100 years ago in North Idaho: Father-son hunting trip ends in tragedy

A father-son hunting trip just north of Sandpoint turned tragic when the two became separated in the cold, snowy wilderness.

The father, Charles Robinson, said he lost track of his son Francis toward dusk. The father searched for him that night and all day, shouting and occasionally shooting his rifle. He camped in the open the next night and continued his search, to no avail.

Finally, three days later, he came upon the boy, lying unconscious in the snow. The boy had a knee injury and was suffering from severe exposure. His father built a fire, which revived the boy somewhat – but only briefly. The young man “in a short time succumbed to his sufferings.”

The father, “utterly exhausted and nearly out of his mind with grief” made his way back to Colburn, north of Sandpoint. A search party was sent out to retrieve the body.

From the murder beat: Police arrested a man in the William Wry murder case after a mysterious tipster mailed the Spokane police chief an anonymous letter.

The letter said Wry’s murderer could be found in a hotel room.

Police descended on the room and arrested the occupant. Now, they were interrogating the man to find out what, if anything, he knew about the murder of the Montana cattleman in a remote area near Garden Springs.

From the robbery beat: For the second time in two months, robbers attacked the First State Bank of Spangle. This time, they broke through the vault walls overnight and rifled through 150 safe deposit boxes.

No one had yet been arrested for the first robbery, in which assistant cashier Ruth Jennings had been shot in the arm. Police reported no leads in this second robbery.