Bonneville County Rancher, Developer, and Public Servant Hank Kiefer [otd 03/18]

Henry W. “Hank” Kiefer was born March 18, 1851 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania … one of twelve children born to the family between 1844 and about 1863. As a boy, he served an apprenticeship as a machinist, while also working part-time for his father, a Master Tanner. His father died in 1865, his mother two years later.

Golden Spike Ceremony. National Park Service.

In 1869, Hank decided to head West. French’s History specifically mentions June as the date when he arrived in Colorado. It may well be significant that the transcontinental railroad had been completed just a month earlier.

Within a year or so, Kiefer landed a job with Coe & Carter, a well-known Omaha firm that had major contracts to supply ties and lumber  for the Union Pacific Railroad. Over the next few years, the job took Hank through Wyoming, Utah, and into Idaho.

In 1878, the Utah & Northern Railway extended its narrow gauge tracks across eastern Idaho, headed for Montana. Kiefer took charge of a logging camp on the South Fork of the Snake River. As the tracks approached the Montana border in the spring of 1879, Hank moved the camp closer to Monida Pass.

Kiefer worked on tie contracts in the Rocky Mountains until the spring of 1883. At that time, he purchased a ranch on Willow Creek, northeast of Eagle Rock (now Idaho Falls). There, he raised cattle, farmed, and also planted an apple orchard. Four years later, Eagle Rock school teachers took their pupils on a field trip to see the first home-grown apples in the Upper Snake River Valley.

Hank spent the rest of the 1880s tending to his crops and livestock. Thus, the Idaho Register in Idaho Falls reported (October 1, 1887), “Hank Kiefer has purchased from Taylor & Smith one of the latest improved hay balers and will soon commence operating it, when he will be prepared to ship hay.”

 In 1892, he was elected Assessor for Bingham County. At that time, the county encompassed most of eastern Idaho. He then served two years as sheriff, before being elected again as County Assessor.

In the summer of 1901, Kiefer, like many others, took a fling at the the Klondike gold rush, where he apparently did better than most. The following year voters elected him to a term in the Idaho Senate.

As his farm-ranch operation prospered, Kiefer invested in irrigation projects, real estate, and a mercantile company in Iona. He remained president of one canal company for nearly twenty-six years, until the holdings were reorganized as a cooperative water district.

In 1907, his expertise in land development, and his Republican Party loyalties, led President Theodore Roosevelt to appoint Kiefer to be Register for the U. S. Land Office in Blackfoot. He would subsequently be re-appointed to that position by President Taft.

Idaho Falls Carnegie Library construction, ca 1915.
Bonneville County Historical Society.

However, he still retained an interest in Idaho Falls and, in 1908, donated a lot to be used for a public library. A committee proceeded with a request for a Carnegie Library grant and the facility opened in 1916. After his tenure as Land Office Register ended, Hank became a member of the Idaho Falls City Council. In late 1917, he served a half-year as Acting Mayor.

After that, Kiefer began winding down his active participation in business and politics. He lived a comfortable retirement until his death in 1937.
                                                                                 

References: [French]

Barzilla W. Clark, Bonneville County in the Making, Self-published, Idaho Falls, Idaho (1941).

Mary Jane Fritzen, Idaho Falls, City of Destiny, Bonneville County Historical Society, Idaho Falls (1991).

“Golden Jubilee Edition, 1884–1934,” Idaho Falls Post-Register (September 10, 1934).

Medical Researcher and Teacher Thomas C. Galloway, M.D. [otd 03/17]

Dr. Galloway.
University of Idaho Archives.

Eminent physician Thomas C. Galloway was born March 17, 1886 in Boise. As a researcher at the Northwestern University Medical School, Galloway made award-winning discoveries in the symptomatic treatment of "bulbar" poliomyelitis, one of the most dreaded diseases of the Twentieth Century.

