1893 — Where Gold Didn't Waver

Miners have been chasing gold around Gibtown since 1872, mining quartz gold since 1877 when it was discovered in Anderson and Dahlonega Creeks. George Anderson built an arrastra to crush his ore, and crushed it was—for a time. The town sprouted quick around him, called Andersonville at first, until his wife—God bless her spine—refused to live in a place that shared a name with the Confederate prison where her father had nearly died. So Anderson yielded, and they renamed the place for General Gibbon, who led a dawn attack against the Nez Perce the same year that Anderson found gold and named the camp, Gibbonsville.

The A.D. & M. Co.—now there was a name to make a payroll clerk weep or cheer, depending on the week. Officially, the letters stood for Anderson, Dunton & Mining, though in town we said it meant Always Digging & Maybe—a nod to the promise every mining company makes before the vein runs thin.

When the company came in, it came with intention. Not just a tent and a two-man shaft, but a full mill operation, wagons full of timber, contracts in triplicate and enough capital behind it to convince even the most cynical claim jumper that Gibbonsville was going to be “a real district”—not just a dusty hope on a government map.

But the year 1893 didn’t just arrive with a new calendar—it came with a reckoning. The kind of reckoning that sent bank presidents into early retirement and left speculators chewing on their shirt cuffs. It began, as panics often do, with the railroads.

For years, they’d been laying track like gamblers stacking chips—too many miles of iron over too few paying customers. The Philadelphia and Reading Railroad was the first to fold, a big outfit with bigger debts and when it collapsed that February, it set off a chain reaction. Railroads started falling like timber and with them the markets.

Then came the silver trouble. In their infinite wisdom the men in Washington had passed the Sherman Silver Purchase Act back in 1890, requiring the government to buy millions of ounces of silver every month. The idea was to boost the silver industry and inflate the currency just enough to help farmers and debtors. Instead, it flooded the market with paper money backed by a metal that was losing value by the day. Folks no longer trusted their dollars and did what folks always do when scared—they ran to gold.

The Treasury’s gold reserve, once solid as Gibraltar, began to dwindle. Every man who could read a ledger or owned a safe started converting silver-backed notes into gold coin. Confidence slipped and so did the currency. By the summer of ’93, banks were shuttering like saloons on Sunday. Over five hundred failed across the country. Businesses folded, credit dried up and wages—where they existed—sank to near nothing.

It was a hard time for anyone with a mortgage, a payroll, or a stomach. Unemployment swept the country, hitting the eastern cities like a flood. Breadlines formed. Tent cities sprouted. And yet, curiously, up here in the Gibbonsville hills, the sound of industry went on.

The town might’ve been tucked in tight, but it seemed to operate on its own clock. The stamp mills still rang through the timber, ore wagons rolled down from the upper claims and men still lined up for dinner at the boarding houses. Gibbonsville was humming through the crisis, even as Wall Street wheezed.

Gold, after all, doesn’t read newspapers. It stays in the quartz and waits for the right man with the right hammer. And while metals prices elsewhere tanked, the gold veins above Gibbonsville held steady—narrow but faithful, enough to keep the district alive. The mills kept turning, the merchants kept buying and selling—even the post office never missed a dispatch.

Some said it was just luck. Others figured we were too far from the centers of commerce to feel the tremors. But I think it had more to do with stubbornness. This wasn’t a boomtown by accident—it was a working town, built not just on gold but on labor. And labor, like water, finds its level.

Of course, nothing lasts forever. The ore would one day run lean, the prices would stay low and even Gibbonsville would feel the weight of change, but in that long year of 1893, when the rest of the nation was on its knees, the little town stood upright—pick in hand, boots in the mud and eyes on the next load.

As if all was well in the world—aside from the game birds—on February 1st, a new conservation law took effect: “The law for the protection of prairie chickens, grouse, sage hens, and pheasants goes into effect today and continues till July 15th, during which time it is a misdemeanor to kill or disturb the birds.” It was a strange note of civility amid so much economic carnage. Men might be out of work but the grouse had lawyers.

Fahey’s Hall wasn’t much to look at from the outside—just a tall wooden box with a pitched roof and enough windows to let the fiddle music out, but if you lived in Gibbonsville in the early 1890s, you knew it was the place where the town took a breath. Weddings, elections, lectures, the annual ball—if it mattered, it likely passed through Fahey’s front doors.

It belonged to Jerry Fahey—packer, merchant, occasional philosopher. He freighted in everything from blasting powder to baking soda, and if there was a man in town who knew what the next season might bring, it was Jerry. Naming the dance hall after himself wasn’t ego—it was simply efficient. He paid for the lamp oil, posted the notices, and if you were short a partner come waltzing time, he’d loan you a nephew.

