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About Illinois Valley news. (Cave City, Oregon) 1937-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 1, 2018)
Illinois Valley News, Cave Junction, Ore. Wednesday, August 1, 2018 Page A-5 The Plaques of E Clampus Vitus: by Sublime Grand Noble Humbug Bill Wensrich Clyde Johnson Lynching The Plaques of E Clampus Vitus-- Humbug Chapter No. 73 The 20 second in a continuing series of articles prepared by Bill Wensrich. “If you ain’t plaque’n, then you ain’t Clampin’” Bill Haas, a “Cracker Jack” of Noble Grand Humbugs, is credited with having this historical plaque erected. Bill put up more plaques than any other club president and took the reins again as the Chapter began to decline in the early nineties. First set in a concrete monument in front of the Boston Shaft restaurant in 1991, the plaque was located near the site of the hanging. In 2012 Humbug Chapter moved the plaque across the street to the north side of Moonlit Oaks Avenue in Yreka where it shares a brand new concrete monument with its new sister plaque, Moonlit Oaks Dance Pavilion. For the original dedication ceremony, Bill arraigned for Fred Burton to talk as well as others. Folks who live through the era shared their memories of the 1930s with the 40 to 50 people present at the dedication. This plaque tells the story of the last lynching in California. In 1935, Clyde Johnson, confessed killer of Dunsmuir’s Police Chief, was hung from a pine tree located about two miles west of Yreka on the road to Fort Jones. The following excerpted selections from Alan McMurry’s “Just a Little Lynching Now and Then” best summarizes events was a long shot, but they decided to question the two men. Their car made a U turn and pulled up alongside the two men. As Daw stopped the car, Malone sensed danger. He reached for his submachine gun. Daw yelled “get your hand away from that belt!”His order was too late. Malone didn’t have enough room to operate his machine gun. Johnson began shooting. Jack Daw was immediately hit, his foot slipped off the clutch and the car lunged forward. Johnson jumped on the rear bumper and used his gun barrel to breakout the rear window firing continuously through the glass. Bullets rattled around everywhere inside the vehicle. Malone realized the car was picking up speed and about to crash. Johnson’s now empty Lugar clip encouraged him to jump off the bumper. Malone then raced the car down the street to the Highway Patrol Office. How he never got hit is a miracle. “Barr had run off with the money from the holdup. Johnson thought he had killed both officers. Clyde couldn’t believe his eyes when the car righted itself down the road. He started walking back toward Downtown Dunsmuir again. Thinking he had gotten away, Clyderan into Charley Tracey and Steve Abaroff, posse volunteers. Johnson was captured by these two men and turned over to jailer W.J. Stevenson at the City Jail. “Chief Daw died at 2 a.m. that morning. The next four days included interviews, inquiries and inquests by the justice system. Clandestine vigilante meetings had also been held on some of those four evenings. Angered by the senseless surrounding the case” “Robert Barr and Clyde L. Johnson arrived by freight train in Dunsmuir, California on July 27, 1935. It was the deepest and darkest depth of the Great Depression. People had no money and no jobs. Many men just drifted, riding the rails. Barr and Johnson were young men. Robert was 25 and Clyde a few years older. In the past month Johnson had committed robberies in Hollister and Roseville. Low on funds they hatched a plan to rob a bar in nearby Castella. The two men didn’t know the area. What they didn’t understand was that Dunsmuir, at the bottom of a rugged steep canyon along the Sacramento River, only has two escape routes, north or south. “After walking 10 miles from Dunsmuir to Castella they arrived at what they thought was the bar; it turned out to be a pool hall called Padulas. With five or six men inside,Johnson pulled out his .30 caliber Lugar and Barr held a Colt 38. After taking everyone’s wallet and cleaning out the cash register, they found a 1929 Chevrolet outside with a key in the ignition. Forcing the sleeping occupant out of the car, they drove back toward Dunsmuir. Ditching the car in North Dunsmuir their plan was to hide out in the hobo jungle and catch the next freight train out of town. They began walking along the road toward downtown Dunsmuir. “Meanwhile, Dunsmuir Police Chief Jack Daw and local state highway patrolman George Malone went to Castella to investigate the robbery and gather information. On their way back to Dunsmuir they spotted two men walking. It killing of Jack Daw, and a perception that other criminals in years past had ‘gotten off,’ a decision to mete out justice was made. The night after Jack Daw’s funeral, at 1:30 in the morning, 30 to 35 masked men gathered near the jail house door. Overpowering Deputy Martin Lange, the vigilantes took Johnson and drove to a place just south of Yreka where there was an open air dance pavilion called Moonlit Oaks. A few hundred yards south of the dance floor was a tall lonely pine tree, a good spot for a necktie party. Once there they took Johnson out of the car, stripped him of his shoes and hung a noose around his neck. Willing hands pulled Johnson up