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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (July 12, 1890)
878 WEST SHORE. MOSCOW IS MOVING. The enterprising young city of Moscow, in Northern Idaho, is accomplishing a great deal in a quiet way this year. It has sustained two heavy fires since the snow disappeared, but the buildings burned were wooden structures and are being re placed with better and safer ones. This ordeal of fire is one that seems inevitable in the average town, and the earlier it comes the less disastrous it generally proves. On recovering from these visitations of fire a spirit of rugged independence is developed and the whole subsequent growth is on a better basis. Moscow's fires have in no wise crippled her. The first important enterprise carried to successful issue this year was the project of supplying the city with artesian well water. The boring of a well there was in the nature of an experiment, but it terminated successfully, and now there is an abundant supply of pure water conducted through the city in iron pipes for domestic use and for fire protection. The ques tion of obtaining an adequate water supply and of disposing of the city's sewage were the most perplexing ones that confronted the people and both are completely solved by the success of the artesian well project. No city in the country has a better water service now. The water is even employed in irrigating gar dens, though this is not necessary in that country. Another important thing for Mobcow is the extension of the Paloupe branch of the Noithern Pacific railway to the Potlatch country and on down the Clearwater river to Lewiston. This extension, which is now under construction, will pass through Moscow and give it competition in transportation as well as to afford an outlet to a different seaport for its vast grain output. By harvest time this year Moscow will have not only two rival railway lines to ship over but the choice of two seaports to ship to. The result must be an increase in the amount the producer gets for his product and a proportionate increase in the wealth of the section. And to make grain raising more profitable is to make the country more attractive to industrious settlers. It was only five years ago that all produce from the Moscow region had to be freighted to the Snake river, that being the only transportation route out, and for but a few weeks in the fall. Almota, Wawawai and Steptoe canyons and Lewiston hill were the practicable approaches to Snake river from that direction, and they were from twenty-eight to thirty-seven miles from Moscow. Mwt of the grain went by way of Wawa wai canyon because that was the eat iest road to travel. But such transportation was uncertain and expensive at best. Often heavy losses were sustained by reason of the inability to get boaU to float the grain down the river during the brief period that the stream was navigable after harvest. Often long chutes were constructed in which the grain was sent from the top of the canyon down to the river, 2,000 feet or more, thus making a short cut when teaming was impracticable. Th AAA Inn ft - v-w tviia spouts may be seen along the Snake to-day. But the railroads have relegated them to " innocuous desuetude," and the farmers are correspondingly more prosperous. TEKOA JUNCTION, WASHINGTON. The Washington & Idaho railway is the branch of the Union Pacific system extending into the Cceur d'Alene mining region It Joins the main Spokane line of that system at Tekoa, a young town at the forks of Latah and Hangman creeks and but a few miles from the Idaho boundary. The town was platted in the summer of 1888, when the railway survey was made through that country. A raw mill had been in operation there two years previously. The real growth of the town did not begin until a little more than a year ago, when the railway construc tion pushed it into prominence and a prosperous community gathered in a few months. It was last year incorporated under the law that was afterward declared void, and re-incorporated the past spring. The town now has a population of about 400 souls. One of the advantages of Tekoa is that it is an important railway junction and a divisional point on the line. The rail road company has a round house there, and car shops are in coarse of construction that will have a pay roll of $25,000 per month. These shops will be in operation before the end of the year. The establishment of such enterprises in so young a town surrounded by a richly productive country greatly hasten its growth and place it upon a substantial foundation. Tekoa has two large grain warehouses that are insufficient to accom modate the crop marketed there. It has a weekly newspaper and three hotels. A public school house, to cost about $6,000, will be constructed this year. A church is also under way. A flouring mill and a machine shop and foundry will be built this year and a brick yard put in operation. Considerable attention is being directed to grading streets and putting walks in good condition. An artesian well, 100 feet deep and flowing about twenty-five feet above the surface of the ground, supplies an excellent quality of water. Tekoa is in the midst of a very rich agricultural country. Not all the land around the town is under cultivation yet, but the fields are immensely productive and the crops of grain taken are mrprising to the ordinary farmer. There iB sufficient natural moisture for crops and the use of fertilizers of any sort is unknown on that rolling, elevated plain. The creek bottoms, hill sides and hill tops are all cultivable, though the Bteeper hill sides are generally left to furnish pasturage for grazing ani mals, and only the land in more favorable situations put under the plow. There is no scab land to interfere with the opera tions of the husbandman. The roads in the country are in good condition, and the general trend of the ridges toward the , streams and down their courses brings a wide range of countty directly to Tekoa to market products and buy merchandise, for it is situated at the junction of the two most important streams of that region. The Idaho boundary is only two miles to the east, beyond which is the Cceur d'Alene reservation, of which 220,000 acres will soon be opened to Bottlers. Fuel is obtained in abundance within four miles of the town. The heavy tim ber supply about the streams flowing into Cceur d'Alene lake can be brought by rail to Tekoa to be manufactured. It i likely that many enterprises for utilizing these advantages will be started in the young town this year, and there is every pros pect that the growth, bo auspiciously begun, will be continued with the development of the tributary country. The grounds of the Washington State Reform School, re cently located at Chehalis, are being cleared and graded pre paratory to building.