A6
HISTORY
Blue Mountain Eagle
Wednesday, January 23, 2019
OUT OF THE PAST
75 years ago
Dr. J. H. Fell passes after
half a century benefiting
mankind
Dr. J. H. Fell, 80, dean
of the medical profession
in Grant County, and one of
the best-known physicians
of the state, died Sunday
afternoon at the home of his
son, George Fell, near John
Day, after a lingering illness.
Although he had been in fail-
ing health for several years,
he has practiced almost con-
tinuously, maintaining his
office in his home at Can-
yon City, and even in his last
illness, when he was bed-
fast, patients came to him for
medical advice.
Joshua Harlan Fell was
born in Bloomington, Illi-
nois, December 21, 1863,
where he attended high
school and Illinois Wesleyan
University. During his early
life he became interested in
medicine and spent consid-
erable time in his brothers’
pharmacy in Bloomington.
He came to Morrow County,
Oregon, in the early eight-
ies where, for a time, he was
associated with his father
and brothers in the sheep
business. It was during this
period that he began to study
medicine very seriously
under his uncle, the late Dr.
Fox of Heppner, Oregon, as
a preceptor. After several
years of study he matricu-
lated at Rush Medical Col-
lege, Chicago, Illinois, from
which school he graduated in
1889. Later in the same year
he arrived in Grant County to
take up the practice of med-
icine and has practiced his
profession throughout the
county since that time.
In 1891, he was united
in marriage to Mary Inez
McHaley who preceded him
in death in 1923. He is sur-
vived by his son, George
E. Fell of Canyon City, a
brother Walter P. Fell of
Eugene, Oregon, and a num-
ber of nieces and nephews,
as well as a host of friends
throughout the state.
When a young man,
Dr. Fell made several trips
throughout the South Seas
and the Orient as a ship’s
surgeon.
He was a member of the
Episcopalian church, and the
Elks lodge.
Funeral services were
held from the Driskill Mor-
Eagle file photo
From Jan. 20, 2009: Ed Carwithen conducts the Juniper Singers
while Markku Sario accompanies the group on the keyboard.
tuary chapel in John Day
on Tuesday afternoon, con-
ducted by the Rev. Arthur
Beckwith, vicar of the Burns
and Canyon City Episcopa-
lian churches. Interment was
at Pendleton, in the Fell fam-
ily plot where Mrs. Fell is
buried.
50 years ago
Knox move plans are
confirmed
E. L. Knox Co., a John
Day landmark since 1907,
will pass from the Main
Street scene this spring.
O utlook
Henry (Hank) Gohring,
who has operated the fami-
ly-owned department, gen-
eral merchandise and variety
business since 1951, con-
firmed recurring rumors of
recent weeks that the com-
pany would close its John
Day store.
Gohring said the com-
pany plans to open a new
variety store in Heppner.
Headquarters for the com-
pany will be in Hermiston,
where the firm now oper-
ates a variety store. A vari-
ety store in Burns is the third
member of the chain.
“We figured our chances
for expansion were greater
in the area we’re going into,”
Gohring said. With the clos-
ing of the John Day store, he
added, the firm’s merchan-
dise will be exclusively of
the variety type.
The firm got its start about
the turn of the century when
E. L. Knox, who died in
1959 at age 89, started a gen-
eral store in Mitchell in adja-
cent Wheeler County. Knox
moved about 1900 to Antone
before coming to John Day
in 1907 to form a combina-
tion hardware-general store
business with W. H. John-
son. Johnson’s sons built the
Knox store building in 1902.
The company contin-
ued to sell groceries and dry
goods until 1947, when the
grocery part of the business
was sold to Chester’s Mar-
ket, John Day, which is now
located diagonally across
East Main Street.
The Knoxes acquired a
general store in Dayville in
the late 1920s or early 1930s
and continued to operate
it until March 1967, when
the business, now known as
Ripa’s Mercantile, was sold
to Mr. and Mrs. Don Ripa.
