This Week In History - Oct. 12, 2023

100 Years Ago

O.R. Stookey, undertaker and furniture dealer, is expected home today from Spokane where he purchased a REO ambulance which he will use in his undertaking business. Mr. Stookey states he has plans for leasing and furnishing quarters for a new undertaking parlor and chapel.

Tomorrow, October 12, is Columbus Day and has been set aside as a legal holiday in the state of Idaho. The banks of the city will be closed during the day and the schools of the county will have the appropriate exercises in commemoration of the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus.

The Fourth Annual Boundary County Fair has passed into history as one of the finest gatherings ever held in North Idaho.

50 Years Ago

Property valued at $3,341 was stolen last weekend by a person or persons who broke into North Hill Service and Equipment, Inc. Police said that the building's side door was apparently broken into with a pipe wrench, and 11 chainsaws, a Winchester rifle, and a disc grinder were taken. Owner Tommy Smith is offering a $100 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of the burglars.

Bonners Ferry has a new title - “Home of the Grizzly Grabbers.” This is the overall theme coined by B.F.H.S. students for this week’s homecoming activities which culminate tomorrow night at 7:30 when the Badgers take on the Newport Grizzlies.

A letter was received by the Bonners Ferry Jaycees this week from a lawyer representing Mrs. Ronald Nigero, San Diego, Calf., who was hurt when the display stands on which she and others were standing collapsed during the Kootenai River Days rodeo. The letter asks local groups involved to pay approximately $1,000 in compensation, according to Jaycee member Joe Nieman.

15 Years Ago

The Bonners Ferry Boys Soccer team celebrated Senior Day with a 7-0 victory over Priest River to run their Intermountain League record to 5-0 and overall record to 10-4-3.

Mike Woodward recalled how ten years earlier, on Oct 16, 1998, he received word that one million yards of mud had slid, taking out U.S. Highway 95 north of Bonners Ferry and a portion of the Union Pacific rail line. "It was running like a lava flow. Initially, it was moving about the rate you would walk."

~Submitted by the Boundary County Museum