His father, of the same name, was among a handful of whites who first settled along the Weiser River in 1863 [blog, June 6]. The elder Thomas married in 1868 and began raising a family. After about fifteen years, Galloway owned a huge herd of horses. However, his oldest children were also approaching high school age, and he and wife Mary felt their local educational opportunities were limited.

Father Tom sold his horses, and one of two ranches they then owned, and moved the family to Boise City. There, he bought a home as well as much other real estate. It was also there that Thomas, Junior, was born. The Galloways remained in Boise until the older children had completed high school, then moved back to Weiser in 1896-1899.

Thomas, Junior, arrived at the University of Idaho campus at a time of substantial growth. During that general period, contractors completed a new women's dormitory, a gymnasium, and a new science hall. Of course, he would have also been on campus when fire destroyed the Administration Building at the end of March 1906: He graduated that spring.

He taught chemistry at the University for a year and then moved on to the University of Chicago. The Idaho Statesman proudly reported (May 19, 1911) that Galloway was “winning high honors in scholastic and athletic lines” there. As a junior at the University's Rush Medical College, he had already published a paper in the American Journal of Physiology. Moreover, having taken up wrestling for exercise, he had become a two-time wresting champion at the school.

Galloway earned a medical degree from Rush Medical College in 1912. He spent the rest of his life in the Chicago area, although we're told that, "At his ranch in Idaho, Dr. Galloway hosted family reunions each summer for fifty years."

Thomas spent over a half century affiliated with the Evanston Hospital, and taught for many years at two other area hospitals and the Northwestern University Medical School. Galloway eventually served as Director of the Medical School. He authored or co-authored numerous medical publications.

His most noted discovery involved the use of tracheotomy to treat "bulbar" poliomyelitis. This polio variant causes severe breathing difficulties even before paralysis impacts the diaphragm and lungs.

Iron lung ward for treatment of polio victims, ca. 1953.
U.S. Food & Drug Administration.

Galloway carefully studied the risks associated with the tracheal operation versus the known breathing problems, including fatal respiratory arrest. His 94-page monograph describes the results and preferred procedure in great detail. His work is credited with saving hundreds of lives, and is still valid today, although polio vaccines have reduced the disease from a widespread, frightening scourge to a relatively uncommon pathology.

Dr. Galloway received many awards: An Honorary Doctor of Science degree from UI, recognized as a Distinguished Alumnus by Rush Medical College, and the James E. Newcomb Award from the American Laryngological Association. Galloway passed away in February 1977.
                                                                                 

References: Richard J. Beck, Famous Idahoans, Williams Printing, (© Richard J. Beck, 1989).

Thomas C. Galloway, Treatment of Respiratory Emergencies including Bulbar Poliomyelitis, Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, UK (1953).

Rafe Gibbs, Beacon for Mountain and Plain: Story of the University of Idaho, The Caxton Printers, CaIdwell (© 1962, Regents of the University of Idaho).

Frank Harris, "History of Washington County and Adams County," Weiser Signal (1940s).

Steamboat Pioneer and Coeur d’Alene Booster Joseph C. White. [OTD 03/16]

Coeur d’Alene developer Joseph Clarence White was born March 16, 1865 in a tiny settlement about 35 miles south of Omaha, Nebraska. The family moved to Colorado when Joseph was about eleven years old. After high school, he enrolled at the University of Denver. He completed a B.A. degree in 1888, even though the family had claimed a homestead in the Idaho Panhandle a year or so before that.

J. C. White. [French]

For four years, J.C. (as he was known throughout his adult life) worked as a railroad construction engineer in north Idaho. Then, in 1892, he claimed a homestead about 40 miles northeast of Moscow. The following year, the Idaho road commission appointed J.C. to survey potential routes in Latah County. Although he retained his homestead, J.C. apparently moved to Rathdrum some time after his marriage in January 1896. For two years around the turn of the century, he was the official Surveyor for Kootenai County. Following that, he served a term in the Idaho House of Representatives.