until his feet were four feet off the ground.” Near Moonlit Oaks Dance Pavilionon a dance floor of air under its own open air pine pavilion, Clyde Johnson danced his last dance. Robert Barr, who escaped, was captured one year later. Those who did the deed must have held the firm belief that the lynching would serve as a deterrent, and justice was served. We are a nation of laws. When a local populace feels the law has failed them, troubling decisions can too often be made. Bill Wensrich serves on the E Clampus Vitus Board of Directors. His recently published Guide Book for the ECV Transierra Roisterous Alliance of Senior Humbugs titled The Trail to Sailors’ Diggin’sfrom Paragon Bay is available for purchase from the non-profit Del Norte County Historical Society Museum located at 577 H Street in Crescent City, California. Today in History: by The Associated Press Today is Wednesday, Aug. 1, the 213th day of 2018. There are 152 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On August 1, 1966, Charles Joseph Whitman, 25, went on an armed rampage at the University of Texas in Austin that killed 14 people, most of whom were shot by Whitman while he was perched in the clock tower of the main campus building. (Whitman, who had also slain his wife and mother hours earlier, was finally gunned down by police.) On this date: In 1714, Britain’s Queen Anne died at age 49; she was succeeded by George I. In 1876, Colorado was admitted as the 38th state. In 1907, the U.S. Army Signal Corps established an aeronautical division, the forerunner of the U.S. Air Force. In 1911, Harriet Quimby became the first woman to receive a U.S. pilot’s certificate from the Aero Club of America. (Quimby’s accomplishments included being the first woman to fly across the English Channel; she was killed in an accident in July 1912 at age 37.) In 1936, the Olympics opened in Berlin with a ceremony presided over by Adolf Hitler. In 1944, an uprising broke out in Warsaw, Poland, against Nazi occupation; the revolt lasted two months before collapsing. In 1957, the United States and Canada announced they had agreed to create the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD). In 1975, a 35-nation summit in Finland concluded with the signing of a declaration known as the Helsinki Accords dealing with European security, human rights and East-West contacts. In 1981, the rock music video channel MTV made its debut. In 1994, Michael Jackson and Lisa Marie Presley confirmed they’d ALL Custom jeweLry designs & repAirs done in house! been secretly married 11 weeks earlier. (Presley filed for divorce from Jackson in Jan. 1996, citing irreconcilable differences.) In 2001, Pro Bowl tackle Korey Stringer, 27, died of heat stroke, a day after collapsing at the Minnesota Vikings’ training camp on the hottest day of the year. In 2007, the eight-lane Interstate 35W bridge, a major Minneapolis artery, collapsed into the Mississippi River during evening rush hour, killing 13 people. Ten years ago: Some 30 mountaineers began a disastrous attempt to scale K2 in Pakistan; 11 of them died in a series of accidents, including icefalls. Crowds of resisents from China watched a total solar eclipse along the country’s ancient Silk Road, one week before the start of the Summer Games in Beijing. 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Members Don’t Worry About Emergency Ambulance Expenses! ea. Reg. $12.39 K e r b y , or 24 Hours • 7 Days A Week Quantum Health Reg. $10.19 23772 redwood Highway A $55 yearly membership to Paramed covers all family members in the home. Illness and injury can strike without warning; but, it’s comforting to know that your cost is covered for emergencies and medically necessary transports. Joe Elliott (Def Leppard) is 59. Rock singer-musician Suzi Gardner (L7) is 58. Rapper Chuck D (Public Enemy) is 58. Actor Jesse Borrego is 56. Actor Demian Bichir is 55. Rapper Coolio is 55. Actor John Carroll Lynch is 55. Rock singer Adam Duritz (Counting Crows) is 54. Movie director Sam Mendes is 53. Country singer George Ducas is 52. Country musician Charlie Kelley is 50. Actress Jennifer Gareis is 48. Actor Charles Malik Whitfield is 46. Actress Tempestt Bledsoe is 45. Actor Jason Momoa is 39. Actress Honeysuckle Weeks is 39. Singer Ashley Parker Angel is 37. Actress Taylor Fry is 37. Actor Elijah Kelley is 32. Actor James Francis Kelly is 29. Actress Ella Wahlestedt is 20. Thought for Today: “The only fool bigger than the person who knows it all is the person who argues with him.” — Stanislaw J. Lec, Polish writer (1909-1966). 2 WEEK SPECIAL Hyland’s Baby 7 allowing the National Security Agency leaker to slip out of the Moscow airport where he had been holed up for weeks. President Barack Obama faced congressional critics of the National Security Agency’s collection of Americans’ telephone records as he and Vice President Joe Biden joined lawmakers on both sides of the issue for an Oval Office meeting. One year ago: By a vote of 92-5, the Senate confirmed President Donald Trump’s nomination of Christopher Wray as FBI director. He replaced James Comey, who was fired by Trump amid the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential campaign. Today’s Birthdays: Singer Ramblin’ Jack Elliott is 87. Former Sen. Alfonse D’Amato, R-N.Y., is 81. 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