Monday, July 20, 2009

More tiny, but viable, towns

The Casper Star Tribune ran an intersting article over the weekend about a town that's disappeared.

Commenting on this on SMH, I noted:

A Casper Star Tribune article that sort of sheds light on some of the topics discussed here:

http://www.trib.com/articles/2009/07/19 ... 0157b9.txt

This article discusses an entire town disappearing. But it misses part of the reason for that. The town was only a few miles from another, that being the town of Midwest. Midwest is just about four or five miles from another, Edgerton. And Midwest is only about 50 miles from Casper. So the town in the article was probably only about 30 or 40 miles from Casper.

When it was founded, travel conditions would have made the town probably both necessary and viable. But by the 30s, when it disappeared, it was really redundant and inefficient, it's role having been taken over by older and slightly larger Midwest.

Today, Midwest and Edgerton are sort of shadows of their former selves as well.

Thursday, July 2, 2009

1920, law, and the Geology Museum

I learned just the other day that the University of Wyoming College of Law was founded in 1920, and received ABA approval in 1923.

Shoot, that's a lot earlier than I thought. I had thought, for some reason, that the College of Law dated from after World War Two. It sort of redefines my concepts of what the university regarded as worthwhile or important early on. When the College of Law was founded, I think the school was about 30 years old.

In other news, the University has had to cut its budget fairly significantly due to the decline in mineral revenues. Nearly the entire state budget is funded through severance taxes, which have taken a real hit in the last year. The change in economic fortunes has been massive, due to the national slow down, and the regional decline in the value of natural gas. So, as a result, Gov. Freudenthal has ordered ever state agency to cut back, and also enacted a general hiring freeze.

The University has taken the ax to distance programs, I guess (I'm not really up on that). But as part of the cutbacks, the very old Geology Museum is being closed.

It's a shame. I'll admit that I find it sad, as I'm a graduate of the Geology Department. I hate to see it close. I don't know how old it is, but it's real darned old. I don't disagree with the need to cut back, but I find it very difficult to accept that a cut back in a feature of a hard science department is academically sound.

Monday, June 15, 2009

Followup to the Combs murder, discussed below

The CST's history column follows up on the murder of attorney Combs.
Casper Tribune-Herald, 1934

Evidence piles up -- Throughout the week of June 15, excited headlines screamed of the presumed solution to the previous week's top story. "MRS. COMBS ARRESTED

"WIDOW FACES FIRST DEGREE MURDER CHARGE

"In a startling climax to investigation into the murder of S. S. Combs, his widow, Mrs. Hazel Combs, was placed under arrest. ... A warrant charging the first degree murder of the former (Casper) city attorney was served on the slight, steel-nerved woman. ...

"(Combs) had been shot five times at such close range that powder burns were left by some of the shots. ...

"Prisoner Visibly Shaken When Shown Weapon

"To the rear of the (Combs) cabin, about 50 feet distant, is the outhouse where an important discovery was made. Beneath fresh wood ashes ... was found the revolver with which, the officers said, the murder was committed. It contained six empty shells. ...

"MURDER WEAPON IDENTIFIED

"EXPERT LINKS REVOLVER WITH BULLETS FOUND

"Insurance Collection Is Held Motive

"... Mr. Combs was husband No. 4. ... He was an attorney who represented her in divorce proceedings against husband number 3. ... Harley Atwood, the second husband of Mrs. Combs, died ... from asphyxiation by gas, when a coffee pot boiled over on a gas stove in the room where he lay asleep on a couch

Saturday, June 13, 2009

Modern Transportation

Changes in transportation methods were brought home to me again this week.

On Tuesday of this past week I drove 140 miles to Rawlins Wyoming, worked all day, and returned home that evening. 140 miles isn't a long distance in modern terms. My route took me past Independence Rock, where I stopped at the rest station as I always do. Then, resuming travel, down the Oregon Trail a ways further, and then across some desert country to Ten Mile Hill, a huge topographic rise just outside of Rawlins. Then into Rawlins, whose Union Pacific station is depicted above.

I have no idea if this station is still there. A lot of Rawlin's older buildings are. Rawlins itself, still on the main line of the UP, has seen some very hard times in recent years, but it seems to be rebounding, it's recovery fueled, as it were by natural gas exploration, as well as some wind energy development.

When I wrapped up my work, I turned around and was home in the early evening. A typical day's work for a litigator in Wyoming. It was an enjoyable trip really. Armed with my company supplied Ipod, I finished the book on tape version of Alexander Hamilton for the third time, and listened to a selection of episodes of "The News From Lake Woebegone".

I was to return to Rawlins on Thursday. I didn't, as I came down with the flu. Before somebody asks, no I don't know if it was the "Swine Flu". Whatever it was, it was fast moving, and I am over it now. I crawled into work on Thursday, but a partner of mine very graciously volunteered to take my place, so he repeated by Tuesday travel on Thursday.

