100 years ago in Spokane: ‘Speak to Your Neighbor Day’ proposed to promote community togetherness

A community organizer proposed that Spokane hold a “Speak to Your Neighbor Day,” to promote “neighborly feeling and hospitality.”

“There are hundreds of people living in Spokane who see each other every day, but who never nod or say hello,” said the organizer.

However, some rules would be necessary. Men would speak to men, and women would speak to women. Street “mashers” – young men who flirted openly with women – were warned not to take advantage of this new friendliness.

From the railroad beat: Work was beginning on a new Bellingham-to-Spokane railroad, which was expected to open a rich market of coal, wheat, fruit, dairy and ranch land.

This was a new line of the existing Puget Sound, Spokane International Railway Co. The company already had men working between Bellingham and Deming, and officials expected to have 50 miles finished by summer.

The entire line was to be about 512 miles. The plan was to skirt the base of Mount Baker, tunnel through the Cascades (at an unspecified point), head down the Methow Valley to the Columbia River, and then east to Spokane.

The company predicted that coal fields near Mount Baker “would excel even the Pennsylvania mines in production.” This prediction would turn out to be wildly optimistic.