The University of Oklahoma Press has issued an expanded paperback edition of a volume that should be in the library of anyone interested in Inland Northwest history: "The Spokane Indians: Children of the Sun," by Robert H. Ruby and John A. Brown.

This comprehensive history of the Spokane Tribe was originally published in 1970 and has not had a new edition for 24 years. This volume brings the story of the Spokanes up to date.

Like any work dealing with complicated and sensitive historical subjects, "The Spokane Indians" has sometimes spawned debate and argument. On balance, however, Ruby and Brown's work has been overwhelmingly useful in giving the world a clear picture of a remarkable people.

Here's what George Hill, Spokane Tribal Cultural/Heritage Coordinator, wrote in the foreword to this new edition: "'The Spokane Indians' was something I could show to my Anglo friends. All they knew were the stories of the Plains People. This book showed them that we, the Spokanes, are a people of collective thoughts, actions and stories -- separate and different from other tribes that they had heard of. ... The book bolstered my pride in my people."

I don't believe we can truly understand the land where we live without understanding the people who have lived here for thousands of years. I urge you read this book -- and then to submit your own comments.

No subject on this blog has garnered more controversy than the Nov. 28, 2005 posting titled "Did Butch Cassidy Retire to Spokane?" (You can find it below). It has spawned 73 responses (and still climbing), many of them from Butch aficionados and/or scholars, and many of them contentious and argumentative.

The subject was whether William T. Phillips of Spokane was actually the famous Butch Cassidy. For a variety of reasons, I am now leaning strongly toward the opinion that he wasn't. However, I believe we will never know for sure.

This week, I received a letter from Butch & Sundance scholar Daniel Buck, which included a copy of a new article he and Anne Meadows have written which illustrates why any definitive answer to the question is so complicated. This article, titled "Butch and Sundance: Still Dead?" for the April-June 2006 issue of the Quarterly of the National Association for Outlaw and Lawman History, Inc., gathers together the bewildering number of death reports that have surfaced for the pair over the years.

Butch died in Utah, Butch died in Nevada, Butch died in Bolivia. Butch died as early as 1898 and as late as 1944. As the Salt Lake Tribune noted sardonically in the 1890s: "The supply of Butch Cassidys seems inexhaustible."

In his letter, Buck noted that Washington ranks pretty high in the Butch death chronicles. "Utah and Nevada are now tied at seven Butch tales each. Washington is second with six."

Aren't we proud? If anyone out there has evidence of which one of these many death tales is true, feel free to offer it up right here.

Dean Bennett, a reader from Coeur d'Alene, was shocked to discover that the historic Fort Ground Tavern (on the old fort grounds, right next to present North Idaho College) had closed last spring. He and a few other CDA natives started talking about this travesty and he started collecting information about the history of bars and taverns in Coeur d'Alene. You can find his historic map of the CDA bars and taverns at http://www.frappr.com/historyofcoeurdalenebars.
He could use some help in fleshing out this project. If you have any information about the area's classic bars and taverns, their original owner's names or any other historical information, you can send them to Bennett through the website's forums, or send them to him at canyonwren@adelphia.net. You can also post them here on this blog for others to read.
I think this is a worthy cause -- the Fort Ground was a great old tavern among many in CDA's history. One consolation: the 99-year-old building has been remodeled and will soon re-open as the Fort Ground Grill.

The Inland Northwest History blog is back after a successful and productive hiatus. If all works out according to schedule, you can look for my biography of Spokane civil rights lawyer Carl Maxey to be published in 2007 by the University of Washington Press.
Meanwhile, a lot of blog-worthy material has been gathering over the last three months. In the next few days, I'll be diving in to these issues, including some new Butch Cassidy research, a new edition of Robert H. Ruby's and John A. Brown's history of the Spokane Indian tribe, and (in the very next post) the history of the bars and taverns of Coeur d'Alene.