I was very grateful for this, as I had a motion hearing in Douglas Wyoming, fifty miles a way, on Friday. I went home on Thursday and slept most of the day. The next day, however, I was back on the road to Douglas.


The courthouse depicted above is no longer in use, and I don't even know where it was. Douglas has a nice new courthouse, built, I think, in the 1970s, or maybe 80s.

This trip too was pleasant and uneventful, except for loosing my motion (rats). On the way to Douglas, I listed to an Ipod interview of H. W. Brands, speaking about Franklin Roosevelt. On the way back, I finished up the last downloaded News From Lake Woebegone I had.

What's the point of this? Modern easy of travel.

Could I have done this a century ago? I doubt it. Even had I owned a car in 1909, there's no way that I could have traveled to Rawlins and back in a day. I wouldn't have tried. It would have been much more likely that, if I had to do that, I would have taken the train from Casper to North Platte NE, and then switched on to the UP line and rode to Rawlins on Monday. I'd have stayed over in Rawlins Tuesday evening. I wouldn't have been able to have a back to back event in Rawlins and Douglas, in all likelihood.

But what does that mean? In part, it probably means that a lawyer, in this context, a century ago, would have gone to Rawlins on a Monday, and came back on a Friday. On Wednesday, he probably wouldn't have had much to do. Perhaps, were it me, I would have gone down to Parco for amusement. If I had to go to Douglas for Friday, I would have had to catch a night train.

What about, say 1939. I could have driven then, road travel was much improved. Even so, it would have been a bit of a brutal trip.

I suspect this also shows that, while travel is easier, life is faster paced. Probably nobody would have tried to schedule back to back travel plans like this "back in the day". Now, I'll often travel up to 600 miles in a day. If something is no further than 300 miles away, I don't stay, usually. That certainly wasn't the case at one time.

History of Natrona County

I'm surprised to find that A. J. Mockler's History of Natrona County is on line.

Granted, it is one of the dullest books ever written. But what an amazing tribute to the internet in that what is truly a rare book is so easily available in this form.

Monday, June 8, 2009

Dual Careered lawyer

Here's an interesting item from today's CST history column. I'm afraid that I'm interested in it for the wrong reasons.
"Three Wounds in Head and Two in Body of S. S. Combs"

Recently retired Casper City Attorney Sewell Stanley Combs, 50, was found shot to death in his car June 10 at his ranch near Granite Canyon.

"The bullets that literally riddled his body were fired by a 'cowardly murderer' who shot the unsuspecting victim in the back of the head and body," a sheriff said.

Combs' widow, Hazel, "(h)er face ... drawn by grief, her eyes tortured by unshed tears and sleeplessness ... seemed overnight to have aged many years. She was haunted by the knowledge that while she lay asleep in their ranch home between Alcova and Leo, ... her husband was brutally murdered in his car--not a quarter of a mile away! ...

"The position of the body and other details indicated ... that Combs had been ... unaware of the menace hovering over his life when the assailant, in the back seat, shot him through the head, then emptying the gun as the man's body slumped over. ...

"Credence was ... given today to the theory that he was slain by an assailant harboring a bitter, personal grudge. ... This theory was a source of mystification, ... it being heard on every side: 'We didn't know Stan Combs had an enemy in the world.' ... Rumor was rife today that the trail of the murderer had led to Casper.
What's interesting here to me, I'm afraid, is that this lawyer apparently had a ranch way out of town. The location mentioned here is a pretty good trip out of Casper now, but in 1934, it was a very good trip indeed.

Lawyers coming from ranch families was common in Natrona County as recently as 20 or so years ago. In other counties, it remains common. But combining the professions is not common any longer. I wonder if it was at that time, and if so, how common.

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Casper, Natrona County, 1909

Another interesting item about transportation a century ago. From a recent Casper Star Tribune article, quoting the Natrona County Tribune of 1909.

"A Dozen Will be in Service During This Summer.

"... J. P. Cantillon, superintendent of the Wyoming & Northwestern railroad company, ... was the first of Casper's citizens to start the fashion. Mr. Cantillon owns a Pope-Toledo, 20 horse power. ... (T)o its use is due the fact that very few of the ranchers about here now have any teams that are afraid to meet an auto in the road. ...

"C. M. Elgin ... has a Chalmers-Detroit 30-horse power," which he drove to Casper after purchase. "The time made on the trip ... (was) eighteen hours and forty-five minutes from Denver.

" ... M. N. Castle (Shorty) owns a 20-horse power Reo . ... (He) deserves credit for a new mixture ... for fuel for his machine, but he only used it once, and says that he will never do so again if he can help it. ... (H)e ran out of gasoline and could procure no more, but the ranch where he stopped had plenty of coal oil. Shorty tanked up with the coal oil and the mixture ... sufficed to run him into town, a distance of twelve miles."

