How To Use This Site




How To Use This Site


This blog was updated on a daily basis for about two years, with those daily entries ceasing on December 31, 2013. The blog is still active, however, and we hope that people stopping in, who find something lacking, will add to the daily entries.

The blog still receives new posts as well, but now it receives them on items of Wyoming history. That has always been a feature of the blog, but Wyoming's history is rich and there are many items that are not fully covered here, if covered at all. Over time, we hope to remedy that.

You can obtain an entire month's listings by hitting on the appropriate month below, or an individual day by hitting on that calendar date.
Use 2013 for the search date, as that's the day regular dates were established and fixed.

Alternatively, the months are listed immediately below, with the individual days appearing backwards (oldest first).

We hope you enjoy this site.

Monday, April 15, 2013

April 15

Today is the Federal Income Tax payment deadline in the United States. 

1861     President Abraham Lincoln declared a state of insurrection and called out Union troops Following the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter, South Carolina.  He calls for 75,000 volunteers for Federal service, somewhat countering the often stated claim that nobody expected a long or major war.

1869  John Campbell, Wyoming's first Territorial Governor, took the oath of office.

1890  Laramie passed an anti gambling ordinance: Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society. 

1892  Governor Barber  requested that Colonel Van Horn of the U.S. Army "obtain the custody of and take to Fort McKinney and there give protection to the men belonging to the invading party who were arrested before the surrender, and who are now confined in the county-jail at Buffalo."

1905  Tennis played for the first time in Saratoga. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1916  The Casper Daily Press: April 15, 1916
 
In this edition we're reminded that Easter of 1916 was in mid April, unlike this year when it was in mid March.



1917  The Sunday State Leader for April 15, 1917: A plot against Pathfinder.
 


I've stopped the frequent updates of Wyoming newspapers here as the story I was really tracking, the Punitive Expedition, has closed out as a day to day item of concern.  Not that Mexico doesn't keep appearing, as this paper demonstrates.  But by mid April it finally seemed evident to everyone that the US was not going to be fighting Mexico as a stand in for Germany. We were really going to fight Germany.

Not that the papers don't remain interesting, and here's an example.

As far as I know, there was never a serious attempt to blow up Pathfinder Dam, but a story about a belief that there was hit the front page of this Cheyenne newspaper.  Lots of panicky stories like this were going around as people saw German agents everywhere.

As is also evident here, the war was giving a boost to prohibitionist.
U.S. Army issues corrected manuals, April 15, 1917
 
Showing how things were going, and of course with fresh experience from the Punitive Expedition in hand, the U.S. Army issued a set of corrected manuals just in time for training the greatly expanded Army that it was creating.  These included:
Infantry drill regulations, United States army, 1911 : corrected to April 15, 1917 (changes nos. 1 to 19).
Rules of Land Warfare, 1914. Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos. 1 and 2). War Department Document No. 467
Details about Small Arms Firing Manual, 1913:  Corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes Nos 1-18)
Manual of Interior Guard Duty, 1914:  Corrected to April 15, 1917 

Regulations for the Army of the United States, 1913, corrected to April 15, 1917 (Changes nos. 1 to 55) 

Field service regulations, United States Army, 1914 : corrected to April 15, 1917 (changes nos. 1-6) 

A Manuel For Courts-Martial, U S Army, Corrected to April 15, 1917
There were most likely additional manuals in this corrected set.

1922  Wyoming Democratic Senator John Kendrick introduced a resolution to investigate oil sales at Teapot Dome, Wyoming (the Naval Petroleum Oil Reserve).

Saturday, April 15, 1922. The Teapot Dome Scandal Breaks.


The Saturday Evening Post decided to grace the cover of its Easter issue, with Easter being April 16 that year, with a Leyendecker portrait of a woman looking at her Easter bonnet.

Country Gentleman, however, went with a different theme.


Some in Washington, D. C. took time to play polo on this day.


Horses were much in evidence on that Holy Saturday in Washington, D. C., as a Junior Horse Show was also held.



The White House received visitors.


Which included a party of Camp Fire Girls.


Not everyone was taking the day off, however.

