proved expensive because there were/are no large forests near the river. And finally, maintenance costs proved to be far greater than expected.

Despite steady losses, the Company pursued its scheme for about three years. Then the directors decided to transfer the Shoshone to the lower Snake and the Columbia. The captain they assigned to run Hells Canyon in 1869 walked away when he saw the first really big whitewater, Copper Ledge Falls (now covered by a man-made lake).

Wild Sheep rapids, a Class-V during spring run-off:
mishaps are life-threatening. National Park Service.

The captain who arrived the following spring repaired some weather damage, reinforced the forward hull, and shot the falls. The boat made it, although part of the prow broke away. After temporary repairs, the sternwheeler continued through some of the most challenging whitewater on the planet.

The sternwheeler’s arrival at Lewiston created a sensation. Their bow debris had preceded them downstream and convinced observers that the Shoshone was no more. From there, the ship chugged downstream to The Dalles, where workers made more permanent repairs.

After about three years on the upper Columbia River, the company transferred the ship to the lower river and sold her. Still unlucky, in late 1874, the Shoshone hit a rock and sank in the Willamette River. The new owners salvaged her machinery, but let a farmer have the hull for a crude barn.

*The Tenino: Columbia-Snake river sternwheeler, same length as the Shoshone, 25 vs 27-ft wide, a foot greater draft, comparable twin-engine (steam) design.
                                                                                 

References: [Hawley], [Illust-State]

Darcy Williamson, River Tales of Idaho, The Caxton Printers, Ltd., Caldwell, Idaho (1997).

Miner, Rancher, Bank Founder, and Legislator Joseph Ireland [otd 05/15]

J. N. Ireland. H. T. French photo.

Joseph N. Ireland, co-founder and namesake of the J. N. Ireland Bank, was born May 15, 1839 in Calvert County, Maryland. That's on Chesapeake Bay about twenty miles southeast of Washington. His father died when Joseph was eight, and at fourteen he went to Baltimore to learn saddle-making.

Many Marylanders had strong southern sympathies when the Civil War broke out. Ireland’s reminiscences give no indications, but it seems he might not have wanted to “take sides,” because he emigrated west in 1862. The wagon train he joined split in the vicinity of Old Fort Hall. Ireland stayed with the part that headed for Montana.

Joseph enjoyed considerable success in the Montana gold fields, starting near Bannack (15-20 miles west of today’s Dillon). Then, in the summer of 1863, they got word of major discoveries in Alder Gulch. Within a month of the discovery, stampeders, Ireland among them, founded the town of Virginia City. Ireland later recalled how difficult it could be to keep what one had earned: “There was no law in the country. … Highwaymen were numerous, even operating by day.”

Ireland was tough enough, and smart enough, to prosper despite the difficulties and danger. In late 1863, he and his partners traveled east and made a substantial bank deposit in Omaha. Joseph returned to Idaho the following spring and began building stagecoach stations under contract to Ben Holladay [blog, Aug 11].

By around 1870, cattle raising had taken root in eastern Idaho, so Ireland started a ranch in the general area of Fort Hall. Like Con Shea and David Shirk, he started in the cattle business by driving herds of longhorns up from Texas [blogs, September 24 and October 14]. In 1875, he moved his operation to near Malad City, where he would remain for thirty years. Two years later, he returned to Baltimore to marry his first wife. (He would be widowed in 1888, and remarry in 1905.)

In 1883, Ireland and a partner “experimented” with raising sheep as well as cattle, trailing a herd of over nine thousand in from California. They took heavy losses on the drive and during the first year on the range. However, once they learned the ropes, they began to realize substantial profits from their operation.

In 1888, voters elected Joseph to the Territorial Council, a legislative body roughly equivalent to a state Senate. Four years later, he and some other prominent Malad City businessmen founded a new bank. Because Joseph was the oldest of the founders, they named the institution the J. N. Ireland Bank.

In late 1897 or early 1898, Ireland sold his ranch and invested in the First National Bank of Pocatello. When failing eyesight forced his retirement from day-to-day business in 1905, he moved to that city. Shortly after moving there, he joined with four other investors to found the American Falls Realty and Water Works Company.

J. N. Ireland Bank, Malad, Idaho, ca. 1908. Photo courtesy of Ireland Bank.

Over the next few years, he attained director or vice president positions for several different banks, with locations ranging from Blackfoot, Idaho, south to Ogden, Utah. He retained his interest in the Ireland Bank in Malad, and was a director for it also. Ireland passed away in May 1928.

Today, the J. N. Ireland Bank company, still independent, operates about a dozen branch banks, mostly in small southeast Idaho towns. In fact, Pocatello is by far the largest city where they have banks, and the company has two branches there.
                                                                                 

References: [Blue] [French]

J. N. Ireland Bank, Home Page.

“The Malad Valley,” Salt Lake Tribune, Salt Lake City, Utah (April 7, 1887).

