Pomeroy Pioneer Portraits

Ten Years Ago

November 3, 2010

The first co-Mr. Football in memory, Mack Wolf and Jay Breithaupt, escorted Queen Sadie Slaybaugh at Homecoming this year.

Pomeroy Shrine Club will conduct its annual Fall Fund Drive this week, with donations going to support the Spokane Shriner’s Hospital for Children.

Pomeroy Conservation District received the Southeast Conservation District of the Year award from the Washington State Conservation Commission.

Twenty-Five Years Ago

November 8, 1995

Garfield County trapper Ed McDowell caught six beavers in Pataha Creek just north of the football field last week. The beavers had dropped trees into the creek, built several dams and burrowed into both banks, threatening the stability of the track and football field.

Two Montana men are charged with possession of stolen property after they were stopped five miles outside of Pomeroy by Police Chief Dave Boyer. County dispatch received a report about a possible driving-while-intoxicated violation. Boyer headed westbound outside the city looking since Sheriff’s personnel were in the mountains assisting Department of Wildlife enforcement. He spotted the pickup going eastbound and stopped it. Neither of the occupants had licenses and a license check showed the vehicle reported stolen out of Spokane County.

Pomeroy boys’ cross country team received the award at the state meet for having the highest grade point average of all Class B boy’s teams in the state.

Fifty Years Ago

November 5, 1970

Doctors Stephen and Shirley Richardson, a husband and wife medical doctor team, moved here last week from Canada and plan to establish a practice in Pomeroy.

The opening of elk season and all this week hunters by the thousands in all kinds of conveyances will be making their way to the Blue Mountains.

Football fever may reach epidemic proportions in Pomeroy as the Pirate juggernaut travels to Dayton on Veteran’s Day in quest of a perfect undefeated season. The swashbuckling Pirates set the stage for next week’s tussle by annihilating the shell-shocked Waitsburg Cardinals in an impressive 33-0 victory last Friday night on the local gridiron.

Seventy-Five Years Ago

November 8, 1945

An army of elk hunters, estimated all the way from 2,500 to 3,500, including many women, invaded the Blue Mountains in Asotin, Columbia and Garfield counties last weekend to be on hand for the opening of the elk season in this area on Sunday morning. They came from every section of Washington north, south, east and west, Alaska and Texas. Never in the history of Pomeroy, say pioneer citizens, have there been as many strangers in Pomeroy at one single time as there were Friday and Saturday of last week, all making preparations to go into the mountains via Pomeroy. By Saturday evening this army of strangers had purchased hundreds of dollars’ worth of groceries and winter clothing from local merchants, in many instances certain lines being completely sold out. The state liquor store also did a land-office business. Hotels were taxed to overcapacity and many people were compelled to spread their own beds in trucks, cars and elsewhere in order to find sleeping accommodations Thursday and Friday nights. According to the local game protector, 137 elk were checked out through the Pomeroy checking station and of this total only 20 head were killed by Garfield County hunters.

Pomeroy and Garfield County experienced the first taste of winter Wednesday when two inches of snow blanketed Pomeroy. Heaviest snowfall to date in the county was reported at Mt. Misery where snow measured a depth of 18 inches by Wednesday with additional snow still falling.

One Hundred Years Ago

November 6, 1920

A more ambitious program for gala days in Pomeroy never has been slated for Armistice Day, when the boys who did the fighting have their play, and the city and country play with them. Included are a program at the Seeley Theatre, community dinner, boxing match and a “Frontier Days” establishment with gambling, games of chance and a dance hall with painted ladies!

The stunt show proved a financial success, clearing about $150, with the money to be used for school activities.

After a short period of experimentation in which the Board of Control acted as a court to try cases of students arrested for minor offenses, members voted to turn punishment of student offenders over to the faculty.

One Hundred Twenty-Five Years Ago

November 2, 1895

Mr. Pearsol’s team took a lively spin around town Wednesday. They broke loose from the hitching rack at the Savings bank, ran up Main street, turned south on 5th, then east on Columbia and finally, after circling around several blocks were caught by Reub Hender, who overhauled them on horseback. There was a box containing several dozen chickens in the wagon when the team started, and although Mr. Pearsol has put in much time since chasing chickens around town he has captured only about half of them.

There has been much complaint this season throughout Garfield County over the scarcity of water for stock. The continued dry spell exhausted the water in many wells and springs that have not failed for years. The Tukanon has shrunken to a small creek and many of the smaller streams [that were] are dried up.