Today In Wyoming's History: April 15: 1922  1922  Wyoming Democratic Senator John Kendrick introduced a resolution to investigate oil sales at Teapot Dome, Wyoming (the Naval Petroleum Oil Reserve).

As the U.S. Senate's history site notes:

Senate Investigates the "Teapot Dome" Scandal


April 15, 1922

Senate Committee on Public Lands hearing


Not unexpectedly, the Teapot Dome story, which was just breaking, and had been broken in the East the day prior, was big news in Wyoming.







1946  End of Special Session of the Legislature concerning funding of the University of Wyoming.

Elsewhere:

1207     St. Francis of Assisi renounces worldly goods.

1947   Jackie Robinson debuts for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

1952   The maiden flight of the B-52 Stratofortress.

Sunday, April 14, 2013

April 14

1846  The Donner Party departs Springfield, Illinois, for California.

1860  The first Pony Express rider with west bound mail arrived in San Francisco.

1865 President Lincoln shot by John Wilkes Booth as part of a deluded conspiracy by a small group of Confederate sympathizers.

1881  The Oregon Short Line, a Union Pacific subsidiary, organized.   The railroad ran from Granger to Huntington Oregon.


1892  Sheriff Angus asks the Commander of Ft. McKinney to turn over the Johnson County invaders to his custody.  The New York Times ran Gov. Barbers plea for Federal troops on its first page.

1902  J. C. Penny, and partners, opened his first store, in Kemmerer.  It was a Golden Rule store.

1916:  Casper Weekly Press: April 14, 1916
 
The Friday Casper paper, oil taking its place besides the Punitive Expedition and the slow march of the US towards entering World War One.


1922  The Tea Pot Dome scandal breaks in the Wall Street Journal.  Attribution:  On This Day.


It was Saturday, and the Saturday Evening Post chose to run an illustration of a woman waiting, presumably on a date.

The Country Gentleman illustration depicted a young couple applying for a marriage license, with a caption below that would be regarded as racist today, but which was still common for complete independence when I was young.

The Lansing-Ishii Agreement which had defined Japanese and American spheres of influence in China was abrogated after six years of being in effect due to Chinese objections regarding the agreement.

The Tribune reported on a tidal wave in Japan, and Irish plots against the British, but the really shocking news was the visitation of the Ku Klux Klan to the Emmanuel Baptist Church in Casper at 15th and Popular Streets.  There is no church there today, that location featuring a gas station, two apartment buildings, and a traffic island..


An Emmanuel Baptist Church still exists in Casper, but it's in North Casper today.  I have no idea of there being any connection between the two or not.

Emmanuel Baptist Church, Casper Wyoming


Not the best photograph, by any means, we admit.

Emmanuel Baptist Church in North Casper, Wyoming.

Apparently the same group had visited the Baptist church located at 5th and Beech street earlier.  That Church structure is no longer there either, but a subsequent structure built in 1949 remains, however it is no longer a Baptist Church.

First Baptist Church, Casper Wyoming

This is the First Baptist Church in Casper, Wyoming. It's one of the Downtown churches in Casper, in an area that sees approximately one church per block for a several block area.

This particular church was built in 1949, and sits on the same block as Our Savior's Lutheran Church.

Changes in Downtown Casper. First Presbyterian becomes City Park Church, the former First Baptist Church.

I debated on whether to put this entry here or on our companion blog, Lex Anteinternet.  In the end, I decided to put it up here first and then link it over. This will be one of a couple of posts of this type which explore changes, this one with a local expression, that have bigger implications.

When we started this blog, some of the first entries here were on churches in downtown Casper.  These included the First Presbyterian Church and the First Baptist Church, with buildings dating to 1913 and 1949 respectively.  First Baptist, it should be noted, has occupied their present location, if not their present church, for a century.

Indeed, while I wasn't able to get it to ever upload, I have somewhere a video of the centennial of the First Presbyterian Church from 2013, featuring, as a church that originally had a heavy Scots representation ought to, a bagpipe band.  Our original entry on that church building is right below:

First Presbyterian Church, Casper Wyoming

This Presbyterian Church is located one block away from St. Mark's Episcopal Church and St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church, all of which are separated from each other by City Park.

