Then and Now: Dishman depot

The settlement of Dishman is named for businessman Addison T. Dishman, born in 1865. He moved to the Spokane area in 1887 and ran a livery stable in Spokane with his brother until it was lost in the 1889 fire.

For a few years the Dishman brothers lived in Sandpoint. Addison started Spokane & Idaho Lime Co. in Bayview.

Addison moved back to Spokane in 1892 and built the Dishman Trading Post in 1895, giving it to brother Wilton to operate near the corner of Mullan Road and Sprague Avenue. Dishman was the first business district east of Spokane city limits and was mostly rural and agricultural before 1920. Apples were a major crop.

In that same era, J.F. “Fred” Brod, born 1877 in Missouri, became a partner in the Spokane Garage auto dealership in downtown Spokane in 1905, when The Spokesman-Review newspaper estimated their were only 100 cars in the city. Brod’s long career touched on multiple modes of transportation.

A Spokane Chronicle real estate advertisement promised that Brod, “Spokane’s most expert chauffeur,” would give free rides to prospective buyers at the new North Kenwood subdivision in north Spokane in 1906.

In 1907, Brod bought an acreage in Opportunity, just east of Dishman and moved there. Around 1907, Brod started a box factory at the Dishman train depot, turning out boxes for shipping apples and tomatoes.

For a few years, Brod was the station agent at the Dishman depot. He was also the Opportunity Township constable, using his own car to slow down traffic. “As long as I am holding office automobile drivers will use a little sense or face the music and that’s about all there is to it,” he told The Spokesman-Review in 1910 at his box shop. He had restored a wrecked car, painted it red and used it to chase speeders. He named the car “Maud.”

At the age of 54, Brod took flying lessons at Felts Field and received his pilot’s license, believed to be the oldest person to do so at the time. He volunteered for the Civil Air Patrol for many years.

Brod died in 1942.