Cold wave, January 1902

By Richard I. Gibson

Obviously it’s not THAT noteworthy: It gets cold in Butte in the winter. The cold wave of 1902 made the news, though – one of the coldest late January cold spells on record.

“Wagon wheels creak with the complaining whirl of extreme cold and windows are sheeted with ice. The big policeman shrinks one coil deeper into his big coon-skin coat and wishes somebody would start something in the near-by saloon.” —Butte Inter Mountain, January 25, 1902

The only colder temperature than Butte was at Fort Assiniboine, where -48° to -52° was recorded. The cold snap was statewide: 27 below at Helena, 35 below at Great Falls, 15 below in Billings.

“The hotel lobbies look inviting and travelers who come from sunnier climes postpone their business engagements and ask the clerk anxiously how long this is going to last.” Yes, some things never change.

At the busy corner of Main Street and Broadway, the “Ice Picture Man” entertained passers-by by reading Frostographs. The article from the Inter Mountain is quoted below in its entirety:

He came sliding down Main street with a festive air, whistling “When the harvest days are over, Jessie dear,” and occasionally balancing himself with the dexterity of a circus rope walker on the icy pavement until he reached the little knot on the corner, who were studying the thermometer and agreeing that it was much colder than the register indicated.

“Say,” said the gentleman with the whistle, who moved as if he had learned to walk on a pair of Norwegian skis, “did any of you fellows ever notice the peculiar designs on the windows here in Butte when the weather gets very cold? Now, it is a well-known fact that frost reflects the surrounding objects on the window panes, and that when you see trees and plants on the glass they are simply reproductions of the trees and shrubs in the neighborhood. These pictures are scientifically known as ‘frostographs.’

“If you notice the pictures on the Butte windows, however, you will see that there are very few of these beautiful trees and designs on the window panes, and I believe this bears out the theory that they are really reproductions.

“Now I have a theory.” Here half the audience slipped quietly away. “These pictures that you see on hear are photographic reproductions of familiar objects around the city.

“Let me show you,” and the stranger assumed the attitude and tone of the professional dime museum conductor. “On the right you see a faithful representation of the shafthouse of the Gagnon mine. Ah, I see you recognize the similarity. Over here you can observe readily a very excellent reproduction of the Hennessy building. Here, partly blurred by the melting ice, and yet readily recognizable, are the smoke stacks on the hill. See, there are the stacks of the ‘Anaconda’ and ‘Neversweat,’ and away up on top of the pane you find the shafthouse of the ‘Mountain View.’

“Now, note the perspective, how much larger in comparison these buildings are than the reflections of the works on the hill. The new Hirbour building takes up about half the pane, and even the city hall looks twice as large as the Hennessy building.”

“Say, mister,” said a street urchin, who happened along at that moment, “what do you call that mixed-up-looking mess there, close to what you call the city hall?”

“That,” said the professor, without a moment’s hesitation, “is a remarkable picture: that is a flawless frostograph of the police disturbance in Butte,” and before the crowd could catch its breath he was sliding down the hill with an easy swing that would make a Norwegian ski-runner ashamed of himself.

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Source: Butte Inter Mountain, January 25, 1902

The Meagher Guards

By Richard I. Gibson

The Meagher Guards of Butte, “perhaps the most unique military organization of its kind in the country,” was formed in 1895. It was a completely independent military unit, not beholden to either the State of Montana or the United States government, formed by prominent Butte Irish-Americans including Captain William McGrath, W.E. Deeney, Steve Holland, and Michael Joy. 

“The Irishman is by natural instinct a first-rate fighting man. Some of the best soldiers the world has ever seen have come from the little green isle across the sea.” —Butte Inter Mountain, January 25, 1902

Sixty-two volunteers joined and named the group for Thomas Francis Meagher, the Civil War veteran who was Montana Territory’s Acting Governor in 1865-67. They were self-disciplined, under the captaincy of William McGrath. When the Spanish-American War began in 1898 they were mustered into the U.S. Army as Company B of the First Montana regiment. The Second Montana regiment drew heavily on Butte and the new Meagher Guards that succeeded those who had already headed to war.  Company B fought with distinction in the Philippines during the war. “More than a few are now sleeping the honored sleep of the patriot dead over the sea in the far-away Philippines.”