The corner stone of the church gives the dates 1913 1926. I'm not sure why there are two dates, but the church must have been completed in 1926.

Well, since that centennial, First Presbyterian has been going through a constant set of changes, as noted in our entry here:

Grace Reformed at City Park, formerly First Presbyterian Church, Casper Wyoming

This isn't a new addition to the roll of churches here, but rather news about one of them.  We formerly posted on this church here some time ago:
Churches of the West: First Presbyterian Church, Casper Wyoming: This Presbyterian Church is located one block away from St. Mark's Episcopal Church and St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church, all of whi...
People who have followed it would be aware that the Presbyterian churches in the United States are undergoing a period of rift, and this church has reflected that.  The Presbyterian Church, starting in the 1980s, saw conflict develop between liberal and more conservative elements within it which lead to the formation of the "moderate conservative" EPC.  As I'm not greatly familiar with this, I'll only note that the EPC is associated with "New School Presbyterianism" rather than "Old School" and it has adopted the motto  "In Essentials, Unity; In Non-Essentials, Liberty; In All Things, Charity. Truth in Love.".

The change in name here is confusing to an outsider in that this church is a member of the EPC, but it's no longer using its original name.  As it just passed the centennial of its construction, that's a bit unfortunate in some ways. 

We'd also note that the sought set of stairs is now chained off.  We're not sure why, but those stairs must no longer be used for access.

The changes apparently didn't serve to arrest whatever was going on, as there's a sign out in front of the old First Presbyterian, later Grace Reformed, that starting on February 23, it'll be City Park Church.

City Park Church, it turns out, is the name that the congregation that presently occupies another nearby church, First Baptist Church, will call its new church building, which is actually a much older building than the one it now occupies, which is depicted here:

First Baptist Church, Casper Wyoming

This is the First Baptist Church in Casper, Wyoming. It's one of the Downtown churches in Casper, in an area that sees approximately one church per block for a several block area.

This particular church was built in 1949, and sits on the same block as Our Savior's Lutheran Church.

What's going on?

Well, it's hard to say from the outside, which we are, but what is pretty clear is that the rifts in the Presbyterian Church broke out, in some form, in the city's oldest Presbyterian Church to the point where it ended up changing its name, and then either moving out of its large church, and accompanying grounds, or closing altogether.  I've never been in the building but I'm told that its basement looked rough a couple of years ago and perhaps the current congregation has other plans or the grounds and church are just too much for it.  At any rate, the 1949 vintage building that First Baptist occupies is apparently a bit too small for its needs and it had taken the opportunity to acquire and relocate into the older, but larger, church.  It can't help but be noted that both churches have pretty large outbuildings as well. Also, while they are both downtown, the 1913 building is one of the three very centrally located old downtown Casper churches, so if church buildings have pride of place, the Baptist congregation is moving into a location which has a little bit more of one.

While it will be dealt with more in another spot, or perhaps on Lex Anteinternet, the entire thing would seem to be potentially emblematic of the loss that Christian churches that have undergone a rift like the Presbyterian Church in the United States has sustained when they openly split between liberal and conservative camps.  The Presbyterian Church was traditionally a fairly conservative church, albeit with theology that was quite radical at the time of its creation.  In recent years some branches of that church have kept their conservatism while others have not and there's been an open split.  As noted elsewhere this has lead in part to a defection from those churches in a lot of localities, and a person has to wonder if something like that may have happened here, as well as wondering if the obvious fact that a split has occurred would naturally lead to a reduction in the congregation as some of its members went with the other side.  We've noted here before that the Anglican Community locally not only has its two Episcopal Churches in town, but that there are also two additional Anglican Churches of a much more theologically conservative bent, both of which are outside of the Episcopal Diocese of Wyoming.

A person can't really opine, from the outside, if something like this is "sad" or not, but it's certainly a remarkable event.  We've noted church buildings that have changed denominations of use before, but this is the first one where we've actually witnessed it.  And in this case, the departing denomination had occupied their building for a century.

In both instances, the small KKK group was there for the odd purpose of noting something they approved of.  