This blog is on sabbatical until Aug. 7. I am taking time off from the Spokesman-Review to finish a biography of Carl Maxey, the Spokane civil rights lawyer. Please check back in August, when I will tell you more about the completed project. At least, it had better be completed

People continue to send in reminscinces of Bob's Chili Parlor and I'll share a couple of them here.

One is from Jackie Orth of Bayview, Idaho, who remembers that Friday nights as a teenager consisted of going to the Hi Nite in the Odd Fellows Hall (now CenterStage) on West First, and then finishing out the night by eating chili at Bob's, "the most wonderful chili in the world."

The other is from Barbara Nobles, the daughter-in-law of longtime owner Harry Nobles. She sent in a couple of handwritten recipes, which she asked me not to post. As she noted, it wouldn't do that much good to post them anyway since "all of the fresh meat, spices, etc., can't be found today."

I will say that one of the main ingredients was suet. Another was catsup. The "spices" are not specified. It is somewhat similar, but not identical to, the bulk recipe posted earlier.

The tamale recipe is almost as baffling. For those who want an idea of what a Bob's tamale tasted like, Barbara suggests Garibaldi's Tamales, a commercial variety, out of Hayward, Cal.

She said the family thinks they are "somewhat close to the Bob's recipe." Bob's tamales were, however, never frozen and were "inner-wrapped with corn husks (the old style)."

Here was a heady event in 1906 Spokane: The week the streets flowed with beer.

Thirsty men in Cannon's Addition (the lower South Hill) reported what seemed like a mirage. City street sprinkling wagons, used to keep road dust under control, were rolling through the streets and spewing beer over the edge of the Hangman Creek bluff.

"Beer foamed from the loose top of the receptacles and percolated in rich creamy streams from the sprinkling machines on the ends of the wagons," reported the Spokesman-Review.

The spectacle was of "more than passing notice to the masculine part of the public living in Cannon's addition."

It was no mirage. The old Hieber Brewing Co. needed to get rid of a large volume of spoiled beer. They apparently contracted with the city's sprinkler wagons to help dump it.

If they thought nobody would notice, they were deluding themselves.

"It is said that men have been seen almost to weep as the sprinklers passed by," noted the S-R.

No use crying over spilt beer.

We received a lot of response from our Feb. 12 Inland Northwest History column about Spokane's old Bob's Chili Parlor. Obviously this subject evokes nostalgia of a particularly spicy variety.
Here's what reader Doug Fisher had to say: Dear Jim. You can't imagine how excited I was to see the article on Bob's Chili Parlor in the Sunday Paper.
I am a Culinary Instructor at the Inland North West Culinary Academy at Spokane Community College.
I teach a class in Modern American Cuisine. I just on Friday was telling my students about the fabled
Bob's of yesteryear in Spokane and then on Sunday here is the article. What a nice surprise My students
were quite excited to see the article. I'm sure the circulation of your paper jumped at least by 3 or 4!
I have seen articles in the past for the recipe for Bob's Tamales.I actually eaten them there once when
I was a kid. My Mom loved that place. Thanks for the article, signed, Doug Fisher Chef Instructor Spokane Community College.

We also received a number of requests for the "original recipe." I will give it to you here with a couple of warnings. First, several recipes claim to be authentic, but at least this one was endorsed by the former owner's daughter-in-law and is obviously geared to restaurant proportions. Second, it includes several unexplained references, including one for "a quart of red." Is that standard chili powder? Or some kind of pre-prepared sauce? Who knows?

