Jim Kershner’s this day in history

From our archives, 100 years ago

Spokane police were still pursuing bank robbery suspect George M. Martin. When he learned that police were on his trail, he went first to Genesee, Idaho, and then hired an auto and driver to take him to Troy, Idaho. Then he changed his mind in the middle of the trip and asked the driver to take him to Bovill, Idaho.

The driver said the car broke down before they got to Bovill and Martin got out to walk the rest of the way. There, he apparently purchased a train ticket to Missoula. However, authorities said he did not board the train in Bovill.

Instead, he walked “to one of the numerous switches going toward St. Maries” and boarded the train at one of those.

The driver said he “had no idea Martin was wanted for robbing a bank,” and as soon as he found out, he “hastened to Moscow to tell officials all I knew about the matter.”

From the war beat: Spokane’s Central Verein – the local German society – indefinitely postponed its annual German Day celebration “because the war made German festivities seem inappropriate.”

The Central Verein was collecting money for destitute families and to alleviate the suffering of wounded soldiers.

The Central Verein also heard from a German who had been working in construction for the Canadian government in Windermere, British Columbia. He said he and nearly all of the other Germans in Windermere had been forced to leave.