The floors had a give to them, just enough bounce that your feet felt lighter than the week had been. On more than one occasion, I watched men who hadn’t smiled in months suddenly remember how. Women came in gingham, velvet, or whatever the season allowed and the music—whether fiddle or organ or borrowed cornet never waited on elegance.

The place didn’t need stained glass or chandeliers. It had what mattered: a roof over your head, a tune in the air and neighbors who’d stomp the boards beside you. For a few hours we weren’t miners or merchants, widows or wanderers—we were just townsfolk, in step.

Mining reports rolled in, stubborn as ever. “B.J. Moore, cashier of the Dillon National Bank, returned from Shoup. He is interested in the Clipper Bullion property and satisfied with the outlook, accompanied by J.M. Parfet the superintendent.” Good old Jim Moffit Parfet—always tied to some promising claim. I smiled to see his name in print again, as steady a presence as any man in these hills.

News from Shoup was thin that winter but I kept skimming the papers, hungry for word of familiar names—a friend’s arrival, a boarding house quarrel, or even a mention of my husband. Billy’s visits to Gib’town were often enough that the children didn’t forget what he looked like but just rare enough to leave me thumbing through the Idaho Recorder for proof he still lived.

My son Eddy had a way of courting trouble, especially if it came wrapped in mischief and smelled faintly of cigars. He took a shine to the stubs the men above town left behind—“butts” he called them—and fancied himself grown enough for a puff or two. One spring afternoon, I lay baby Billy in the cradle on the porch with his mosquito netting drawn and told Ed plain as day: Mind your brother.

Eddy nodded solemn as a preacher but the moment I turned my back he spotted temptation smoldering in the gravel—a half-smoked cigar, still ripe for the lighting. He struck a match and puffed like a little chimney sweep, coaxing that stub back to life until the end glowed red as a coal.

Billy began to fuss, and Eddy leaned close to the cradle to investigate—cigar in hand. That mosquito net, thin as gossamer and just as flammable, caught fire in a flash. Up it went, and Eddy, panicked, tried to bat it out and snatch it away from his baby brother. He stuffed the charred net into his pockets, trying to hide the evidence.

Lucky for little Billy that one of us adults came running. Not so lucky for Eddy. He made a dash for the yard but didn’t get far. He got a whipping that day—one he’d wouldn’t soon forget. [1]

Idaho Recorder, February 22, 1893

LOCAL INTELLIGENCE

The Gilmer boys are hauling ore to the Kentuck mill at Shoup.

They have 250 tons of high grade ore out and will soon have the mill running.

W.E. Taylor is working two men on the Monolith mine at Shoup on a lease. This property is showing up well and will be known in the near future as one of the best ore producers of the camp.

Charlie Schultz and Thomas Palmer and son John are working on their lease on the True Fissure mine at Pine Creek.

As soon as the creeks started rushing again, the stamp mills began crushing the ore that piled up over winter. Every camp welcomed the sound of the stamps. Soon we would start planting our gardens.

Before June came to a close, Billy rode into town and we stole away for a few days of rest and relaxation in Salmon City—Billy needing to turn in a few bricks—I needed a change of scenery.[2]

We were back in Gib’Town just in time to prepare for the annual festivities and Independence Day coincided with good weather so we did it up big.

Idaho Recorder, July 12, 1893

A GALA DAY

GIBBONSVILLE, July 5th

The “A.O.M.S.”[3] gave a picnic and celebration near the mouth of Sheep creek yesterday about five miles from this place, which was a gem in its line. Though a young society composed almost entirely of single gentlemen and small in numbers, for generosity and patriotism they did themselves proud, arranging free transportation for all in town who had no conveyances of their own and free refreshments to everybody.

The exercises consisted of music, reading the Declaration of Independence followed by an address from our state senator that was worthy of the day and the men, and found unanimous approval, and then came such a dinner as would make eastern picnickers envious. When they think the women of Gibbonsville are not artists in the culinary line they are mistaken. And such appetites this air produces!

After dinner, base-ball, fishing, swinging, gathering flowers, etc, until the sun was almost hidden behind the mountains we all went back to town and were greeted with another surprise by the society in the announcement that the dance too, was free at Fahey’s hall. Almost the entire population, old and young gathered and tripped the “light fantastic” till the small hours of morning, all voting it a day of enjoyment well calculated to instill lessons of patriotism and all declare the society should annex three more initial letters to their title, viz, R.G.F., meaning “Royal Good Fellows.—VET[4]

LOCAL INTELLIGENCE

W.E. Taylor is working the Monolith mine at Shoup, under lease from the owners, Ben. A. Lowe & Co., of Salt Lake. He recently made a run of ore in the Kentuck mill with paid him handsomely.