After his term, he had a fine home built in Coeur d’Alene. He headed a company that owned at least a share of an electric rail line connecting Coeur d’Alene to Spokane. Then, in June 1903, the company launched a large new steamboat, the Idaho, to operate on Lake Coeur d’Alene. Described as “a hustler, a mover and a pusher,” J.C. soon expanded his steamboat holdings, buying up smaller competitors.

He was also a man of “great personal charm,” who enjoyed life and liked to party. Thus, he became an enthusiastic and  effective promoter of the business as well as recreational opportunities in the Coeur d’Alene region. He helped found a local Chamber of Commerce, which he led for a time, and encouraged the formation of other societies and associations.

Still, for all his charm and bon vivant nature, J.C. was not averse to the “hard-ball” competitive tactics of that era. Thus, in April 1908, he persuaded the owner of a controlling interest in his largest, most persistent competitor to sell out to him. His Red Collar Steamship Company would hold a virtual monopoly on lake traffic for perhaps a decade. However, that became less profitable over time as rail lines and better roads for trucks began to penetrate the east side of the lake.

Steamer Idaho. Washington State Archives, Digital Collections.

Oddly enough, in his eagerness to promote the area, J.C. also weakened one of his main holdings. As chairman of a commission on roads, around 1920 he spurred construction of the first concrete-paved road in Idaho, connecting Coeur d’Alene to Spokane. Soon, the electric rail link began to lose money. That, plus increased competition against the steamship line, finally forced the company into receivership in August 1922. (A new owner for the Red Collar line held on until 1929, when it was sold as a log transport operation.)

J.C. did not give up entirely; he had a smaller boat built for lake traffic and ran that until 1930. He also had numerous other interests and investments to keep him busy: several banks (sometimes as an officer), silver mines, and more. Moreover, in July 1931, at the age of 66, he accepted an appointment from the Idaho Bureau of Highways as maintenance supervisor for all of northern Idaho. He went into semi-retirement after about two years at that task.

Still, in 1940, now aged 75, he was serving as Weed Control Officer for Kootenai County. A year or so after that, he began to suffer from chronic heart disease and cut back entirely. He passed away in April 1953.

                                                                                 

References: [French], [Hawley]

“Death of J. C. White … ,” Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington (April 7, 1953).

Ruby El Hult, Steamboats in the Timber, The Caxton Printers Ltd., Caldwell, Idaho (© Ruby El Hult, 1952).

“[White Newspaper Articles],” Silver Blade, Rathdrum, Idaho; Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Spokane Review, Spokane Chronicle, Washington (June 1893 – March 1933).

Workmans' Compensation Law Initiated in Idaho [otd 03/16]

On March 16, 1917, Governor Moses Alexander signed Idaho's first Workers' Compensation law. The state thus joined a trend that began in this country around 1910-1911, and even earlier in Europe.

Governor Alexander.
McDonald, Moses Alexander.

Historically, records of the concept date back almost as far as we have writing … some four thousand years. It seems likely that the idea grew right along with the notion of one man paying another to work for him. Written laws, like the ancient Hammurabic Code of 1750 B.C., provided detailed schedules: so many drachmas (or other monetary unit) for loss of a finger, and so on.

Ancient writings indicate that the codes based such schedules on the actual disability assumed to be associated with a specific, “quantifiable” injury … broken or severed limb, loss of an eye, crushed foot, etc. The concept of impairment (diminished ability to perform a task) due to an injury was undeveloped or non-existent. Thus, a “bad back” or double vision from a blow to the head might not be grounds for compensation, even if you lost your job because of it.

In Europe, after a hiatus during the Middle Ages, the “common law” began to provide some recourse for an employee injured on the job. However, those precedents set the bar very high before the employer had to pay anything. The injured party had to prove a considerable degree of negligence on the part of the employer.

If a worker’s actions, or those of a fellow employee, somehow contributed to the injury, the employer was off the hook. Stumble and fall off a scaffold that had no safety rails … sorry, you should watch your step. A guy above drops a hammer on your head … sue him.