The Reo in question appears here.

J. V. Puleo, on this topic on the Society of the Military Horse website, posted an interesting photograph of a little newer Reo here.

Monday, May 4, 2009

Transportation, Early 20th Century



Natrona County Tribune, 1909 A trip to write about -- "AN auto-stage line is to be established between Shoshoni and Thermopolis in the near future, and every editor in the state is hoping that the gasoline wagon will be in operation before the meeting of the Press association."

An item noted in today's Casper Star Tribune.

Saturday, May 2, 2009

Best Post of the Week of April 27, 2009

Lex Anteinternet?

Niobrara County Courthouse



This is the Niobrara County Courthouse, one of the oldest courthouses still in use here. Perhaps its the oldest one still in use. Anyhow, this is an example of how they used to be.

__________________________________________________________________________

Postscript. 

Perhaps simply because this is one of the first posts that I did on this blog it has remained, for some reason, one of the consistently most viewed.  Anyhow, in checking back on it, I realized that I didn't post a link to the photo of this courthouse up on Courthouses of the West, our companion blog, in the main thread, although I did add it in a comment.

Also, since posting this, I've learned that at the time I posted this photo there were at least two, and probably three, courthouses then in use that are older than this one.  One of those, the Johnson County Courthouse, just went out of use, as a new courthouse has been built.  Another one, however, in Uinta County is much older than this one, having been actually built in the 1870s.

Transportation, late 19th Century


A modern highway map shows as distance of 211 miles from Worland, in the southern half of the basin, to Rawlins, and 293 miles from Cody to Green River, but modern transportation systems are not remotely like those of 1879. In practical terms, Green River and Rawlins were further from the Big Horn Basin in 1879 than they are now from Outer Mongolia, and criminal prosecution was nearly impossible.

There were no roads leading south from the basin, only trails. At least one yearly trip to the Union Pacific had to be made, though, because in the early 1880s this was the nearest railhead, the only real opening to a market to sell cattle and get supplies. E. W. Copps declared that the cattle drive from Buffalo to Rawlins, a trip that did not require a traverse of mountains, took eighteen days. Coming from the basin, however, a cattle owner first had to get out, and any exit required going over an 8,000-foot pass, such as Birdseye Pass or Cottonwood Pass; thus, David John Wasden's estimate of six weeks for a round trip seems about right. Of course, the return trip, when cattle were not being driven, did not take as long but was still arduous. Owen Wister describes a 263 mile excursion from Medicine Bow "deep into cattle land," a trip taking several days by wagon, while "swallowed in a vast solitude." His description sounds like a journey north into the Big Horn Basin.
Goodbye Judge Lynch, by John W. Davis.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Tuesday, April 13, 1909. The Aadna Massacre.

The Adna Massacre of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire, which would kill over 20,000 people, commenced.  Ottoman troops would participate in it.

Armenian orphans from the massacre.

On the same day, a rebellion broke out in the Ottoman Empire after newspaper editor Hassan Fehmi Effendi was assassinated. The rebels forced the resignation of democratically elected Prime Minister, Grand Vizier Hüseyin Hilmi Pasha, and killed the Minister of Justice. Tewfik Pasha.

The revolution was backed by Sultan Abdul Hamid II, who sought to regain the absolute power.  It wouldn't go well for him.

What would become the University of North Carolina was photographed.

State Normal School, #1, Greensboro, N.C., April 13, 1909.

State Normal School, #2, Greensboro, N.C., April 13, 1909.

Last prior edition:

Monday, April 12, 1909. Doc Powers falls ill.

Sunday, April 12, 2009

Monday, April 12, 1909. Doc Powers falls ill.

 


Michael Riley "Doc" Powers, catcher for the Philadelphia Athletics and a physician, became seriously ill during a game.  He'd ultimately die of peritonitis a few days later, after three intestinal operation.  He blamed his condition on earthing a cheese sandwich during the game, while some though he'd been injured straining to catch a foul ball, or by crashing into a wall during the game.

He was 38 years old at the time of his death.

I’m guessing the cheese sandwich was right.  Having been a victim of the dreaded gasoline station sandwich, and having witnesses my son virtually rendered comatose due to one, I think Doc was right.

Saturday, April 11, 2009

Sunday, April 11, 1909. Tel Aviv founded.

Settlers drawing lots for plots, April 1909.

100 Jewish settlers living in Jaffa founded a 12 acre village located in sand dunes, dividing the property into 60 lots.  It was called Ahuzzat Bayit, but only for a year, after which it was renamed Tel Aviv.

Last prior edition:

Saturday, April 10, 1909 Finnish, Métis Tragedy, and Arctic Tragedy.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Saturday, April 10, 1909 Finnish, Métis Tragedy, and Arctic Tragedy.

