Jim Kershner’s this day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Spokane’s free employment bureau supplied jobs to 391 men and 242 women in August 1913.

This was the city’s attempt to help solve the unemployment problem, and it was apparently working. The bureau found jobs for janitors, engineers, carpenters, watchmen, porters and office workers. Among the women, it found jobs for cooks, chambermaids, seamstresses, waitress and clerical workers.

It also helped immigrants find jobs. The list of applicants included people from Germany, Sweden, England and Ireland.

From the divorce beat: Elia C. Divers told a Spokane judge she wanted a divorce because her cheapskate husband “forced her to live on beans, and nothing but beans, for six weeks.” 

Even worse, her children had to live on the bean diet. Her husband refused to provide the family with flour, tea, coffee or other provisions.

She also said her husband was abusive.

Also on this date

(From the Associated Press)

1970: Palestinian guerrillas seized control of three U.S.-bound jetliners. (Two were later blown up on the ground in Jordan, along with a London-bound plane hijacked on Sept. 9; the fourth plane was destroyed in Egypt. No hostages were harmed.)