Here's the recipe:
General directions: Start with 120 pounds of meat for a full batch of chili of 30 gallons. Run meat through meat chopper and place in a big vat. Add 1/2 ounce onions and 1/2 ounce garlic for every pound of meat and add about 1/3 pound more onions than garlic (3 and a half pounds garlic and 4 pounds onion for a full batch).
Add scoop of salt and more later if needed to please taste. Add 2 and a half gallons of more of melted tallow, put in a bag of bay leaves and start fire (two center burners). Let braise for about three-quarters of an hour or until red color has disappeared from the meat, then add mixed seasonings.
About 15 minutes after adding mixed seasonings, add peppers, about three gallons. Turn off all fires but center burner. Cook a half-hour then add about 3 gallons of beef stock. Add one ladle of chili capino, sprinkling over the top and then stir it in. Add one quart of ketchup, 1 and a half cups of herb sauce, stir occasionally and let cook 1 hour.
Add about one quart red (enough to thicken as desired). Put on all fires and bring to a quick boil for 5 minutes, then turn off all fires. One half-hour later try for taste as to salt.
To prepare peppers: Take about 10 gallons peppers and soak in warm water, pour off water and run through grinder three times, once through medium-sized plate and twice through fine plate. Put in ice box, use as needed.
When ready to use, take four or five handfuls of ground peppers and about four gallons of hot water, put on fire and bring to near boil, stirring as it heats until peppers are well dissolved and right thickness (about like ketchup). Run through strainer to take out pulp before pouring into chili.

To prepare mixed seasonings: Mix one quart comino (cumin) to two parts oregano after they have been well-dried. Run through the grinder, grinding them fine. When ready to use, take one heaping teaspoonful of mixed seasonings for each four pounds of meat and about one gallon of water and bring to a boil, stirring until well-mixed and partially dissolved; add to chili when meat is braised.

To prepare bay leaves: Take small cloth about the size of a man's handkerchief and put two good handfuls of bay leaves in it. Tie the corners together and put in chili when ready to start fire. The first time you use the bag of bay leaves, you can leave it in the chili only until about the time you put in the peppers. After that, you can leave them in until the chili is done. A bag of bay leaves is good for four batches of chili.

To prepare special herb sauce: For two gallons, take one pound mixed herbs, two gallons cold water, boil four hours. Strain, add enough water to bring the amount to two gallons; add two lemons ground very fine, three-quarters cup salt; let boil 10 minutes. Remove from the fire; strain again through cheese cloth and add two tablespoons oil of cloves. Cork up tight and set away until ready to use.
Yield: About 30 gallons.

Whew. Now, that's a chili recipe. Anybody have the nerve to try it today?

I'm preparing a story for an upcoming edition of the Spokesman-Review about Calamity Jane (real name Martha Canary) and her Spokane and North Idaho connections.

According to an excellent new biography, "Calamity Jane: The Woman and The Legend," by James D. McLaird (University of Oklahoma Press), the infamous Jane showed up in Spokane around 1883 when she was following the construction crews of the Northern Pacific railroad westward through Montana, North Idaho and on into Washington State.

A story in the Spokane Press, printed on Aug. 6, 1903, right after her death, quotes a number of old-timers who remembered her dealing faro (a card game) at her own establishment, a wooden building on Main Avenue.

"While dealing her custom was to peacefully chew tobacco and smoke a cigar at the same time," one old-timer was quoted as saying. "If anyone suggested a drink she was always Johnnie on the spot, drinking neat whisky with relish and buying a return treat with alacrity."

The paper claimed, with only slight backing evidence, that Jane was the "keystone around which all the excitement and life of the new town was reared."

According to McLaird, she also showed up in the Coeur d'Alene mining district in 1884. She brought a few of her "girls" with her to the raucous mining town of Eagle City. There is some evidence that she performed her first-ever stage show in a long, tented ballroom in Eagle City, in which she narrated a "monologue of her life," and then brought out her dancing girls.

She left after a few months because of competition from Molly Burdan, aka Molly b'Damn. Apparently, the miners didn't have enough gold dust in their jeans to keep both of these frontier entrepreneurs in business.

Does anybody out there know of any other Calamity Jane stories from the Inland Northwest? I'm trying to gather as much information as possible for my upcoming story.

Here's a nugget I ran across in a 1905 newspaper: An article speculating about which way downtown Spokane would grow -- east or west?

This was at a time when the center of Spokane was considered to be at about Howard and Riverside. The reporter asked five local real estate men (and yes, they were all men) to weigh in on the subject. There was no consensus.