On the changes in the linked in article, while I'm not completely certain, I believe that no congregation is presently using the old First Baptist Church, and the old Presbyterian Church continued to undergo denominational changes.  It's something affiliated with Presbyterianism in some fashion, but I don't know how.

Amalgamated Bank, the largest union owned bank, forms.

The National League of Women's Voters voted against endorsing the League of Nations while simultaneously urging the US to associate with other nations to help prevent war, a mixed message.


1975  The Moreton Frewan house in Cheyenne added to the National Registry of Historic places.

1994  The final Environmental Impact Statement leading to the reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park published.

Soldiers at Soda Butte Creek Patrol Station with wolf in 1905.

 
In the 1970s John Prine released a song that continued to irritate the giant Peabody Coal Company ever after.  It's chorus lamented the disappearance of a town due to mining, laying that at the feet of Peabody in the chorus:
And daddy won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay
Well, I'm sorry my son, but you're too late in asking
Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away.
Well, now it's Peabody that seems to be disappearing, at least in terms of being the giant it once was.  Yesterday it took Chapter 11 (reorganization) bankruptcy.
Peabody is the largest coal producer in the world.  And yet its fortunes have fallen so far and so quickly that over just a few years its value has been estimated to have declined from billions to millions, and now its in bankruptcy. It's coal trains, or rather those of railroads serving Wyoming, heavily laden with Campbell County coal were a common site in parts of Wyoming, but now I'm told that you can find idled locomotives reflecting the decline and a once proposed rail line has now been dropped.  Signs that are hard to ignore.

Saturday, April 13, 2013

Sidebar: The Johnson County War

Over the past week, I've been running the events of the Johnson County War on a day by day basis.  This event may be the single most significant event in Wyoming's history, if measured in terms of popularity.  It's been the subject of several books, most recently Davis' "Wyoming Range War", and it's formed the basic plot outline, in a highly developed and adulterated way, for endless novels and movies, including such famous ones as The Virginian (the only one to really take the large stockman's side) and Shane.

The popular concept of the war is that it represented an armed expression of unadulterated greed.  While greed cannot be dismissed as an element, the larger question remains.  What was it all about?

The cattle industry, as we know it, didn't really come about until the conclusion of the Civil War.  Prior to that, the most significant meat livestock in the US was pork.  Swine production produced the basic farm meat for most Americans, which is not to say that they didn't eat cattle, they did, but cattle production was fairly small scale in the East, and much of it was focused on dairy and mixed production.  Meat cattle were more common in the South, and while it's popular to note that American ranching was a development of Mexican ranching, it was also very much a development of Southern ranching practices.  This, in fact, partially gave rise to the Johnson County War, as will be seen.

At any rate, the American Beef Cattle industry was born when the railroads penetrated into Kansas after the Civil War, and returning Texas cattlemen found that the herds in their state had gone wild, and greatly increased.  Cattle in Texas, up until that time, had followed the Mexican practice of being raised principally for their hides, not for meat, but the introduction of rail into Kansas meant that cattle could now be driven, albeit a long ways, to a railhead and then shipped to market.  An explosion in urban centers in the East provided a natural market, and soon the cattle industry in Texas had switched over to being focused on shipping cattle for beef.

The Texas industry spread north as well and by the 1870s it was making inroads into Wyoming, although really only southern Wyoming for the most part.  At the same time, and often forgotten, a dramatic increase in herds in Oregon, the byproduct of early farm herds and pioneer oxen herds, produced a surplus there that caused herds to be driven back east into Wyoming at the very moment that northern Wyoming opened up for ranching.

But what was ranching like here, at the time?

It was dominated by the fact of the Homestead Act, a bill passed during the Civil War in order to encourage western emigration into the vast public domain. But the bill had been written by men familiar only with Eastern farming, and it used the Eastern agricultural unit, 40 acres, as a model. That amount of acreage was perfectly adequate for a yeoman farmer, and indeed after the Civil War "40 acres and a mule" was the dream of the liberated slave, which they hoped to obtain from the Federal government.  But 40 acres wasn't anywhere near adequate for any sort of livestock unit in the West, and most of the West wasn't suitable for farming.  In the West, additionally, the Federal homesteading provisions oddly dovetailed with State and Territorial water law.

