100 years ago in Seattle: Former Spokane pastor pitches in for wartime dock work

Plenty of former Spokane residents were in Seattle working in the great wartime shipyards on Puget Sound.

D.E. Wilson was one of them. He was working as a carpenter’s helper on three ships, and was laying forms for the steel of a fourth.

Meanwhile, he had another job, too: He was preaching at a Seattle Congregational Church. He was actually the Rev. D.E. Wilson, the former pastor of Lidgerwood Congregational Church.

From the divorce beat: A Seattle priest expressed his great concern about the “divorce evil” during remarks at the State Conference for Social Welfare in Spokane.

It was a shame, he said, that America should be beaten only by Japan in the ratio of divorces to marriages. Also, “Washington had the shame of being the great Mecca for those from other states, Canada and other countries,” for those who wished to obtain easy divorces.

The pastor believed that “divorces should only be granted for grave cause, such as adultery, cruelty or nonsupport.”

From the court beat: The state Supreme Court upheld the conviction of Frank Hood, convicted of murdering hotel landlady Margaret Braun in 1916.

Braun was serving a life sentence for the murder.