This day in history: Did social anxiety quash a burgeoning carpool program in Spokane?

From 1975: An ambitious campaign to get Spokane commuters to carpool ended in near-total failure.

After a year of work, the program netted only 48 carpool participants.

“A cost-benefit analysis for the program is pretty grim,” said the assistant director of the Washington Department of Ecology. “When you figure it out, it cost about $460 for every person who signed up for a carpool.”

He said people “just weren’t ready to put up with the possible inconvenience of having to ride with someone else.”

Coeur d’Alene’s plan to turn Tubbs Hill into a public recreation area was nearing completion. A 34-acre plot of land was set to be acquired, which would be added to 100 acres the city already owned. Together, this covered nearly the entire hill.

Citizens had contributed to the project for years, by holding bake sales, recycling drives and raffles.

Tubbs Hill was considered unique in the West – and possibly the entire country – for being an undeveloped plot so close to the business center of a city.

From 1925: Olaf Rye, 12, was fetching a pail of water for his mother in the Spokane River, west of Spokane Bridge.

While his brothers stood nearby, he slipped off a rock and was carried away by the strong current. The two brothers watched helplessly as Olaf was carried 600 feet downstream, to an eddy in midstream.

His body was recovered by divers hours later at the bottom of the eddy 12 feet deep.