Water law was the domain of states or territories exclusively, and evolved in the mining districts of California, which accepted that claiming water in one place and moving it to another was a necessary right.  This type of water law, much different from that existing in the well watered East, spread to the West, and a "first in time, first in right" concept of water law evolved.  This was to be a significant factor in Western homesteading. Additionally, the Federal government allowed open use of unappropriated public lands for grazing.  States and Territories, accepting this system, sought to organize the public grazing by district, and soon an entire legal system evolved which accepted the homesteading of a small acreage, usually for the control of water, and the use of vast surrounding public areas, perhaps collectively, but under the administration of some grazing body, some of which, particularly in Wyoming, were legally recognized.  In the case of Wyoming, the Wyoming Stock Growers Association controlled the public grazing, and had quasi legal status in that livestock detectives, who policed the system, were recognized at law as stock detectives.

This was the system that the large ranching interests accepted, developed and became use to in the 1870s and 1880s.  Large foreign corporations bought into Western ranching accepting that this was, in fact the system.  It had apparent legal status.

But nothing made additional small homesteading illegal.  And the penalty for failing to cooperate in the grazing districts mostly amounted to being shunned, or having no entry into annual roundups.  This continued to encourage some to file small homesteads.  Homesteading was actually extremely expensive, and it was difficult for many to do much more than that.  Ironically, small homesteading was aided by the large ranchers practice of paying good hands partially in livestock, giving them the ability to start up where they otherwise would not have been.  It was the dream of many a top hand, even if it had not been when they first took up employment as a cowboy, to get a large enough, albeit small, herd together and start out on their own.  Indeed, if they hoped to marry, and most men did, they had little other choice, the only other option being to get out of ranch work entirely, as the pay for a cowhand was simply not great enough to allow for very many married men to engage in it.

By the 1880s this was beginning to cause a conflict between the well established ranchers, who tended to be large, and the newer ones, who tended to be small.  The large stockmen were distressed by the carving up of what they regarded as their range, with some justification, and sought to combat it by legal means.  One such method was the exclusion of smaller stockmen from the large regional roundups, which were done collectively at that time, and which were fairly controlled events.  Exclusion for a roundup could be very problematic for a small stockman grazing on the public domain, as they all were, and this forced them into smaller unofficial roundups. Soon this created the idea that they were engaging in theft.  To make matters even more problematic, Wyoming and other areas attempted to combat this through "Maverick" laws, which allowed any unbranded, un-cow attended, calf to be branded with the brand of its discoverer.  This law, it was thought, would allow large stockmen to claim the strays found on their ranges, which they assumed, because of their larger herds, to be most likely to be theirs (a not unreasonable assumption), but in fact the law actually encouraged theft, as it allowed anybody with a brand to brand a calf, unattended or not, as long as nobody was watching.  Soon a situation developed in which large stockmen were convinced that smaller stockmen were acting illegally or semi illegally, and that certain areas of the state were controlled by thieves or near thieves, while the small stockmen rightly regarded their livelihoods as being under siege. Soon, they'd be under defacto  siege.

This forms the backdrop of the Johnson County War.  Yes, it represent ed an effort by the landed and large to preserve what they had against the small entrant.   But their belief that they were acting within the near confines of the law, if not solidly within it, was not wholly irrational.  They convinced themselves that their opponents were all thieves, but their belief that they were protecting a recognized legal system, or nearly protecting it, had some basis in fact.  This is not to excuse their efforts, but from their prospective, the break up by recognized grazing districts by small entrants was not only an obvious threat to its existence (and indeed it would come to and end), but an act protecting what they had conceived of as a legal right.  Their opponents, for that matter, were largely acting within the confines of the law as well, and naturally saw the attack as motivated by greed.

As with many things, the conflict in systems of laws gave each side a basis to see their own acts as fully valid. The small stockmen had the high side of the fight, but the fight itself was more ambiguous in motivations, to some degree, than it is typically portrayed as being.