Idaho Recorder, July 19, 1893

LOCAL INTELLIGENCE

From parties recently from Gibbonsville we learn that a steady improvement is perceptible in the mining interests of that section. More properties are being worked with better results than ever before obtained. There are no idle men in the camp and a general spirt of hopefulness prevails. Success to the sturdy and self reliant camp.

Mrs. Pat Whelan, of Butte, is visiting her sisters, Mrs. McGree and Mrs. Sweeney of the Big Flat. She will be remembered by many old time friends here as Miss Kate Hickey.

The mountains don't go quiet for a birth—or a death. On July 30th, Anna St. Clair, wife of William and daughter of Henry and Clara Grieber, gave birth to a son out on the Big Flat. It should have been a happy occasion. But by the time the Recorder printed the news, the tone had shifted. “Lying very ill,” they said, and that Dr. Kenney had “but little hope.” The doctor’s hunch was right.

Anna died on August 11th. She was young, it seemed like only yesterday that I’d penned a short poem to mark the celebration of their wedding. And now? She’d left behind a newborn and little Herb—just three years old and only one of the couples of the triple wedding on Pine Creek only four years ago were still intact. William Wallace St. Clair stayed on at the Flat, working with his father-in-law Henry in the timber, running boards through the sawmill and trying, I expect, to keep the pieces of his life straight.

Out here, joy and grief lived side by side. A wedding and a funeral could share the same week. A baby’s first breath might be followed by a mother’s last. We didn’t dress it up in poetry—we just kept going. But we remembered.

Idaho Recorder, August 16, 1893

DIED

Died—At the residence of her father, Mr. Henry Greber, on August 14, 1893, Anna C, wife of Wallace W. St. Clair, aged 22 years, 3 months.[1]

The departed was well known and very much respected throughout the entire community for her many good qualities, and in their hour of distress, all sympathize with the husband and relatives.

In 1879 she came to this county, while still a child, with her parents and has sojourned among us ever since; was married in 1889 to W.W. St. Clair.[6]

Two little boys are left to the grief stricken husband, the elder not yet four years of age and the other an infant twelve days old. The recorder sends its sympathy in this time of affliction.

Idaho Recorder, December 20, 1893

LOCAL INTELLIGENCE

W.E. Taylor came up from Shoup yesterday. He brought with him a nice gold brick, the result of a clean-up just made in the Kentuck mill on ore from the Monolith, on which he has a lease.”

Eddy started school that fall, slate in hand, while Alta took to her second year like she’d been born to it. The Monolith kept Billy in ore, the Kentuck mill kept stamping and the towns carried on—dances, funerals, picnics and payrolls—same as ever. 1893 might have knocked the pins out from under the country, but up our way the mills still pounded and we figured that was enough.

NOTES

[1] A story was told to me by my Aunt, Ed Callahan’s daughter Lois Callahan Ross Martel in 1988. —S.E. Crie

[2] Idaho Recorder, July 5, 1893.

[3]The A.O.M.S. may have been a brotherhood—a local organization in Gibbonsville composed mostly of bachelors and young working men, a kind of informal mining society. Its initials may have been modeled after the lofty names of national fraternal lodges, such as the Ancient Order of United Workmen. “Ancient Order of Mining Society” is one possible decoding, though no formal charter has been found. It’s equally possible the initials were invented on the spot, part of the frontier tradition of making the everyday sound grand—a tradition Annie herself excelled in. Whether real or rhetorical, the A.O.M.S. behaved like many such groups: officers, bylaws, initials, and an air of solemnity—usually followed by a free dance and a second helping of pie.

[4[ Though the Idaho Recorder does not state a cause of death, Anna Grieber St. Clair likely died of childbed fever—what we now know as puerperal sepsis. It was a common and often fatal complication of childbirth in the 19th century, caused by bacterial infection introduced during or after delivery. Before the widespread adoption of antiseptic practices—and in an era when there were no antibiotics—even a clean home birth could turn tragic. In frontier communities like those along the Salmon River, access to trained medical care was limited, and mortality from childbirth remained heartbreakingly high.

[5] As to the pen namme of VET. It is the first time the writer appears, and the last. I think that it reads a lot like Annie's prose, but can't be sure who wrote it.

[6] The correct date of William Wallace and Anna C. Grieber’s marriage was November 29, 1888, married at Pine Creek, Shoup, Idaho.