When the war ended, the Meagher Guards ceased to exist, but some of its members joined the Butte company of the National Guard – Company B.

Following their service in the Meagher Guards, returning veterans took up various professions. Captain William McGrath, who lived at 744 South Main, became a sergeant in the Butte police force. William E. Deeney, who had been a major in the Second Montana regiment, returned to Butte to live at 1009 West Granite Street, and ran a saloon at 43 West Broadway (Williams & Deeney). Michael Joy, First Sergeant in the First Montana, was a miner after the war at the Diamond Mine and lived at 11 West Agate. Captain John Cleary, seen in the photo at top, worked in the Anaconda Mine and lived at 739 Maryland. S.G. Jeans became a clerk after the war, and roomed at 23 West Quartz.

Other names in the Meagher Guards read like a litany of Irish Butte: McMahon, Mahoney, Hayes, Conlin, Maher, Kelly, O’Malley, Crowley, Gallagher, McGarvey, Murphy, McManimon, McCartin, Burns, Donovan, McAuliffe, McCann, McBride, Byrne, Ryan, Shannon, Doyle.

Sources: Butte Inter Mountain, January 25, 1902; City Directory for 1900.

Butte’s first motorized postal service

Butte Inter Mountain, January 20, 1902

By Richard I. Gibson

Butte wasn’t always first in the nation or the world at everything, much as we’d like to think so. But as one of the largest and richest cities in the west, Butte was usually pretty close to the cutting edge.

Test operations had been run in Detroit, Cleveland, Washington D.C., and Elizabethport, New Jersey in 1899-1900, but the first motorized delivery of the U.S. mail on a regular contracted run was an electric car in Buffalo, New York, in the summer of 1901 for the temporary post office at the Pan-American Exhibition. In October 1901 in Minneapolis, the Postal Service let the first contract for five electric vehicles and operators to handle the mail.

Butte was ready to help lead the way. In January 1902 the announcement came that Butte would have two vehicles for rural mail delivery beginning the following summer. The car in the photo above is a Winton Electric Car. In 1900, automobiles were rare, with about a third of all that were produced electric, another third steam powered, and the rest gasoline powered. It wasn’t until 1912-13 that the demand for gasoline reached the point where it surpassed kerosene as a petroleum product. Winton actually pioneered gasoline engines, and was among the first regular producers of cars in the United States. They sold 22 cars in 1898, and more than 100 in 1899. In 1901 they began producing high-end touring cars and the 1-cylinder, 9-horsepower mail delivery vans. A Winton was the first car to make a drive from coast to coast across the U.S., in 1903 (it took 64 days). They were out of business as car makers in 1924, but their engine branch continued, ultimately becoming part of General Motors in 1930. 

“The automobile will revolutionize mail-delivery.”
—Butte Postmaster Irvin, January 20, 1902

Butte’s Postmaster Irvin expected two vehicles to arrive in Butte by July 1902 for use mostly on rural routes across the state, not just in the Butte area. The speed of the mail cars was to be 10 miles per hour, and the cars weighed 2,330 pounds and could travel 40 miles on one electric charge. The Post Office Department had awarded Butte a “liberal appropriation” for the rural delivery service - $6,000,000 for fiscal year 1903 vs. $2,000,000 for the previous year, meaning that “in all postoffices of the first, second, third, and fourth-class, automobiles will be used where the service warrants it and the nature of the country will permit.”

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Sources: Electric Vehicles in the Postal Service, by Historian, USPS, April 2014; Butte Inter Mountain, January 20, 1902; Winton Motor Carriage Company; photo of 1901 car from USPS photo collection 

Merry Christmas, 1902

Anaconda Standard, Christmas 1902. Art work by Thorndike.

Santy—"Gee Whiz! What can I give you that you haven't got?" Celebrating a bountiful year.