The fight didn't start with the invasion at all, but actually a campaign of assassinations was started by somebody.   It cannot be assumed that the WGSA had ratified this, but certainly whoever commenced it was on that side of the fight.  It proved unsuccessful, and if anything it made Johnson County residents nervous, but all the more opposed to those aligning against them.  Finally, as we have seen, events transpired to the point where the WSGA actually sponsored an invasion, albeit one of the most ineptly planned and executed ones every conducted by anyone.

The invasion, as we've seen, was a total failure in terms of execution.  It succeeded in taking the lives of two men, with some loss of life on its part as well, but it did nothing to address the perceived problem  it was intended to address.  The invaders were much more successful in avoiding the legal implications of their acts, through brilliant legal maneuvering on the part of their lawyers, but the act of attempting the invasion brought so much attention to their actions that they effectively lost the war by loosing the public relations aspect of it.  For the most part, the men involved in it were able to continue on in their occupations without any ill effect on those careers, a fairly amazing fact under the circumstances, and, outside of Gov. Barber, whose political career was destroyed, even the political impacts of the invasion were only temporary.  Willis Vandevanter was even able to go on to serve on the United States Supreme Court, in spite of the unpopularity of this clinets in the defense of the matter.  Violence continued on for some time, however, with some killings, again engaged in with unknown sponsors, occurring. However, not only a change in public opinion occurred, but soon a change in perceived enemies occurred, and a new range war would erupt against a new enemy, that one being sheep.  The range itself would continue to be broken up unabated until the Taylor Grazing Act was passed early in Franklin Roosevelt's administration, which saved the range from further homesteading, and which ultimately lead to a reconsolidation of much of the range land.

April 13

1860 the Pony Express completed its inaugural run from St. Joseph, Mo., to Sacramento in 10 days.

1863  Gen. Patrick Connor sent a telegram to Gen. Halleck asking for cavalry reinforcements following a Ute attack at Sweetwater.  Ute raids were unusual in Wyoming, and Connor accused the Mormons of urgin them on in his message to Halleck.

1866  Robert LeRoy Parker ("Butch Cassidy") born in Beaver Utah. 

1877    The Fort Benton (Montana) Record, coins a slogan for the RCMP:  They always get their man.

1892  The 6th Cavalry arrives from Ft. McKinney to intervene in the Johnson County War, which saw large cattle interest "invade" Natrona and Johnson  Counties.  The 6th Cavalry was dispatched in response to a request from Wyoming's governor, Gov. Barber, who was sympathetic to the invaders, to the effect that "a state of insurrection exists in Johnson County."  Upon arriving at the scene, the senior officer on location quickly deduced that the invaders were the offending party and that they were about to be overrun.  Rather than allow this to occur, the invaders were arrested.

Invaders while being held in Cheyenne, awaiting trial.

At the time the 6th Cavalry arrived, the Invaders were in serious danger of being blown to bits, as the Johnson County improvised armored wagon was getting closer and closer to their structures, and soon would have been within dynamite throwing range.  They were taken to Ft. McKinney.

1912  This photograph of Lusk was taken:


1916   The Wyoming Tribune: April 13, 1916
 

Back to a Cheyenne morning paper for today, lacking the Casper paper.

1917  Wyoming Council for National Defense appointed by Governor Houx.

Governor Frank Houx, who occupied the officer of Governor when his predecessor went to the Senate, ended up signing a lot of important measures, something somewhat unusual for a Governor never elected to the office.  Included his wartime acts was the appointment of Wyoming's Council for National Defense.


Councils for National Defense fulfilled a variety of roles in trying to coordinate industry, transportation and morale during the First World War.

Friday, April 12, 2013

April 12

1844   Texas became a US territory.

1861     The Civil War began as Confederate forces fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina. The Civil War would have a major impact on the policing of the West, and on Western immigration.  Very soon after the commencement of the war, Regular Army units were withdrawn from the Frontier, at the very same moment when emigration to California and Oregon, and other points West, increased.  This heightened tensions with Native tribes, which in turn caused the Federal Government to increasingly rely upon various state units raised for Civil War for Frontier duty.  Ultimately, the Federal Government would also deploy "Galvanized Yankees", i.e, southern POWs paroled upon volunteering for Frontier service.  All of this was played out in Wyoming, as well as the rest of the West.