"There is only one way for the city to go and that is to the east," said F.J. Walker. "In three years, Washington Street at Riverside Avenue will be the most widely crossed business street in town, and property there will be just as valuable as on the Howard and Riverside crossing."

"The town will grow west, of course," said F. Flint. "Where else should it grow? Take all of the public buildings, the city hall and the best business blocks -- they are in the western part of the city. With one or two exceptions, there are no good store buildings east of Washington Street. ... The best residence district is in the western part of the city and the business district of any city joins the best residence district, not the poorer ones."

The real estate man who proved to be the best prognosticator was C.F. Clough, who said downtown "will naturally expand in all directions from its present location."

In fact, downtown went on to grow both west and east, as well as north and south. However, the downtown core has remained essentially stable. The center of downtown can still be considered roughly at Howard and Riverside, the site of the Bank of America Financial Center (aka the tallest building in Spokane).

The more important question of today is not which direction downtown will grow, but which direction the metro area will spread.

Anybody have any predictions? And don't just say, "In all directions."

An alarming new "dope" fad was sweeping through Spokane in 1906, according to a pharmacist on Howard Street.

"`Wideawake' Is All The Rage," blared a headline in the Jan. 28, 1906 Spokesman-Review.

"The fiends call cocaine or coke 'wideawake'," said the pharmacist. "They say that by using it they can stay awake all night ... There is nothing that these dope fiends will not do to get their drug."

Yet getting it was simple enough. They merely had to walk into the druggist's shop with some cash.

Here's how a reporter described the scene in the druggist's shop:

"'Gimme a dollar's worth of wideawake,' said a tall cadaverous-looking individual.
"... When the druggist returned from the rear of the store, he grabbed the bottle from his hand, flung down a dollar and slunk out of the store."

Obviously, cocaine was legal. It could be purchased without a prescription. It was becoming so popular that the druggist said it was beginning to supplant his previous big sellers: Gum opium and morphine. Yet the druggist had no illusions about these drugs -- he knew they were trouble.

"You would not believe how many of these fiends there are until you had worked here night after night, as I do," the druggist was quoted as saying. "There seems to be no particular class of people who use the drugs. They come from all ranks of society. Very many sink to the lowest levels from the use of narcotics. Men and women, blacks and whites, use dope in equal numbers. Once they become addicted to the use of drugs, very few quit it."

As if to illustrate his point, the S-R ran another story that week about a Pine City man who had been brought to Colfax by his brother for urgent medical treatment.
"He is a morphine fiend and a complete wreck," wrote a Colfax correspondent. "He is perfectly helpless and almost idiotic. He can scarcely walk and cannot dress or feed himself. An effort will be made to have him committed to the asylum at Medical Lake."

So let me throw out a couple of questions:

Are you surprised at the extent of the narcotic trade in 1906 Spokane?

And are you surprised it took another eight years -- until 1914 -- for cocaine to be banned by federal law?

"Durkin Saloon." Postcard Collection, Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture.

Here's a sketch of one of Spokane's most endearing early characters: Jimmie Durkin, saloon owner, liquor tycoon, millionaire and philosopher.

He was born in England in 1859 of Irish parents, and immigrated to Brooklyn at age 9. In 1886, he lit out for Colville and opened a liquor store. He came to Spokane in 1897 and opened a saloon to compete with the famous Dutch Jake's saloon-theater-gambling-house. Durkin branched out into liquor stores and liquor distribution, and before long he was one of the wealthiest men in Spokane.

What makes him so fascinating was not his wealth, but his mind. The papers routinely called him "Spokane's Main Avenue philosopher" and he delighted in quoting his progressive opinions on all kinds of subjects.

For instance, during the Scopes evolution trial of 1925 (the famous Monkey Trial), Durkin dashed off a telegram to defense attorney Clarence Darrow praising Darrow's devotion to "the brightest of all jewels known (the truth)" and paid tribute to Darrow's contributions to "freedom of thought and education."

He was brought up Catholic, yet became a proud atheist, at a time when atheism was not exactly accepted. When asked to reaffirm the Catholic faith on his deathbed in 1934, he replied, "As I live, so I die, for any man who does otherwise is not a man."