Four years earlier, in April
1963, the company purchased
the store in Burns. The new-
est and largest Hermiston
store was purchased in Sep-
tember 1967.
Theron Knox, a son of E.
L. Knox, joined his father in a
partnership in 1922 and con-
tinued in the business until he
was incapacitated by a heart
attack in 1951. Gohring, who
is married to Theron’s daugh-
ter, Anne, moved to John Day
in 1951 from Yakima, Wn.,
to take over active operation
of the business.
Gohring began his retail
career in McMinnville in
1936 in a grocery store, mov-
ing later to Sheridan and
Hillsboro. He switched to the
dry goods business in 1942.
Besides surviving severe
economic conditions in the
county through the years,
Knoxes’ store rallied from a
disastrous fire in February
1957 and opened again two
months later with all new
merchandise.
Gohring said the firm
will cease its operations no
later than May 1 and will
start its closing-out sales in
mid-February. Both families
will move to Hermiston.
SENI R
We inaugurated a
new program today: the
entrée donation. An
anonymous donor paid
for the meat for our meal
in memory of Blaine
Rose Coombs
Kendall. If you would
like to be a part of this
new endeavor, please
give us a call. The purchase of the entrée could be for any reason, so don’t
feel constrained. Anyway, the meat was sticky chicken wings, and they
were really good! Along with it was an Italian pasta salad, rice, fruit and a
chocolate chip cookie. Now, if you examine that menu, you will notice
that it was a multi-national meal served right here in little old Prairie City;
how about that? There were 58 people that enjoyed it either in the Hall or
at their home.
Drew Harmer led the flag salute and Tom Roark asked the blessing.
The table that got to go through the serving line first had to answer the
question of what was Frosty the Snowman’s nose made of? All the tables
had snowmen (wishful thinking) with carrots for noses; our table had the
special one that had a ‘button’ nose. Whee. Tom has a lot of fun figuring
out these special table centerpieces.
We had lots of fun playing pinochle. The word is getting out so, if you
want to play, come on down – or up, as the case may be.
The winner of the gift certificate donated by Chuck’s Little Diner was
Prairie City
Seniors
Brrr, make this cold
weather go away! I’m
pretty sure I can speak for
all of us when I say we are
tired of the cold, dreary
days that have taken hold
Dusty Harris
of the town. On Jan. 14 our
greeters were Ron and
Dave who graciously welcomed our diners. Table service was provided
by the Redeemer Lutheran Church; thank you for being so helpful and
always serving with a smile! Bonnie and Francis delivered our meals to
John Day and Mt. Vernon today; 40 regular and 40 frozen! Our winner
of the Len’s Drug gift card was Grace Francis and Nancy won the two
free lunches. Nadine fixed hoagies with all the trimmings, chips, spinach
tortellini soup and cinnamon rolls.
Jeanette and Everett manned the greeter’s desk on Jan. 17 while Linda
and Dennis Dickerson delivered the 43 meals. Sherry and her crew from
John Day
Seniors
Our cooks, Terry Cade
and Teawna Jewell,
cooked us a bunch of
different, and yummy,
pizzas. We also got fresh
green salad and tapioca
Soo Yukawa
pudding with whipped
cream for dessert. We
thank our cooks for
cooking up our lunch! We had 40 guests on the books and five takeouts.
Our greeters were Jimmy Cole, Linda Blakeslee, Kristi Guimont and
Bodean Andersen. Jimmy and Linda collected and counted the money,
Kristi checked in the guests, Bodean led us in the flag salute, made the
announcements, and prayed the blessing over our meal.
The winners of the free meal tickets were Dennis Abraham and Terry
Bowlus and the winner for the Len’s Drug gift card was Christian
Yukawa.
Here is an announcement of change: the North Fork Café and Espresso
Bar will be open Wednesday through Sunday; the hours are slightly
changed also. They are working to get a phone line put in to handle the
to-go orders.