1870  Sioux reservation in South Dakota created.

1889  Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show departs New York for Paris.

1892  An invader by the name of Dowling, having escaped the TA at night on the 11th, reached Douglas, over 100 miles away, and sent a telegraph to Gov. Barber that the invaders were in trouble.  Barber had been in on the plot and participated to the extent that he was not going to activate the Guard to intervene.  Barber asked for the President to intervene, claiming "An insurrection exists in Johnson County. . . "  The telegram to the President did not get through, however, and he then began to telegram Senators Warren and Carey.  Carey spoke to the President, after being reached, that evening and President Harrison ordered Gen. Brooke in Omaha to send troops.  Troops at Ft. McKinney were ordered to move and departed in the middle of the night.  During the day, the besiegers constructed and began to use an hastily fortified wagon to move their lines closer to the ranch house and barn.

1905  Wyoming Wool Growers Association founded.

1916  A clash occurs between US Regulars and Mexican Carranzaistas at Parrel.

The Punitive Expedition: The Battle of Parral. April 12, 1916

 Corporal Richard Tannous, 13th Cavalry, wounded at Parral.
U.S. cavalry under Major Frank Tompkins, who had been at Columbus the day it was raided and who had first lead U.S. troops across the border, entered Parral Mexico. At this point, the Punitive Expedition reached its deepest point in Mexico.
The entry was met with hostility right from the onset.  Warned by an officer of Carranzas that his Constitutionalist troops fire on American forces, Tompkins immediately started to withdraw them  During the withdraw, with hostile Mexican demonstrators jeering the U.S. forces, Mexican troops fired on the American forces and a battle ensued.  While Mexican forces started the battle, it was lopsided with the Mexicans suffering about sixty deaths to an American two.  Tompkins withdrew his troops from the town under fire and sought to take them to Santa Cruz de Villegas, a fortified town better suited for a defense.  There Tompkins sent dispatch riders for reinforcements which soon arrived in the form of more cavalrymen of the all black 10th Cavalry Regiment. 
This marked the high water mark of the Punitive Expedition.

LoC caption:  "Removing Sgt. Benjamin McGhee of the 13th Cavalry who was badly wounded at Parral, Mexico."

Casper Daily Press: April 12, 1916
 

1919  April 12, 1919. Turmoil.
Villers Carbonnel, France.  Formerly a village of 500 souls.  April 12, 1919.

Scenes like the one above may explain French discontent with the Peace, as reported by the Casper Daily News.

Bolshevik sympathy was reported as the cause of the recent mutiny or near mutiny in the 339th Infantry's Company I, fighting in northern Russia. That may seem extreme but in fact there was some truth to it. The Michigan contingent to the unit had been drawn from National Guardsmen who included a fair number of immigrants from Finland who held fairly left wing views going into service and who were, in fact, becoming somewhat confused over their role in Russia, and loosing sympathy with it. Of course, simply wondering why they were fighting and dying in a cause that they hadn't really signed on for had something to do with that as well.

Speaking of Bolsheviks, plenty was going on in Bavaria, as the paper noted.  On this day the German Communist Party seized control of the Bavarian government, displacing the anarchist who had taken over a couple of days prior.


A little closer to home, tragedy struck in Fremont County when Harry Kynes from Shoshoni, only recently returned to the United States, died of what was undoubtedly the Spanish Flu.


Also closer to home, the news had now broken that Col. Cavendar's death was a suicide, as we earlier related, and was in the news again.  


The weekly The Judge was looking at baseball.

The magazine The Judge used a play on words on its cover, relating labor strikes, which had been much in the news, with striking out in baseball.

The Saturday Evening post was looking at Spring.

Tacoma Washing, April 12, 1919.

And Tacoma was photographed.

And so one really eventful week drew to a close.  Communist revolution in Bavaria, a mutiny in the American Army in Russia, the assassination of Emiliano Zapata, Japanese troops firing on Korean civilians. .. it must of been frightening to pick up the paper.

1920  The Rock Springs Hide & Fur Company  was destroyed by fire.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1934  Harry Sinclair purchased Parco.

