This Week in History

August 18

 

1817: 60-70ft sea serpent sightings reported offshore in Gloucester, Massachusetts.

1926 Weather map televised for 1st time

1969: Woodstock Festival closes with Jimi Hendrix / Band of Gypsys as final act; other performers included Joe Cocker, Country Joe MacDonald & The Fish, The Band, CSN&Y, and Sha Na Na .

1976: Korean axe murder incident: 2 US soldiers tasked with cutting down a poplar tree blocking the view of UN observers are killed by North Koreans claiming it was planted by Kim Il-sung in the Korean Demilitarized Zone

 

August 19

 

1887 Dmitri Mendeleev makes a solo ascent by balloon to an altitude of 11,500 feet (3.5 km) above Klin, Russia to observe an eclipse.

1897 1st electric taxis driven in London.

1921 Ty Cobb, is 4th to get 3,000 hits.

1950 ABC begins Saturday morning kid shows (Animal Clinic & Acrobat Ranch).

1960 Soviet Sputnik 5 carries 2 dogs, 2 rats, 40 mice, 1 rabbit and fruit flies into orbit, – first animals to return alive from orbit.

1984 Republican convention in Dallas, Texas nominates incumbent Ronald Reagan for President.

 

August 20

 

1882 Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “1812 Overture” debuts in Moscow.

1940 British PM Churchill says of Royal Air Force, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”

1964 US President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Economic Opportunity Act, an anti-poverty measure totaling nearly $1 billion.

1991 Dolphin Dan Marino surpasses Joe Montana as the highest paid NFL player with a 5-year extension for $25 million.

 

 

 

 

August 21

 

1680 Pueblo Indians takes possession of Santa Fé in the New Mexican Province,
from Spanish.

1878 American Bar Association organizes “at Sarasota, New York.

1976 “Operation Paul Bunyan” begins in retaliation for the “Korean axe murder
Incident” 3 days prior. 110 troops, 27
helicopters, 3 B-52 bombers are deployed to the Korean Demilitarized Zone to cut down a poplar blocking the view of U.N. observers.

 

August 22

 

1603 1st stones laid in Zuiderkerk, Amsterdam.

1877 Nez Perce (Niimíipu) indians flee into Yellowstone National Park.

1945 Vietnam conflict begins as Ho Chi Minh leads a successful coup.

1956 Elvis Presley begins filming “Love Me Tender” (The Reno Brothers).

1984 Last Volkswagen Rabbit produced.

 

August 23

 

1617 1st one-way streets open (London).

1799 Napoleon leaves Egypt for France en route to seize power.

1919 “Gasoline Alley” cartoon strip premieres in Chicago Tribune.

1939 Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union agree the Molotov-Ribbentrop non-aggression pact and secretly divide Poland between themselves, setting the stage for World War II.

1954 First flight of the C-130 Hercules transport aircraft.

 

August 24

 

1349 6,000 Jews, blamed for the Plague,
are killed in Mainz.

1847 Charlotte Brontë finishes
manuscript of “Jane Eyre.”

1853 1st potato chips prepared by chef George Crum at Moon’s Lake House, near Saratoga Springs, New York (popular
legend says he invented though earlier
recipes exist).

Snowstorm

Company Railroad –

Narrow Gauge Rails

Courtesy of Clint Taylor,
Troy Museum & Visitor’s Center

 

June 1916—
Construction started up Callahan Creek, 5 and 1/2 miles from Troy to haul ore from the Snowstorm Mine to the concentrator in town.

June 1922—
Three more miles of
railroad started to access Lane’s Camp #1 so that Sandpoint Pole and
Lumber Company could then haul logs to the mill in Troy. (Timber sale was 87,000,000 board feet)

Eventually, the railroad was 12 miles long and ended at the South Fork and Glad Creek located in Idaho.

During 1926—
1000 feet of railroad
added to access the
Big Eight Mine.

May 1927—
The concentrator at
the Snow Storm Mine burned to the ground.

July 1928—
Fire destroys the Sandpoint Pole and Lumber sawmill.

Fall 1929—
Sandpoint Pole and Lumber Company starts removing rails.

During 1930/1931—
Railroad operations stop.

Photos courtesy of Troy
Museum & Visitor’s Center

711 St. Regis Haul Rd.

“Step back in time and visit
the thriving mining and logging community that was Troy.”

 

OPEN

Tuesday-Saturday

11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

 

Pack a lunch, wander the
nature trail , challenge yourselves to a game of disc golf
on the world-class
Timberbeast Folf Course.
(Restrooms Open)

 

LEFT: Heisler Locomotive. Photo probably taken up Callahan Creek on
Snowstorm Mine Track. Hauling White Pine and Cedar poles to Sandpoint Pole & Lumber Company.

ABOVE: The Snowstorm
railroad construction train returning to Camp 1 at 5:00 p.m. after a day’s work of building a railroad grade from Troy to the Snowstorm Mine up Callahan Creek. Camp 1 was the company’s main camp, located in Troy where the new mill was being constructed. Photograph
taken by Mrs. L.W. Erlwen in November of 1916, which appeared in the Troy Echo on December 1, 1916. Mr. Erlwen and his two sons are shown on the locomotive pilot (bottom right corner).