Jim Kershner’s This Day in History

From our archives, 100 years ago

A group of Nez Perce Indians expressed their displeasure with a federal policy involving renting tribal lands to white settlers. The government required the rent money to be paid into a government depository instead of directly to the Nez Perce landholder. The government assumed that the tribal members couldn’t be trusted to manage their own financial affairs.

“I am a taxpayer and a voter, and capable of taking care of my own interests as well as the average white man,” said one Nez Perce leader.

From the Idaho saloon files: A Wallace man found himself in a strange situation. While drunk in a Wallace saloon, he apparently made a groggy deal to purchase the saloon. He went to court to try to get the sale nullified.

Complicating the issue was this fact: The man was on the county’s list of “siwashes” – habitual drunkards who are not allowed to be served in saloons.

“I am in a funny position,” the man told the court. “Here the probate court siwashes me, and then the district judge gives me a saloon.”

Also on this date

1974: Hank Aaron of the Atlanta Braves hit his 715th career home run in a game against the Los Angeles Dodgers, breaking Babe Ruth’s record. … 1994: Kurt Cobain, singer and guitarist for the grunge band Nirvana, was found dead in Seattle from an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound; he was 27.