Jim Kershner’s This day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Washington Water Power proposed sweeping new changes to the Spokane River downtown in 1910.

WWP said it had plans to:

• Close the north channel of the Spokane River at Howard Street and divert water “through the middle channel south of the Crystal Laundry.”

• Remove the island in the middle channel east of the Howard Street Bridge.

• Build a powerhouse on the banks of the middle channel on the east side of the Howard Street Bridge.

These changes would mean, among other things, that the city’s new expensive bridge over the north channel would “soon span dry ground.”

From the fair beat: “A small army” of men were preparing the Spokane Interstate Fair Grounds. They were building “two artistic towers” on each end of the grandstand, with “powerful searchlights which will play over the infield at night.”

Those lights would supplement the 22 floodlights being planned to illuminate the fair’s nighttime battle spectacle, titled “Chief Joseph and the Battle of the Clearwater.”

Also on this date

(From the Associated Press)

1862: In the bloodiest battle day in U.S. history, Union forces fought Confederate invaders in the Civil War Battle of Antietam in Maryland; more than 3,600 men were killed.