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).

Territorial Governor George Shoup Calls for Idaho Constitutional Convention [otd 05/11]

On May 11, 1889, George L. Shoup, Governor of Idaho Territory, issued a proclamation calling for a convention to draw up a constitution for the proposed state of Idaho. His proclamation contained features we would consider unorthodox, and might be thought technically illegal.

George L. Shoup.
National Archives.

Idaho’s status as “just” a Territory had frustrated locals almost from the start. The issue was kept alive by on-going friction between the elected legislature and the officers appointed to the executive and judicial branches, most of whom were outsiders. Of course, the Territory’s population was really too low for statehood, but the supposed minimum had been ignored before.

Hard-nosed politics presented the real roadblock. In 1874, Democrats had wrested political control of Colorado Territory from the Republicans, and thought they could retain it.
Two years later, Congressional Democrats agreed to statehood for the Territory. But they were wrong about keeping control of the new state. In the Presidential election that fall, Colorado’s electoral votes for the Republican candidate ultimately cost the Democrats the White House. The lesson was not lost on either party.

Thus, for over a decade afterwards, Congress admitted no new states to the Union. Finally, elections across the country in 1888 seemed to open the door again. Proponents began to encourage the notion of statehood for Idaho.

But first, Territorial legislators had to resolved two issues: the “Mormon question,” and secession advocacy in North Idaho. They addressed the first by passing legislation – almost certainly unconstitutional – that disenfranchised most members of the LDS church. They blunted the second point by agreeing to give North Idaho the state university, in Moscow.

With those issues out of the way, in early April Governor Edward A. Stevenson issued a proclamation calling for a constitutional convention. Because of the rush, it quickly became apparent that nothing could be accomplished in the way of a convention. Then, at the end of the month, Shoup began his term as Governor [blog, Apr 1].

The difficulty for both proclamations was that the U.S. Congress had not passed “enabling” legislation, authorizing the Territory to write a constitution. That meant the Territorial government could not legally fund any action related to such a document: election of delegates, expenses during the convention, or a ratification ballot.

Precedent suggested Idaho could go ahead and write the document. Many territories had previously ignored the “enabling Act” technicality. The lack of legislative funding authority, however, meant that local governments had to cover all expenses. Unfortunately, many counties could not afford that. Thus, they did not act on Stevenson’s call.

Governor Shoup’s proclamation cleverly circumvented that problem. “If,” he wrote, “… the citizens of any county prefer to elect their delegates by some other equitable method, I am satisfied that the delegates so chosen will be recognized and admitted to seats in the convention.”

In the end, only a handful of counties actually ran elections. In most, the political party organizations – either directly or in local conventions – selected the slates. Each major party picked half; if there was an odd number, the party winning the most recent election received the extra spot. Individuals or the party organizations also paid convention expenses.

Once leaders had a document in hand, the people had to vote on it. Again, local cash funding simply did not exist, so volunteers performed much of the work. The referendum easily passed, setting the stage for the favorable Congressional vote on Idaho statehood in 1890.
                                                                                 

References: [B&W], [Hawley]

“Constitutional Convention and Ratification,” Reference Series No. 476, Idaho State Historical Society (1974).

Message Transmitted: Transcontinental Railroad Completed [otd 05/10]

On Monday, May 10, 1869, telegraph operators clattered a message all around the United States, East and West: “D-O-N-E”. That signaled the completion of the transcontinental railroad. The story of the vast national changes the rail line caused has been told and retold, in grand scale.

Meeting of the railroads, 1869. National Park Service.

But perhaps no other region, not directly on the new tracks, felt that impact as much as Idaho, although western Idaho didn’t hear about the event until days later. (Over five years would pass before Boise City and Silver City were linked to the main telegraph system.) The first public news of the link-up appeared in the Owyhee Avalanche in Silver City, Idaho, on Saturday, May 15. Buried on page three was a brief item that began: “Promontory Summit, May 10th – The last rail is laid, the last spike driven.”

Still, even before the Golden Spike Ceremony, the station at Winnemucca, Nevada had become a preferred link from southwestern Idaho to California. Its station handled stagecoach and freight traffic in the fall of 1868, and there is some evidence that stockmen were also shipping animals to San Francisco.

Traffic soon increased substantially: Records show that cattlemen shipped over ten thousand head from Winnemucca to San Francisco in 1870-1871.