Workers might not even be compensated if they were injured by a "known" hazard of the workplace. They were judged to have "assumed that risk" when they took the job. People accepted exceedingly dangerous jobs – like hard-rock mining – because those positions paid better than ordinary work.

The Industrial Revolution had brought with it many new risks, with more workers exposed to those dangers. Under common law, injured workers generally had to file civil lawsuits to have any hope of compensation. The worker usually lost, but not always … so employers had to worry about defending such cases, as well as paying off the occasional big loss.

Workshop, ca. 1919. Personal Collection.

As suits by injured employees proliferated, industry leaders decided an insurance program, coupled with exemptions from all those legal actions, would be cheaper in the long run. In 1884, the first effective workers’ accident insurance laws went on the books in Prussia.

The trend spread to the United States in 1905-1908. Observers usually credit Wisconsin with the first effective workers’ compensation laws in the U.S., in 1911. (Laws passed a year earlier in New York state had been gutted by constitutional issues.) During the next five or six years, over thirty other states followed suit.

The Idaho governor called for a program in his 1913 message to the legislature, but nothing happened. The subject does not seem to have come up in the 1915 session. Then, in 1917, Governor Alexander urged passage of a system “drafted in accordance with the highest ideals of giving adequate compensation to the injured.”

The legislature did pass such a law, which Alexander signed on April 16th.
                                                                                 

References: [Hawley]

Price V. Fishback, "Workers' Compensation," EH.net Encyclopedia, Robert Whaples (Ed.), Economic History Association (March 26, 2008).

Gregory P Guyton, “A Brief History of Workers' Compensation,” The Iowa Orthopaedic Journal, Vol. 19 (1999) pp 106-110.

Dylan J. McDonald (ed.), The Moses Alexander Collection, Idaho State Historical Society, Boise (2002).

Boise Developer and Saloon Owner Madison Smith [otd 03/15]

Madison Smith. H. T. French photo

Boise pioneer Madison C. Smith was born March 15, 1839 in Richmond, Missouri, about 35 miles northeast of Kansas City. The family moved West in 1851, crossing Idaho in a wagon train. Local Indian unrest was rising at that time, but the party had no trouble. They settled in the Willamette Valley of Oregon. Unfortunately, Indians killed Madison’s father in 1856, so he had to work the family ranch until his mother remarried.

Madison was out on his own by 1860, and had built up a small stake. In 1864, he and his brother-in-law loaded a mule train with freight for the gold camps near Idaho City. That area was apparently well-supplied when they arrived, so they moved on to profitably sell their goods in Boise City. Although Smith retained some property and a house in Oregon, he made his home in Boise for most of his remaining years.

Smith found odd jobs where he could for awhile, and then settled into working at a popular saloon. Finally, the Idaho Statesman reported (August 14, 1873) that “Jim Lawrence and M. C. Smith will open out, this week, a saloon in the brick building formerly occupied by … a barber shop. … They understand the business, have many friends, and will endeavor to please their patrons.”

They moved into a larger space after six years or so, but the Lawrence & Smith Saloon remained a fixture on Main Street for at least 15-18 years. It appears that Madison went into business by himself around 1890. We do know he bought a lot near downtown a year after that (Idaho Statesman, June 14, 1891).

In 1893, Smith took a minor flyer in politics: He ran for Boise City Tax Collector on the Populist Party ticket led by his nephew, who was running for Mayor. (His brother-in-law, Peter J. Pefley, had been elected mayor in 1887.) Voters crushed the Populist slate and there's no evidence that Smith took any further interest in politics.

Madison, who never married, largely held aloof from the “boom" mentality of many frontier city developers. His conservative approach was surely influenced by a disappointment in 1896-1897. Smith had loaned money to his brother-in-law and sister to invest in a saddlery company. But the firm collapsed (Idaho Statesman, September 6, 1896), and he recovered less than half his investment.