In one oft-repeated Jimmie story, a friend asked why he spent so much money on advertising. He replied, "It is the very life of trade. I will wager I can place an advertisement in The Spokesman-Review offering to buy cats, and by nightfall I will have a basement full."
The wager was accepted and the ad placed. The next night, his friend looked into Durkin's basement to find it crawling with cats, brought in by the dozens. The friend paid off on the wager, "which more than offset the sum Jimmie had paid for the cats."

Although Durkin was in the liquor business, he believed it could be "conducted on a high plane." His bartenders were not allowed to drink on duty and would not sell to anyone who was getting tipsy. Loud and boisterous conversation was not allowed.

In one prime Durkin story, a fulminating temperance preacher once declared in a sermon that he wished he could dress (decorate) Jimmie Durkin's saloon windows "in a way to display the tragedy of drink."

Jimmie immediately took the reverend up on the offer and offered to pay for it. So the reverend decorated the windows with pictures of ragged women abandoned by hard-drinking men and with statistics about the ill-effects of liquor. One window contained a pile of sad, worn-out shoes, next to a gleaming pair of patent-leather shoes with gaiters, which was labeled, "The shoes of the saloon-keeper."

Durkin allowed the windows to remain up for weeks, prompting the preacher to say, "Jimmie Durkin is a man of his word."

Yet Durkin knew what he was doing. The windows worked as a "gigantic publicity stunt" according to the S-R, and attracted more customers to the saloon than ever.

Still, just before Durkin died, he requested that his epitaph be "Jimmie Durkin, born 1859, died 1934: The minister said, 'A man of his word.'"

"Interior, Ulrich & Durkin Saloon, 1935." Libby Studio Collection, Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture.

A story in a 1905 Spokesman-Review suggests that Irish bars have a long and checkered history in Spokane.

The Shamrock Bar, at 213 Stevens Street, was closed down due to "unsanitary conditions," but the story suggests it also had a wild and raucous reputation before that.

"The Shamrock has been a source of amusement and alarm to the police department," reported the paper. "Patrick Kearney, presiding genius of the establishment, has a beautiful set of red whiskers which he wears a la Dundreary. The police have quelled several riots which started from the attempt of some carouser to fondle the same Dundreary whiskers."

Dundreary whiskers were long, flowing sideburns, somewhat like mutton chops, named after Lord Dundreary, a character in a popular play, "Our American Cousin."

The story goes on to say that Kearney had recently arrived from the "Ould Sod" and that "beer and brouge" (brogue?) are doled out to the customers. When a customer once complained that the beer was flat, Kearney was quoted as saying, "Oi know, me boy, it is a trifle flat. But it is better for your stomach that way."

The story sadly noted that by order of the Sanitary Inspector, the lights were out, "the jangling piano stilled and Stevens Street mourned."

Today, O'Doherty's Irish Grille fills the Irish bar niche not far from the old Shamrock in downtown Spokane -- but without the problems or the Dundrearys.

Meanwhile, I'll throw out this related question: For what other reason has "Our American Cousin" gone down in history?

Those well-versed in America's past shouldn't have much trouble answering that one.

In a recent column I mentioned Spokane's rich vaudeville history, which spurred readers to ask: Where was the old Pantages Theatre?

The Pantages was on the east side of Howard, south of Main. It was built in 1917 and became Spokane's stop on the national Pantages circuit. It changed its name to the Orpheum in 1930 (which is why the sign says Orpheum on the accompanying photo)and converted entirely to movies in 1932. It was torn down in in 1958. The site now consists of the Parkade Plaza and Rite Aid Drug Store.

It was a beautiful building, with six fluted Corinthian pilasters across the front and many other examples of classical ornamentation.
However, it was surpassed by Spokane's true theatrical gem, the Auditorium, on the northwest corner of Main and Post.

This magnificent building was a Spokane landmark from 1890 to 1934, with its massive corner tower projecting more than seven stories above the street.