Further east, Corrine, Utah – about 60 miles north of Salt Lake City – became the transfer point for stagecoach and freight wagon traffic headed north to Montana. The first substantial cattle herds reached the settlement at Taylor’s Bridge (today’s Idaho Falls) within a couple years.

The town of Kelton, Utah – a few miles north of the Great Salt Lake – grew directly from the presence of the railroad. There, stagecoach and wagon traffic to and from Boise City could connect with trains that linked all the way to the East Coast. Before, a trip East to visit family or business associates could easily take a month or two. Now the same might be accomplished in a couple weeks – to us, still a lot, but it vastly reduced the people’s feeling of isolation.

Pioneer Charles Walgamott came west in 1875. He got off the train at Kelton to catch a stagecoach into Idaho. He wrote that Kelton was “ a mere speck in the desert, consisting of some half a hundred houses built around the depot, and large commission warehouses for handling the freight for Idaho. … Large ox and mule teams moved here and there, loaded for the interior, or preparing to load.”

Freight Wagons. Reminiscences of Alexander Toponce (1971).

Charlie was just one of many. The numbers tell the story. When Idaho Territory assumed something near its present shape, in 1864, the legislative census tallied about 19 thousand people. Boise City counted 1,658. But over the next six years, many of the “easy” placer gold fields played out. The 1870 U.S. Census for the Territory enumerated 17,760, a relatively small drop. However, Boise City suffered greatly. It fell to 995 (roughly a 40 percent loss).

Those census takers made their rounds about a year after the rails linked up. Little change could be expected that soon. Ten years, however, made a dramatic difference. The 1880 Census counted over 32 thousand people, an increase of about 84 percent. Boise practically doubled in size. Three years after that, the Territory had its own east-west railroad, and it became a state in 1890.
                                                                                 

References: [Brit]

Stephen E. Ambrose, Nothing Like It In the World, Simon & Shuster, New York (2001).

“Census of 1864,” Reference Series No. 130, Idaho State Historical Society.

Fred Lockley, Mike Helm (ed.), Conversations with Bullwhackers, Muleskinners, Pioneers … , Rainy Day Press, Eugene, Oregon (1981).

J. Orin Oliphant, On the Cattle Ranges of the Oregon Country, University of Washington Press, Seattle (1968).

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

Grand Opening for Owyhee Hotel in Downtown Boise [otd 05/09]

On May 9, 1910, the Owyhee Hotel in downtown Boise opened for business. Naturally, managers touted their new establishment as the best, with the most modern features and richest décor in all the Pacific Northwest. The lobby and surrounding balcony, for example, could seat a thousand people for grand events.

Owyhee Hotel, ca. 1920. J. H. Hawley.

Hotels appeared early in the history of Boise City. Among these, the Overland Hotel, located just three blocks from the capitol building, was the place to stay for nearly forty years. Built in 1866, it was where “movers and shakers” scheduled their most important meetings and events. Politicians made important (to them, anyway) speeches from its expansive second-floor porch.

Travelers throughout the Pacific Northwest knew the hotel. They saw it as a civilized oasis between the coast and Salt Lake or Denver. “Meet me at the Overland” provided all the directions needed for a business or social occasion. However, by the turn of the century, the Overland was seriously showing its age, despite multiple renovations and upgrades.

The Idanha Hotel, built a block or so to the northwest in 1901, took over the top spot. (New owners razed the Overland in 1904 and erected a large office building.) The Idanha, new and with all the most modern conveniences of the day, happily filled the void and “ruled the roost” for almost a decade. People famous – Teddy Roosevelt, Clarence Darrow, and William Howard Taft, among them – and not-so-famous just naturally stayed at the hotel when they visited Boise.

However, the Owyhee Hotel quickly challenged the Idanha’s position. The “new kid on the block” had all the latest, most modern features, that huge opulently-decorated lobby, and multiple dining rooms. Of its 250 richly-furnished rooms, 150 had private baths, something many hotels of the period could not match.

Owyhee Hotel, rooftop garden, ca. 1911.
VintagePostcards.org sales image.

Plus, the Owyhee boasted a unique feature – and soon its biggest draw – a “roof garden.” There, patrons could enjoy drinks and the latest,“smartest” entertainment. Before air conditioning, this was the place to be on a hot summer evening in Boise.

And the Idaho Statesman (June 9, 1913) reported something totally new for the 1913 season: “a genuine cabaret is to be presented for the first time in Boise.” At the time, cabarets were the coming thing in New York and other big cities. In a classic cabaret, the performers move about the room to interact with their audience. American cabarets downplayed the social and political commentary that was part of the original that appeared in Paris in 1881. Here, they focused on singing and dancing, with snippets of comedy. The cabaret style entertainment proved very popular in Boise, and became a regular feature.