Chimney-sweeping time in Butte

By Richard I. Gibson

“It has been noticeable that there is a great rush to have the chimneys of the houses swept and thoroughly cleansed for the accommodation and comfort of the ever-welcome Santa.” Anaconda Standard, December 21, 1902.

One of Santa’s “best and most faithful allies” in Butte was Elias Simmington, the “colored chimney sweep who has served Santa well for many Christmases.” Simmington grew up in Kansas and arrived in Butte about 1882. For more than 20 years, he made a point of sweeping chimneys of “good little girls and boys” in the season approaching Christmas. 

In 1902, Simmington’s promotion of Santa, assuring the children of Santa’s impending safe arrival, opined that since the previous year, Santa had taken to “new fandangled ideas,” and had gotten himself a peach of an automobile. The reindeer, getting a bit old and slow, were to be given a break for Christmas 1902 as Santa tested the new contraption.

In Simmington’s view, Santa liked Butte almost well enough to live here permanently, but the smoke was what kept him from doing it. And Santa’s aversion to smoke was Simmington’s incentive to keep the chimneys clean. In the performance of his job, he was sometimes mistaken for Santa himself. A little girl was certain Santa had arrived, but her brother, who Simmington said was “pretty well posted on everything,” told her, “Naw, that ain’t Santa Claus. Santa Claus has got white whiskers, and that man ain’t.”

Elias Simmington lived at 203 South Ohio Street just south of the intersection of Ohio and Mercury, in the Cabbage Patch. His tenement was a 10-by-20-foot brick veneered room, one of a short row of such homes on the west side of Ohio Street. He died before 1910, when his widow, Babe Elizabeth, was working as a janitor at Symons Department Store on Park Street and living at 1037 Iowa Avenue. She was still in that job and home in 1918. The little one-story house on Iowa Street is gone today, but the lot is a nicely landscaped yard.

On the same 1902 newspaper page as the article about Elias Simmington, another story reported on one Charles Whalen, immigrant to Butte from Baltimore. He came to Butte on the advice of his physician, to get over consumption. He claimed that Butte’s sulphur smoke contained a germicide that killed the consumption germ. “Arsenic in the smoke builds up the system,” Whalen said, “and there you are.” He said he was thinking about building a sanitarium in Butte for the curing of consumption through the breathing of its smoky atmosphere.

Resources: Anaconda Standard, December 21, 1902; Butte Miner, Dec. 21, 1902; city directories; Sanborn maps.

Happy Thanksgiving!

1902 Anaconda Standard:

Cricket in Butte

By Richard I. Gibson

In 1902, Butte boasted two cricket clubs. Not associations of entomologists, but organizations devoted to the English national sport.

The Centerville Cricket Club was established in 1898 – and became state champions. The 30 members were captained by Dave Rundle, a miner who lived at 17 Lexington Terrace in Walkerville. Club President Thomas Scaddon lived at 123 East Center Street (a little cottage still standing) and worked for the T.J. Bennetts General Store that stood at the northwest corner of Center and Main Streets. T.J. Bennetts himself was the Vice President of the Cricket Club and lived at 1200 North Main.

Secretary-Treasurer William Whitford lived at 104 Missoula Street and co-managed the Whitford and Youlten Saloon at 966 North Main. The club was managed by John M. Spargo, another saloon manager (Tickell & Spargo, at 30 West Broadway, the Columbia Block – gone today, the lot where the western, 1-story part of the Piccadilly Transportation Museum is today). Spargo lived at #11 West Copper Alley (gone today, but his little house was just north of the Scott Block on West Copper).

The team practiced on a field in east Centerville, but in 1902 they had obtained permission from Jesse Wharton to use the ball park at Columbia Gardens when baseball games were not scheduled.

Apparently the Centerville team was undefeated in 1901. Helena, Great Falls, and Anaconda had cricket teams, and in 1902, the Centerville Cricket Team schedule included games in Salt Lake City, Ogden, and Denver.

“A good cricket batter must be more scientific than a baseball batter.” —Anaconda Standard, May 25, 1902.

Butte’s cricket team in 1902 included Gerald Knott, Captain, a miner at the Steward who lived at 23 West Quartz, and William Argall, who worked at the Gagnon Mine and lived in the same boarding house on Quartz Street (the Maryland Block, which stood immediately west of the Fire Station, today’s Butte Archives).