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 moved to Corvallis, Oregon, and then followed the rush to Idaho in early 1863. That June, Major Pinkney Lugenbeel began planning for a fort along the Boise River. Riggs and some other businessmen knew that wherever he sited the fort was likely to be a good spot for a town.

After Lugenbeel made his decision [blog, July 4], Riggs hurried down from Idaho City to meet a supply train coming in from Walla Walla. Reviewing the episode many years later, the Idaho Statesman, said (March 21, 1909), “At that time the cabin owned by Tom Davis and one near the site of the post were built but not occupied, so Mr. Riggs has the distinction of stretching the first tent and occupying it as the first citizen of the town.”

Riggs and the supply wagon master tacked up a sign and quickly attracted customers from the flow of emigrants along that stretch of the Oregon Trail. Thus, the Statesman noted, “Within 10 days a population was there, and the new town established.”

By then, Congress had created Idaho Territory. In May 1864, they reduced it to something near its present size and shape. At that point, Boise County encompassed the present county, plus, basically, everything west to the border, and south from around today’s Arrowrock Dam to the Snake River. Voters elected Riggs as a Representative for Boise County to the second territorial legislature. Henry then went to Lewiston and introduced two key pieces of legislation, both of which passed after considerable, and often heated, debate.

Boise City, 1864. Arn Hincelin painting.

One Act moved the Territorial capital from Lewiston to Boise City, effective December 24, 1864. The second split off the western two-thirds of Boise County to form a new county. Perhaps seeking a non-controversial name, legislators chose to call the new entity “Ada County,” from the name of Henry Riggs’ daughter. After his term in the House, voters also sent Riggs to two consecutive terms in the Territorial Council.

Later in the decade, Riggs began to invest more in properties along the Payette River. He finally moved his family to a ranch there in 1871. Still, one of the couple’s children was born in Boise in August 1872. He remained along the Payette for around thirty years, raising cattle and helping develop the town of Emmett.

Henry began to reduce his activities as he approached his late seventies. In 1902-1903, he (and presumably his wife) took a leisurely year-long trip with a loop from Missouri through New Mexico to California, returning by way of Oregon. Then an illness led to erroneous reports of his death, which the Statesman quickly had to retract (June 20, 1904).

He remained active until early 1909, when the family moved him to the hospital at the Soldiers’ Home in Boise. He died there on July 3rd.
                                                                                 

References: [Hawley], [Illust-State]

“Boise is the Best of All Says H. C. Riggs,” Idaho Statesman, Boise (April 29, 1903).

Ruth B. Lyon, The Village That Grew, printed by Lithocraft, Inc, Boise (Copyright Ruth B. Lyon, 1979).

“Henry Chiles Riggs, Sr. : May 14, 1826-July 3, 1909,” Reference Series No. 595, Idaho State Historical Society.

Movie and Television Costume Designer Eddie Stevenson [otd 05/13]

Susan Hayward costume,
David and Bathsheba, 1951.
Edward Stevenson Collection, ISU.

Long-time Hollywood costume designer Edward Manson Stevenson was born May 13, 1906 in Pocatello, Idaho. Stevenson spent over thirty years designing movie costumes before switching over to television in 1955. Along the way, he created wardrobes for a host of Hollywood’s biggest stars: Susan Hayward, Maureen O'Hara, Shirley Temple, Ginger Rogers, Edward G. Robinson, and many others.

Eddie credited an aunt who ran a millinery store with sparking an early interest in fabrics. He also said his first experience was at Pocatello High School, where he designed costumes for a couple of operettas. Unable to cope with Pocatello’s climate – he suffered from a “chronic respiratory ailment” – Stevenson moved to southern California in 1922.

Even before he graduated from Hollywood High School his abilities were recognized. He landed a job as a sketch artist, drawing images described in words by designers, writers, or actors. That led to some early design work of his own. Eddie’s first credit in the Internet Movie Database came in 1924. He provided “additional costuming” for The White Moth, a silent film released in 1924.

Barbara La Marr, star of The White Moth.
Edward Stevenson Collection, ISU.

Over the next several years, Eddie found steady work. However, not until 1929 did his name carry enough weight to get screen credits. That year, he received designer credit for five movies, and is known to have worked for two others.

Stevenson’s career took off in the Thirties. He was part of over eighty productions, and worked with some of the superstars of the industry: Barbara Stanwyck (five times), James Cagney (twice), Joan Fontaine (five), Cary Grant, and others. One of those “others” was Lucille Ball. Eddie first worked with her in 1936 … many years later he would serve as her preferred designer.

