THE BULLETIN • FRIDAY, JANUARY 1, 2021 A3
TODAY
LOCAL, STATE & REGION
Remarkable pioneer may have
built stone fence in NE Oregon
BY DICK MASON
The Observer
COVE — Northeast Oregon
pioneer Anderson C. Smith
was a man of short stature
whose life story gave rise to
tall tales.
It was said Smith once killed
a 900-pound grizzly with a
single shot near Minam and
was such an accurate marks-
man he could knock an eye
out of a grouse with a round
from his Henry Rifle.
“He was the man of the
mountains and the Kit Car-
son of the Pacific Coast,” the
Mountain Sentinel, an old
Union County newspaper re-
ported in its July 6, 1872, edi-
tion.
On a less embellished note,
Smith reportedly built many
stone fences in Northeast Ore-
gon that were used to contain
horses and cattle. The total
may include one in Cove that
still stands, but Smith has been
denied credit for building it
by historians because of geo-
graphic confusion. This is the
belief of Jack Johnson of Cove,
a retired National Guardsmen
who studies local history.
The fence is on farmland 2
miles west of Cove and is close
to 100 yards long.
“I believe it is possible that
this fence was built by A.C.
Smith,” Johnson said.
The Cove resident thinks
that a number of historical
documents mistakenly list this
fence as being built in the Im-
naha area. This is understand-
able, Johnson said, because
early in Cove’s history it may
have been referred to by some
as the Imnaha area. He cites
an 1864 township map that
appears to indicate the Cove
area was on the edge of what
was then known as the Im-
Dick Mason/The Observer
A rock fence that stands near Cove may have been built by Oregon pioneer Anderson C. Smith, who report-
edly built many stone fences in Northeast Oregon that were used to contain horses and cattle in the 1800s.
naha Forest Reserve.
Johnson is searching for
verification indicating that
the fence in Cove indeed was
made by Smith. His case is
strengthened by documented
ties Smith had to Cove. Ac-
cording to the book “Gate-
way to the Wallowas” by Irene
Locke Barklow, Smith and his
wife, whose maiden name was
Sarah A. Whittington, lived
in Cove from 1862-1872 be-
fore moving into what is today
Wallowa County. This was
when Union County included
all of the land that in 1887 be-
came Wallowa County.
A.C. Smith, a Civil War vet-
eran, took a big step toward
opening Wallowa County to
settlers in 1872-1873 when
he built a toll bridge over the
Wallowa River near Minam.
The bridge opened in Febru-
ary 1873, an event so signif-
icant it was reported in The
Oregonian . John Harland
Horner, who documented
much of Wallowa County’s
history in what is known as
the Horner Papers, wrote
this about Smith and the toll
bridge according to Barklow:
“The way into the Wallowas
was practically opened by
Captain A.C. Smith, the Dan-
iel Boone of Wallowa.”
Smith, who was born in
Franklin County, Illinois, in
1831, studied law for many
years and in 1888 was admit-
ted to the Oregon bar. He then
began practicing law in Enter-
prise.
“This was remarkable con-
sidering that he never had any
formal education,” Johnson
said.
Smith came to the West
during the gold rush in the
1850s before traveling to
Northeast Oregon in 1858
where he lived in Cove
and what is today Wallowa
County. Smith later traveled
east and served in the Union
Army as an officer for a short
time during the Civil War be-
fore he was slightly wounded.
He then returned to the
Northwest.
Johnson said Smith, who
died in Enterprise in 1911, is a
fascinating historical charac-
ter, one he would have enjoyed
meeting.
“He was very colorful and
influential,” Johnson said.
Today is Friday, Jan. 1, the first day
of 2021. There are 364 days left in
the year.
On Jan. 1, 1863, President Abra-
ham Lincoln issued the Emanci-
pation Proclamation, declaring
that slaves in rebel states shall be
“forever free.”
In 1660, Englishman Samuel Pepys
began keeping his famous diary.
In 1892, the Ellis Island Immigrant
Station in New York formally
opened.
In 1953, country singer Hank Wil-
liams Sr., 29, was discovered dead
in the back seat of his car during
a stop in Oak Hill, West Virginia,
while he was being driven to a
concert date in Canton, Ohio.
In 1954, NBC broadcast the first
coast-to-coast color TV program
as it presented live coverage of the
Tournament of Roses Parade in
Pasadena, California.
In 1959, Fidel Castro and his
revolutionaries overthrew Cuban
leader Fulgencio Batista, who fled
to the Dominican Republic.
In 1975, a jury in Washington
found Nixon administration
officials John N. Mitchell, H.R.
Haldeman, John D. Ehrlichman and
Robert C. Mardian guilty of charges
related to the Watergate cover-up.
In 1979, the United States and Chi-
na held celebrations in Washing-
ton and Beijing to mark the estab-
lishment of diplomatic relations
between the two countries.
In 1984, the breakup of AT&T took
place as the telecommunications
giant was divested of its 22 Bell
System companies under terms of
an antitrust agreement.
In 1993, Czechoslovakia peaceful-
ly split into two new countries, the
Czech Republic and Slovakia.
In 2005, desperate, homeless
villagers on the tsunami-ravaged
island of Sumatra mobbed Ameri-
can helicopters carrying aid as the
U.S. military launched its largest
operation in the region since the
Vietnam War. Shirley Chisholm,
the first Black woman elected to
the U.S. Congress, died near Day-
tona Beach, Florida, at age 80.
