Jim Kershner’s This Day in History

From our archives, 100 years ago

A man had a double stroke of bad luck when he was riding the rails on an outbound train.

First, the train was involved in a head-on collision with another engine on the Hangman Creek bridge. The man didn’t die (two others did) but one of his fingers was torn off. He ran into a nearby jewelry store and asked for help.

He was taken to Sacred Heart Hospital – where police showed up the next day and arrested him. The jewelry shop owner had recognized the man’s watch as stolen.

From the suffragist files: Spokane’s suffragists boldly proposed to meet their “enemies.”

They invited those opposed to a woman’s right to vote to attend a meeting at a downtown assembly hall and ask questions. Those questions would be “answered by the Misses Helen Coburn, Rachel McKay and Mrs. F.H. Moore.”

The suffragists were evidently feeling confident in their cause, and for good reason: Before the year 1910 was out, the women of Washington would win the right to vote, making it the fifth state in the nation to give women the vote. National women’s suffrage wouldn’t come until 1920.

Also on this date

(From the Associated Press)

1951: President Harry S. Truman relieved Gen. Douglas MacArthur of his command in the Far East.