Even so, Madison was comfortable enough in his financial circumstances that he listed himself as “capitalist" in the U. S. Census for 1900. At that point, he still owned at least one saloon, and may have had property in Lewiston, where his brother-in-law had moved.

Union Block, Boise. Library of Congress

Smith closely followed the building boom that gripped Boise in 1902. Various organizations initiated ten major projects that year, including a new Episcopal Cathedral, a high school, and several commercial blocks.

One such project was the so-called “Union Block," on the northeast side of Idaho Street between Seventh and Eight, and one street over from Madison's saloon property on Main. Three years later, Smith sold the saloon and used the proceeds to buy an interest in the Union Block (Idaho Statesman, October 4 and November 29, 1905).

Madison soon moved into an apartment in the Union Block and managed his leased properties from there. He passed away from pneumonia in June 1921, after a year of increasingly poor health.

Today, the Union Block –  still in use –  is on the National Register of Historic Places. Also, according to the Idaho State Historical Society, the Society now owns a fancy hardwood bar that once belong to Smith. He reportedly ordered it from “the Brunswick Company" around 1890, and it continued in use at various locations for about seventy years. The bar is still in use for special events at the main museum.
                                                                                

References: French, [Hawley]

“Boise Building Chronology,” References Series No. 672, Idaho State Historical Society (1983).

Militia Organized Again, Then Becomes the Idaho National Guard [otd 03/14]

In an interesting coincidence, two different March 14 dates are significant for the Idaho National Guard. On March 14, 1889, Edward A. Stevenson, governor of Idaho Territory, sent a letter to the Quartermaster-General of the U. S. Army, stating that the citizens of Boise had organized a company of militia.

Governor Stevenson.
City of Boise photo.

This action followed over a decade during which the Territory had no authorized military force at all. In the early gold rush days, miners had assembled ad hoc companies to fight Indians. These Volunteer troops became somewhat more formalized for the so-called "Snake War" in 1864-1868, but many lasted only a few weeks.

However, during Idaho's final Indians wars of 1877-1879, the Territory had companies of Idaho Volunteer Militia (a "Regiment," but in name only) as well as numerous local militia units. The latter included three from Boise City alone (the "Boise Mounted Rangers," etc.), and at least eight others (the "First Payette Guards" and so forth). All these organizations disbanded when the last groups of Indians had been forced onto reservations. Around 1879, Governor Mason Brayman urged the legislature to create a formal Territorial-wide militia. However, for various reasons, mostly political, nothing was done.

So matters remained until President Grover Cleveland appointed Stevenson as Territorial Governor. The first actual Idaho resident chosen for that position, he had moved to Idaho in 1864, and was familiar with its militia history. Stevenson had, in fact, encouraged the Boiseans to form their company, which they styled the "Governor's Guards."

The state had no particular budget for such an organization, so the governor asked the Quartermaster-General if the Army could, and would, provide suitable uniforms, arms, and ammunition. The General's specific answer was unreported at the time, but he must have been agreeable: The Governor’s Guards were in full operation by early May. The Idaho Statesman reported (July 3, 1889) that “the ladies of Boise” would present them with a “beautiful banner” during a ceremony on the 4th of July.

Idaho soon had militia companies organized in Weiser, Grangeville, Albion, Eagle Rock, and Hailey.

In 1889, Stevenson and his successor called for a constitutional convention, preparatory to asking Congress to make Idaho a state. That document explicitly defined a militia. Then, on another March 14 – in 1891 – a new state governor signed the Act that formally organized the militia, soon to be called the Idaho National Guard. The legislation also provided an appropriation to supplement funds from the federal government for uniforms and equipment.

Within about a year, the Governor found a use for the new organization: He called the Guard out to restore order in the Coeur d’Alene mining districts, where union unrest had escalated into violence.

In 1898, the U.S. President, for the first time, called out the Idaho Guard to meet a national emergency – the Spanish-American War. To bolster the severely undermanned Regular Army, President William McKinley mobilized Guards units from all over the country.