Praise the Lord, we got some more rain that came our way! The only
thing I’m not too fond of is the gooey, slippery mud. I will just count the
blessing of the moisture we are receiving.
Well, to continue the story of the found dog, I put him in our kennel. I
didn’t know what else to do with him. I called all around and nobody
Monument
Seniors
Leone Meador. Larry and Carlos took care of the home deliveries.
We want to extend our condolences to faithful volunteer Fran Bunch.
Our prayers are with you.
We are also the recipient of a new food processor donated by the Pickle
family; thanks a million. I know the kitchen crew really appreciates it.
Lorna and Krystin brought Marilyn Randall, Mary Crawford and
Charlene Dean from the Blue Mountain Care Center.
We had a visit from Angel Carpenter, too. She came to do an interview
with the Tai Chi lady, Crish. See, things happen in this building!
We finally got the YAP concert accomplished. It was two months late,
but it got put on in fine style. All the participants did great, and there was a
large turnout for this show. There will be another one May 10, so if you
missed this one don’t worry! We want to thank the United Methodist
Church for the use of their facilities to put on these programs; we really
appreciate it. I want to thank all those who brought refreshment goodies;
they were outstanding! A good time was had by all. New classes will
begin Feb. 12. We did recruit two more chimers! More would be good,
though. If each player only has two chimes, it makes it a lot easier to do
the music. I think we each had four chimes to keep track of. Gets exciting
sometimes!
Ex. 28:31-35 “Make the robe of… blue cloth… Make pomegranates of
blue, purple, and scarlet yarn around the hem of the robe, with gold bells
between them… the sound of the bells will be heard when he enters the
Holy Place…”
Ye Olde Thrift Shop were our servers and we thank them very much.
The winner of two ceramic cats went to Amy Rude and Ray
Rickerd. The free meal donated by Valley View Assisted Living went
to Balbina Escudero who split it with Veanne; thank you for being so
generous! The ladies from the First Christian Church joined us for
lunch, which was such a delight.
Lunch was anonymously donated in the name of Curtis Pereira; his
wife and some of the family came to have lunch with us. People have
been so kind and generous lately and we couldn’t be more happy and
thankful to live in such a wonderful community. Lunch consisted of
bacon wrapped meatloaf, mashed potatoes with gravy, green beans
with bacon, rolls and blueberry peach tarts for dessert. Overall it was
extremely delicious; good job kitchen crew!
I think we are all waiting for spring and warmer weather!
Song of Solomon 2:11-12 “For behold, the winter is past; the rain
is over and gone. The flowers appear on the Earth, the time of singing
has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.”
knew who he belonged to. He was looking a little sad too; I was
getting kind of worked up about what to do with him. Somebody
surely loved and took care of him he just looked too nice.
Well a few hours later, there was a knock at the door. Hallelujah! It
was the owner. Apparently, the dog (whose name turned out to be
Samson) was up nearby with his owner doing some work on that ranch
and took off on him. He said he had taken off Samson’s collar so he
wouldn’t get hung up. Boy, was Samson sure glad to see his owner! I
think, secretly, I was more ecstatic that I didn’t have to keep another
dog. Ha! The owner was going around knocking at the neighbors’
places looking for his dog. Since I called around, one of my neighbors
directed him to our place. Whew, that was a relief.
I’m still waiting for Jill to have little kids. I’m pretty sure she is
going to have twins again, if not triplets. I don’t know if she is just
fluffy or fat right now. LOL. I’m pretty sure that the gestation time for
goats is five and a half months. She was with the two Billy goats all
summer so she must be ready to deliver any day now. Bonnie seems ok
with Jill; I’ve been locking them in the goat shed at night because
there is apparently a few cougars running around. In fact, we found
some pretty big paw prints about 50 ft. from our house out back. There
was also some scat. They were definitely not our dogs’ paw prints. I
don’t like that at all.
1 Corinthians 3:19-20 “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness
with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own
craftiness. And again, The Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that
they are vain.”
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