1945  Franklin D. Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage in Warm Springs, Ga., at age 63. Vice President Harry S Truman became president.

1967  A tornado, possibly one of several, hit ground near Veteran.

1984  Buffalo's Main Street historic district added to the National Registry of Historic Places.

2013  Soldiers of the Wyoming Army National Guard's 133d Engineering Company deploy to Bahrain.

2016   Lex Anteinternet: Marathon, Peabody and the airlines
And the news came today that Marathon has found a buyer for its Wyoming assets, the  topic we first touched upon here:
Lex Anteinternet: Marathon, Peabody and the airlines: This past week the state received the bad news that Marathon Oil Company, formerly Ohio Oil Company, which was once headquartered in Casper...
The buyer is Merit Energy.

All in all, this is good news for the state.  Merit's had along presence here and is a substantial operation, so  this would indicate that they are doing well and banking on the future of the petroleum industry in the state.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

April 11

1803   Napoleon's Treasury Minister offered to sell Louisiana for $15,000,000.  Attribution:  On This Day.

1865  USS Wyoming recommissioned.

1890  Natrona County organized.  Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1892  The siege at the TA Ranch had fully set in, with Johnson County residents moving the siege line slowly forward by advancing bails of hay and while pounding the buildings with rifle fire.  Heavy rifles, even including a .45-145, a heavy "buffalo" rifle, were employed to fire on the structures.  One invader made his escape, but the rest were holed up. An effort by 20 invaders to saddle their horses resulted in several horses being shot.  A couple of men were lightly wounded.  A snow fall continued all day and into the night, making the night bright.  The Johnson County men asked for the loan of a cannon from Ft. McKinney but were refused.

1898  President McKinley asked Congress for a declaration of war against Spain.

1899  The Treaty of Paris ending the Spanish-American declared in effect.

1913  Albert S. Burleson, Postmaster General, proposes to President Wilson to introduce segregation into the Railway Mail Service at a Cabinet Meeting. Wilson would act on the proposal and segregate the agency, which had been integrated since 1881.

1916   Casper Daily Press: April 11, 1916
 

1918  Natrona County Tribune, April 11, 1918. US troops engage Mexican raiders
 


Of course most of the news was on the war in Europe, where it was reported that Americans were being committed to battle in the British sector, the British and the Portuguese now being pressed, as we know, by Operation Georgette.
But the Tribune, which unlike the other Casper paper wasn't completely dominated by oil news on the cover, also reported that there had been a skirmish with Mexican forces of some sort, probably raiders, along the border.  One of the Cheyenne papers also included this on the front page, so the troubles to the south managed to reappear even in the midst of the massive 1918 German Spring Offensive.
As it turned out, this skirmish was only that, with American troops apparently repulsing an attempted raid into Texas by Mexican forces of some sort.

1941  President Roosevelt issued an executive order creating the Office of Price Administration.

1952  Wyoming Catholic Register begins publication.

1956  The Colorado River Storage Act passed Congress, ultimately resulting in Flaming Gorge Dam. Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1964  Dedication of the copper plated Tyrannosauruses Rex built by S. H. Knight, at the University of Wyoming.  The life size dinosaur statute is located just outside of the entrance of the Geology Museum at the S. H. Knight Building on the campus.   Attribution:  Wyoming State Historical Society.

1968   President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968 (the Fair Housing Act).
 
President Johnson signing the Civil Rights Act of 1968.
It was one of his hallmark achievements.
On this day, in 1968, President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1968 into law.  The act prohibited discrimination in housing rentals and sales based on race, religion or national origin.  
Prior to this bill such discrimination had been common.  Indeed, restrictive covenants in deeds for entire subdivisions commonly did just that.  One such example from Casper prohibited the sale of houses to "Mongolians".

1973  Vore Buffalo Jump added to the National Register of Historic Places.

1976  The Apple I created.

1994  The Brush Creek Work Center in Carbon County added to the National Registry of Historic Places.

1996  Jessica Dubroff, age 7, and her father and flight instructor, died when airplane crashed after takeoff from Cheyenne Regional in a storm. Dubroff was attempting to be the youngest person to fly across the United States at the time.