In 2014, the nation’s first legal
recreational pot shops opened in
Colorado at 8 a.m. Mountain time.
Ten years ago: A suicide bomber
killed 21 people outside a church
in Alexandria, Egypt, in one of the
country’s worst attacks targeting
Coptic Christians.
Five years ago: Hillary Clinton’s
presidential campaign said it had
raised $37 million in the previous
three months and more than $112
million in all of 2015 to support
her bid for the Democratic nom-
ination. Death claimed former
Arkansas governor and U.S.
Senator Dale Bumpers at age 90;
former U.S. Rep. Mike Oxley at age
71; and cinematographer Vilmos
Zsigmond at age 85.
One year ago: Militiamen backed
by Iran withdrew from the U.S. Em-
bassy compound in Baghdad after
two days of clashes with American
security forces. David Stern, who
spent 30 years as the NBA’s com-
missioner as it grew into a global
power, died at the age of 77, three
weeks after suffering a brain hem-
orrhage. A fire at the Krefeld Zoo in
western Germany killed more than
30 primates, including five orang-
utans and two gorillas.
Today’s Birthdays: Documentary
maker Frederick Wiseman is 91. Ac-
tor Frank Langella is 83. Rock sing-
er-musician Country Joe McDonald
is 79. Writer-comedian Don Novello
is 78. Actor Rick Hurst is 75. Sen.
Robert Menendez, D-N.J., is 67. The
former head of the International
Monetary Fund, Christine Lagarde,
is 65. Rapper Grandmaster Flash is
63. Actor Renn Woods is 63. Actor
Dedee Pfeiffer is 57. Country singer
Brian Flynn (Flynnville Train) is 55.
Actor Morris Chestnut is 52. Rhythm
and blues singer Tank is 45. Model
Elin Nordegren is 41. Actor Jonas
Armstrong is 40. Actor Eden Riegel
is 40. Olympic gold medal ice danc-
er Meryl Davis is 34. Rock musician
Noah Sierota (Echosmith) is 25.
— Associated Press
serving
ALL OF
central
OREGON
CENTRALOREGEONINHOMECARE@YAHOO.COM 541-316-9174
Admission delay at state psychiatric
hospital violates order, court says
BY ZANE SPARLING
Pamplin Media
The Oregon Court of Ap-
peals has upheld a 2019 ruling
that found the state psychiatric
hospital in contempt for failing
to quickly admit incarcerated
persons found unfit to stand
trial.
Since 2002, a federal order
has required the Oregon State
Hospital to admit patients
within seven days in cases
where a trial court has issued
a commitment order, but the
hospital “routinely violated”
that rule hundreds of times, ac-
cording to an investigation by
The Oregonian last year.
The appeals decision, pub-
lished Wednesday, has some in
the legal establishment hoping
it will spur lawmakers to act.
“If the Legislature keeps ig-
noring these violations, and
doesn’t fully fund the state hos-
pital, they are now opening
themselves and state agencies
up to a whole bunch of liabil-
ities,” said defense attorney
Amanda Thibeault. “My real
hope is that the Legislature
cares enough about mentally
ill people to properly fund the
state hospital.”
Thibeault represented Car-
los Zamora-Skaar, who faced
a felony burglary charge relat-
ing to a Beaverton apartment
break-in in December 2018.
Washington County Judge
Charles D. Bailey ordered an
evaluation of Zamora-Skaar’s
mental fitness the following
January, but by April that still
hadn’t happened, Oregon Pub-
lic Broadcasting reported at
the time.
Judge Bailey ordered the Or-
egon Health Authority, which
runs the hospital, to pay a $100
fine for each day a defendant
remained behind bars past
the seven-day deadline. Pub-
lic health authorities then ap-
pealed the ruling — to no avail.
“OSH defended against the
contempt allegation based on
an affirmative defense of in-
ability to comply with the sev-
en-day timeline, given its view
that admitting more patients
... would compromise patient
treatment and put patients and
OSH staff at risk,” according to
the appeals court decision.
Hospital administrators say
they have ample reason not to
fill every bed at the imposing
institution in Salem, such as
maintaining capacity for emer-
gencies. The hospital halted all
admissions in December, citing
an outbreak of COVID-19 that
has infected at least 24 patients
and 71 workers.
The capacity of the Ore-
gon State Hospital is 671 beds
spread across two campuses
and offering three levels of
care, said Hospital Relations
Director Rebeka Gipson-King.
“This does not include beds
held for managed capacity —
keeping one bed open on each
unit for safety and treatment
purposes, the two closed units
on the Junction City Campus
that we do not have funding to
operate and beds we need for
COVID-19 protocols,” she said
in a statement.
Zamora-Skaar’s case has
been settled — he eventually
was transported to the state
hospital, where he recuperated;
he was then found fit for trial,
and later pleaded guilty. Attor-
ney Laura Graser argued the
appellate case.
Thibeault says she’s pleas-
antly surprised to see Judge
Bailey’s finding of contempt to
be upheld and understands the
reality of the hospital’s struggle
with COVID. And yet: “There’s
always going to be another jus-
tification that state agencies
can come up with for violating
our clients’ statutory and con-
stitutional rights,” she said. “It
takes a lot for one government
branch to say that another gov-
ernmental agency could be
held accountable.”
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