First Idaho in the Philippines, 1899. National Archives.

Under that directive, the Idaho Guard became the First Idaho Regiment, a unit of the U. S. Army Volunteers. The First Idaho landed in the Philippines in early August, and saw most of its action helping check the Filipino insurrection. The regiment returned to the States and demobilized in September 1899.

The Guard structure remained in place, of course. It’s next major call-up was for duty on the Mexican Border in 1916 [blog, June 18]. 
                                                                                

References: [Hawley]

Orlan J. Svingen (Ed.), The History of the Idaho National Guard, Idaho National Guard, Boise (1995).

Idaho State Highway Commission Created to Improve Transportation System [otd 03/13]

On March 13, 1913, the Idaho legislature established the State Highway Commission. They thus joined a nationwide trend to raise highway planning and construction to the state level. Prior to that, roads had been almost exclusively a local concern.

Country "Road." National Archives.

Of course, emigrant wagons cut the first roads across Idaho, starting in the early 1840s. The pioneers naturally did only enough to make the route passable. In 1857-1860, the U. S. Army built the first planned roads in the area: The Lander Cutoff, shortening the distance to old Fort Hall, and the Mullan Road across the Idaho Panhandle [blog, Feb 5].

Aside from those exceptions, private companies built most roads, usually as toll routes. Thus, in 1886, Silas Skinner and his partners completed their toll road into Silver City, Idaho [blog, May 19]. Grants for toll franchises – roads, bridges, and ferries – filled the legislative records throughout the early Territorial period.

Some businesses and individuals opened roads on their own. In 1882, pioneer Charles Walgamott “built” a stagecoach road to carry patrons from the train station at Shoshone to his claim overlooking Shoshone Falls, perhaps the first tourist attraction in Idaho. They replaced the normal wheel tires (the outer metal strap) with a cutting band, and then simply ran their coach back and forth over the route. Charlie averred that the exposed edges “helped make the road, but say, for some time that was the roughest road any mortal ever traveled over.”

The action shifted to more local oversight as towns and counties became organized. Thus, County Commissioners denied a renewal of the franchise for the old toll bridge at Eagle Rock (soon to be Idaho Falls), and declared it a public highway in April, 1889.

Such fragmented control resulted in a patchwork of good to atrocious tracks that might or might not provide an actual transportation "system." The drive for greater state oversight began around 1891 in the heavily-traveled East, and slowly spread. The Idaho Register (Idaho Falls, June 7, 1912) noted that "Since that time about two-thirds of the states of the Union have adopted some form of state aid or state supervision."

Idaho's new state Commission immediately began identifying routes for an integrated array of state highways. One priority was a modern highway to more or less parallel, and replace, the old Oregon Trail route across the state. Another would bridge the central Idaho wilderness to connect Boise to Grangeville and Lewiston.

Construction of some parts of the new system began as soon as funds became available. In 1919, the state moved to consolidate its infrastructure development within a Department of Public Works. The Commission became the Bureau of Highways, reporting to that Department.

Idaho Highway Dept's “cook shack" and first truck, ca. 1920.
Idaho Department of Transportation.

Another reorganization followed in 1951, and then in 1974 highway-related activities became the responsibility of the Idaho Transportation Department (ITD). Eight years later, the state moved the vehicle licensing office from the Department of Law Enforcement to the ITD, where it became the Division of Motor Vehicles.

The ITD's role is to extend the trend started in 1919: to integrate road, rail, water, and air transport to best serve the needs of people and businesses.
                                                                                

References: [Brit], [French], [Hawley]

Mary Jane Fritzen, Eagle Rock, City of Destiny, Bonneville County Historical Society, Idaho Falls, Idaho (1991).

“Idaho’s Motor Vehicle History,” Idaho Department of Transportation (2006).

Charles S. Walgamott, Six Decades Back, The Caxton Press, Caldwell, Idaho (1936).