100 years ago in Spokane: Fresh off Rose Bowl victory, Washington State’s football coach makes film debut

From our archives,

100 years ago

Washington State College’s famous football coach, William H. “Lonestar” Dietz, made his film debut.

He appeared in “The Craving,” a feature film starring William Russell and Helene Rosson, which was opening in Spokane.

Apparently, Dietz played himself, because the movie also featured his entire team.

It was filmed in Los Angeles over the Christmas holidays when the Washington State team defeated Brown in the Rose Bowl.

From the election beat: A club of Spokane’s German-American Republican voters pledged to favor any Republican candidate except Theodore Roosevelt, who wanted to intervene against Germany in the European war.

The club also vowed to work against President Woodrow Wilson, because they believed – rightly, as it turned out – that he was also moving toward war.

One German-American speaker went so far as to suggest that Wilson should “be deposed.”

“I would rather eat black German bread made of rye than to feast on English plum pudding, French prunes and Russian caviar,” Adolph Munter declared.

Munter said he was “shocked at the lack of consideration given American citizens of German descent by the press when war broke out over there.”