During his long career, Stevenson had a hand in over two hundred movies. Those include some of the grandest Oscar-winning Hollywood productions: Citizen Kane, The Devil and Daniel Webster, The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, and Suspicion. Many more of the films he worked on received Oscar nominations: The Magnificent Ambersons, It’s a Wonderful Life, I Remember Mama, The Spiral Staircase, and so on.

Lucille Ball in her “little black dress.”
Edward Stevenson Collection, ISU.

Eddie received his first two personal Oscar nominations in 1950, for The Mudlark and for David and Bathsheba.

Not long after that, Stevenson had to have cataract surgery. Still, despite the visual handicap, he continued as a designer, with some of his best work ahead of him. In fact, he finally won an Oscar in 1960: He shared the award for The Facts of Life, which starred Lucille Ball.

By then, Stevenson designed almost exclusively for Ms. Ball, having started with her for the I Love Lucy television series. That continued with The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour and two made-for-TV movies. In all, he designed costumes for over one hundred TV episodes.

Stevenson said that TV posed special design challenges compared to movies, mainly because of the small screen. Of course, up until the mid-Sixties, most shows were broadcast in black and white. That meant he also had to consider how a color combination would look for the actual broadcast. Despite those challenges, Eddie enjoyed the fast-paced tempo of TV production, which he said reminded him of his early days in movies.

Eddie had begun working with Ball for the Here’s Lucy show when he had a heart attack and died in December 1968.
                                                                                 

References: Trent Clegg, A Brief Biography of Edward Manson Stevenson (1906-1968), Department of Special Collections and University Archives, Idaho State University, Pocatello.

"Ex-Pocatellan Designs Comedy Clothes for 'I Love Lucy' Television Series," Idaho State Journal (January 15, 1957).

"Filmography: Edward Manson Stevenson," Internet Movie Database, Imdb.com

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 his first name) learned that business at an early age. His father bought a cattle ranch in 1917, so Howard also became versed in that life.

He graduated from Salmon High School in 1922. Howard had an appointment to attend the U. S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, but chose to stay in Idaho. (Probably a wise decision. The Naval Limitations Treaty, signed in February 1922, forced the U. S. to scrap twenty-six existing or under-construction warships.)

After working with his father in mining and ranching, Howard began his own mining venture in 1924. He likewise moved into ranching about 1930. Father and son actively pursued mining prospects throughout the Thirties and early Forties. The Helena Independent, in Montana, reported (August 6, 1937) on a lease arrangement that involved them both: “The claims … were owned by James Sims of Salmon. Operations will begin August 15, with Howard Sims, state senator, as resident manager.” Despite some optimism at that time, the property, a lead-silver prospect near Gilmore, Idaho, never became a profitable operation.

In fact, Sims recalled that, while their mining and ranching sometimes put them “in the money, … more often we were not.” They did do well in the mid- to late-Thirties with one gold mining operation. But even that ended when the advent of World War II suspended gold mining. The War Production Board sought to shift mining equipment and manpower to the production of essential war materials, especially copper. After the war, Howard added copper, and the strategically important cobalt, to his mining interests.

Howard Sims served his first terms in the Idaho Senate in 1938-1942. He then followed with several consecutive terms in 1956-1964. While there, his mining experience provided valuable input to various committees related to that industry. Oddly enough, despite his previous popularity with voters, Democrat Sims could not ride the 1964 Lyndon Johnson landslide: He was defeated “rather decisively” in his re-election bid.

Sims remained actively engaged in mining into the 1960s. In 1963, his company received an “exploration assistance” grant to search for gold and silver in Lemhi County. (Such subsidies were to be reimbursed from later mining profits.)

Early Pope-Shenon Mine buildings. Idaho Geological Survey.

Also, from 1969 until his death, Sims was an officer of  Salmon Copper Mines, Inc., which had an interest in the Pope-Shenon Mine, in the mountains southwest of Salmon. Very little work was done at the property during his tenure with the company. However, back in 1928, only one other Idaho property produced more copper than the Pope-Shenon mine.

Sims spent six years on the executive board of the Idaho Mining Association. In the late 1960s he was the mining expert on the Salmon National Forest Advisory Council. Sims also had an interest in mining claims in Nevada, northeast of Fallon. Those mines produced antimony (when the price was favorable) and silver.

Howard died in an airplane crash near Twin Falls in January 1971.
                                                                                 

References: [B&W]

Victoria E. Mitchell, "History of the Pope-Shenon Mine, Lemhi County, Idaho," Staff Report 97-15, Idaho Geological Survey, Moscow (1997).

"U.S. Aid Will go to Idaho Miner," Spokane Daily Chronicle (June 18, 1963).

War Production Board Limitation Order L-208, 7 Fed. Reg. 7992-7993 (Oct 8, 1942, with subsequent amendments.)

"Wind Halts Search for Missing Plane," The Idaho Statesman, Boise (Jan 12, 1971), (Jan 20, 1971).