A city-wide picnic organized by the Butte lodges of the Sons of St. George, at Mountain View Park in Anaconda, was highlighted by the “battle royal” between the Butte and Centerville Cricket Teams. The cricket match was followed by a tug-of-war between the two teams. Centerville “put it all over Butte” in both events. The cricket victory prize was a set of cricket bats and balls, and the tug-of-war victory gained the Centerville team 32 gallons of beer and 200 cigars. I wonder which prize they prized the most?

There was a frightening incident at the Sons of St. George Picnic when a woman participating in one of the “numerous” ladies’ races stumbled and fell, knocking herself out for a half hour. Once she was revived, she appeared to suffer no further “evil effects.” The picnic organizing committee was led by Chairman John Nance, a miner who lived at 943 Caledonia Street. The main Sons of St. George Hall was at 959½ North Main in Centerville. It was called the “Peace and Harmony Lodge” and met every Monday evening, with Joseph Richards as President in 1900. He was probably better known as Richards the Undertaker, with his funeral home at 140 West Park and his residence at 409 S. Montana.

The Sons (and Daughters) of St. George was an organization established in 1871 in Pennsylvania, set up to counter the attacks by the radical Irish Molly Maguires in the coal mines of Pennsylvania. The Sons of St. George evolved fairly quickly into a fraternal organization whose goal was to provide benefits to Englishmen and women in distress in America. In addition to social activities like the picnic in Anaconda in August 1902, they provided death and sick benefits to members. The organization was similar to others of the day in having passwords, secret signals, and fancy regalia.

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Resources: Butte Inter Mountain, Aug. 25, 1902; Anaconda Standard, May 25, 1902 (including photo of Spargo), April 19, 1903; 1900 City Directory; Sanborn Maps.

Bella Crangle

By Richard I. Gibson

In 1902, the main post office in Butte was at 30 East Broadway, in the building that today is the westernmost of the buildings occupied by Northwestern Energy. The city had three substations, one at 905 East Front, one at 938 North Main in Centerville, and one at 1011 Talbot, on the East Side (Talbot was the continuation of Mercury Street).

The chief stamp clerk for the post office on Broadway was Bella Crangle. She graduated from Butte High, and went to work in the stamp department in 1898. The Anaconda Standard (April 27, 1902) gave her “the proud distinction of having met every man, woman and child of every nationality, color and creed in the city” in the course of her work. She was up on rates to all nations – necessarily, given what must have been a vast quantity of mail being sent from Butte to Europe and other parts of the world.

Miss Crangle lived with her siblings and their mother Mary, a teacher, widow of Edward Crangle, at 412 West Granite, a house that is still standing. By 1910, after the death of Mary, the siblings – Bella (still with the post office), Edith, Stella (a stenographer with Lawlor & Rowe, a real estate company), and Edward (a machinist at the Tramway Mine) were living together at 330 North Montana Street, a boarding house where the new county jail is located today. In 1918, Bella, still the stamp clerk, was living in the Leonard Hotel.

As a postal clerk in 1902, Bella Crangle was paid $75 a month and had 15 days of paid vacation annually. The average revenue from sales of stamps, stamped envelopes, parcel shipping, and such was about $225 per day in 1902. LOTS of people must have been mailing things – and remember that the first class postage rate in those days was 2¢, while penny postcards were, not surprisingly, a penny.

Bella’s boss, Postmaster George Irvin, said “her work is of the best.” No errors in counting out stamps had ever been blamed on her, even though some of her work was on contract – businesses would purchase stamps in advance to pay for their postage due mail, which Bella applied, so mail was sent on to the businesses without need to come pick it up. There’s service for you.

Postmaster George Irvin lived at 221 North Idaho, on the southwest corner of Quartz Street – another house that is still standing.

In 1904, the new Federal Building and Post Office was constructed on North Main Street, and the East Broadway post office closed.

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Source reference: Anaconda Standard, April 27, 1902; City Directories; Sanborn maps.