The hotel prospered because it also had much else to offer visitors. Those features arose from the experience and expertise of Eugene W. Schubert: He had managed the Idanha Hotel, the Owyhee’s older competitor, from 1902 until his first retirement in 1908. Thus, with financial backing from prominent Boise businessman Leo J. Falk, the Owyhee took its place among the elite hotels in Boise. Unfortunately, Prohibition dampened enthusiasm for the rooftop entertainment, and that attraction never fully recovered.

Still, the hotel's many other amenities sustained much of its grandeur and success for another half century. Then, with a project started in 2013, the property was converted into "The Owyhee," a multi-use structure with up-to-date offices and shops, rental apartments, and banquet and dining facilities (including the rooftop terrace.)
                                                                                 

References: [Hawley], [Brit]

Dick D’Easum, The Idanha: Guests and Ghosts of an Historic Idaho Inn, Caxton Printers, Ltd., Caldwell, Idaho (1984).

Arthur Hart, “Idaho History: Owyhee Hotel Opened in May 1910,” Idaho Statesman (April 4, 2010).

Idaho Woolgrower, Businessman, and Legislator Fred W. Gooding [otd 05/08]

Fred Gooding. H. T. French photo.

On May 8, 1856, woolgrower and state legislator Fred W. Gooding was born in Devonshire, England. Fred began work in a factory there at the age of eight, laboring in the morning and attending school in the afternoon.

The family emigrated to the U.S. in 1867 and settled in Michigan. As a young man, Fred worked on a farm in California before returning to the Midwest. There, he took business classes at what later became Valparaiso University in Indiana.

In 1882, he moved to Ketchum, Idaho. After a year or so in the mines, Gooding opened a wholesale-retail butchering business. With the extension of the railroad to Ketchum in 1884, the area boomed [blog, Apr 26] and Fred’s venture prospered along with it. However, the surge died remarkably soon, done in by falling silver prices and labor troubles. Production from the mines dropped abruptly in 1888.

Thus, that same year, Fred moved to a small settlement near the Toponis Railroad station, about fifteen miles west of Shoshone. There, he took up the sheep business. Gooding started in a big way, acquiring nearly four thousand sheep within a couple years. Unfortunately, an unusually severe winter in 1889-1890 ravaged his herds and left Fred heavily in debt. His good credit gave him time to recover and he soon had a new herd and began paying off what he owed.

In 1895, Fred moved to a new residence in Shoshone, but retained his sheep holdings. By around 1898, he owned well over a thousand acres of land, and sometimes had as many as thirty thousand sheep on his ranch. (Toponis, where Fred started out in sheep, became Gooding in 1907 [blog, Nov 1], named in honor of Fred and three brothers.)

Among other business activities, he established the First National Bank of Shoshone, and later became one of the directors of the First National Bank of Jerome. He and two brothers spearheaded construction of a water system for Shoshone, and an electric light plant.

Western sheep shearing. Library of Congress.

Gooding eventually owned over three thousand acres of private range and irrigated farm land. He became one of the largest wool shippers in the region. A charter member of the Idaho Wool Growers Association, he served two terms as the organization’s president.

In 1921, the state “fast-tracked” emergency legislation to create a new commission to oversee the Idaho sheep industry. At its first meeting, the commission elected Fred as its chairman. The measure addressed the fact that, according to the Twin Falls News (February 21, 1921), “Sheep scabies are prevalent throughout Idaho to the extent that the federal government threatened to quarantine Idaho sheep … ”

In additional to several terms in various county offices, Gooding served on the Shoshone city council and as mayor. He also served two terms in the Idaho legislature, holding the position of president pro temp of the Senate after his election in 1909.

Fred developed a strong interest in improving Idaho’s road system as a way to encourage commerce and settlement. In fact, such was his advocacy and leadership in improving Idaho’s road system, he earned the nickname “Good Roads” Gooding. When the governor created the first Roads Commission, he appointed Gooding as its chairman. Fred Gooding passed away in July 1927.
                                                                                 

References: [French], [Hawley], [Illust-State]

James H. Hawley, Eleventh Biennial Report of the Board of Trustees of the State Historical Society of Idaho, Boise (1928).

"Site Report - Wood River," Reference Series No. 206, Idaho State Historical Society (1981).