Czar Nicholas II approved a recommendation that "laws of general Imperial interest concerning Finland" be enacted by the Duma, in which Finland had a single representative, rather than its own legislative assemble.  It was part of the process of Russification of the country which had commenced in 1899, reversing the original imperial policy put in place in 1808 when Sweden had lost Finland to Russia.

The Finn's have inhabited Finland since at least 9,000 BC, and probably longer.  The first references to it as an entity come from Catholic sources in the 12th Century as the Church began to Christianize the country, but it had no real political organization.  It came under the control of Sweden the following century, with Sweden losing it to Russia in the Finnish War of 1808-1809.  The Russification policy, something the Russians have exhibited ever since the 19th Century wherever it has control, and which effectively continues to the present day, would result in the Finnish independence movement.

Canada opened up the Métis lands in Alberta to homesteaders.  250 claims by French Canadians were registered on the first day.


Professor Ross G. Marvin of Cornell became Admiral Peary's Eighth Arctic Expedition's only fatality when he drowned, maybe.

His body was found floating and appeared to have gone through thin ice, as reported by Inuit guide Kudlookto.  However, in 1926 Kudlookto claimed he had shot and killed Marvin, either because Marvin had started acting irrationally, or because Marvin refused to let Kudlookto's cousin, another member of the expedition, rest.  Peary's daughter (as you'll recall his sons were by his native mistress and were left up in the Arctic in the abandoned care of their mother), discounted the story, although how she would know what happened in reality is another matter. Presumably from information supplied by her father.

It's hard to imagine why Kudlookto would make the story of killing Marvin up, although people do odd things.

Peary's account.

He had been on a prior expedition.  He was 29 years old at the time of his death.

Cipriano Castoro, the former President of Venezuela, was forcibly ejected from Martinique by the French.

Jonesboro, Tenn, April 10, 1909.

Last prior edition:

Friday, April 9, 1909. Establishing Mother's Day.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Friday, April 9, 1909. Establishing Mother's Day.

South Dakota became the first state to officially recognize Mother's Day, with a proclamation by Gov. Robert S. Vessy that designated "the second Sabbath in our national memorial month of May" for the same.

This followed the first church service recognizing the day, which had been in 1907 as prat of Anna Jarvis' effort to establish the holiday, which she had been working on since 1905.  The first service for the day was at Andrews Methodist Church in Grafton, West Virginia.

This brings to mind something we posted last week:

Blog Mirror: Family Values

 

Family Values

Last prior edition:

Thursday, April 8, 1909. Creation of Japanese Corporations

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Thursday, April 8, 1909. Creation of Japanese Corporations

The Japanese Diet passed a law for the Japanese equivalent of corporations.

The United Kingdom and France accepted the Austro-Hungarian annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Chickasha Oklahoma, April 8, 1909.

Last prior edition:

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Wednesday, April 7, 1909. A busy day for the Tafts.

President Taft issued an executive order that deaf mutes and deaf persons be allowed to take the civil service examination.

Some of the Tafts went riding.


Helen Taft became a professor of history and college dean.



Charlie Taft would go on to become a respected mayor of Cincinnati.

The third Taft child, Robert, not pictured here, went on to become a U.S. Senator from Ohio.

Last prior edition:

Tuesday, April 6, 1909. Peary claims the North Pole.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Tuesday, April 6, 1909. Peary claims the North Pole.


Adm. Robert E. Peary, Matthew Henson, Ootah, Ooqueah, Egingwah, and Seegloo, reached the northernmost point of their expedition, which Peary believed to be the North Pole.  They would remain there for thirty hours.

They would learn, upon their return, that Frederick Cook had claimed the prize of reaching the North Pole first already, although his claim could not be substantiated.  In 1989 the National Geographic Society determined that Peary had dome within 5 miles of the North Pole, which may or may not be close enough if it really matters.

The claim of who was first led into a bitter contest, in which Peary prevailed.  Cook went on to a sad life, going into the oil business in Texas and Wyoming, where he'd be accused of fraud.  He was convicted, after which his Texas claims proved to be in one biggest oil pools in the state.  He died in 1940, at age 75, after having just been pardoned by Franklin Roosevelt.

As noted, I'm not a fan of Peary's.  Ironically, the US flag he hoisted at the presumed pole had been sewn by his wife, whom he was cheating on in the Arctic. Peary quit talking about his trip after he took questions he received to be hostile.  He died, leaving an abandoned family in the Arctic, at age 63 in 1920.

As or the first, Cook could well have been first, or not. Same with Peary, depending upon how you determine the pinpoint spot.  It seems reasonably to say they were both pretty close to the North Pole, which in the context of the time, may be close enough.

The first undisputed trip to the North Pole was made in 1968.  

Last prior edition:

Monday, April 5, 1909. Sensational news.