The stage was deliberately built extra-large -- in fact, it was the largest in the world when it was built. The architect, Herman Preusse, deliberately made it one foot deeper than the Chicago theater that held the record, according to "Spokane Building Blocks," by Robert Hyslop.

The 1,750-seat theater had three balconies and a number of what we would today call "luxury boxes." Hyslop calls them "half-round palaces."
Sarah Bernhardt sang there; so did Al Jolson. And the 14-year-old Bing Crosby worked there as, in his own words, a "flunky in the prop department."

Yet as early as 1924 it was being used mostly as a movie house. This premier Spokane landmark was torn down in 1934. The site became a Pay Less drug store for a while and is now River Park Square.

As Hyslop says, sic transit gloria mundi.

The Dec. 4 history column in the Spokesman-Review titled "'Fair Offer' of $37", was about the opening of the Colville Reservation to white settlement in 1905. In the story, I mentioned that many of those lands have been re-acquired, and that the Colville Tribes have a policy of buying back lands put up for sale.
I received an e-mail from a person identified only as "a concerned tribal member" who said that the policy falls short of the reality. The writer said that if tribal members can't get a competitive offer from a tribal member, they are allowed to sell to non-tribal members -- and this is happening all over the reservation.
"This is disturbing to me as a tribal member," said the writer. "I see these small acres with huge houses going up all over my family's historic hunting/fishing/gathering sites. Sure, I am jealous, but I am also outraged because the tribes cannot compete with non-members in every instance."
So what do you think? Is this indeed cause for outrage? I'd like to hear from tribal members and non-tribal members on this subject.

I'm passing along requests for information submitted by three readers about various regional historical issues.

The first comes from Patrick Gooden, who is trying to find the burial place of one of John Muir's daughters, who moved to Spokane for her health and ended up staying here. Her name was either Wanda or Helena. He believes she was unmarried. I checked our archives and could find no information on her based on this limited information. I am posting it in case any readers can help.

The second comes from Ron Myers, who is seeking information about Fred H. Moore, a well-known labor attorney who defended Sacco and Vanzetti. Moore lived in Spokane from 1889 to 1910. Myers was hoping someone might have old letters or other information related to Moore.

Third, Cindy Fine asks if anyone knows anything about Stadacona Park, a tiny oval park between Arthur and Perry and 10th and 11th. Our archive notes that it was absorbed into the larger Grant Park around 1968. As for the name, I could find only that there was once a Stadacona Farm near the present airport, suggesting that the name is a family name from some early residents. But I can't find much about the park beyond that.

If anybody can shed light on any of these issues, please reply by clicking on the "comments" link.

Poring over turn-of-the-century newspapers can be vastly entertaining -- not to mention appalling.

Here's a story I stumbled across from a 1905 edition of The Spokesman-Review which earnestly debates the question: Can women schoolteachers ever make good wives?

Here's what C.L. Shuff, a male teacher in Spokane, was quoted as saying: "I do not say that a teacher should not marry, but I do say a woman should not teach. In our order of society a woman's place is to be mistress of a home and teaching is not conducive to making a woman a good housewife. In the first place, when a woman teaches school, she comes to depend on others to do the work of housekeeping and she grows to dislike these duties. In the next place, teaching gives a woman a mental attitude which is unfortunate in home life."

Shuff illustrates his point with an anecdote about a trip he took with a group of people, one of whom was a schoolteacher. She was, in his words, "constantly running off by herself, perfectly oblivious to the rest of the party." She then "spent her time taking notes of trivial things till her husband and the rest of us were completely out of patience with her."

He concludes that "this attitude of hers is directly due to the fact that she had been a school teacher for a long time."

Other local men defended women school teachers, including a former Spokane school superintendent, who said that the stereotype of woman teachers as "finicky and irritable" was disappearing.

"The finicky women are being weeded out and the teachers who are now employed are the sweet-tempered women. Their training is entirely along the lines of increasing these qualities and as a consequence school teachers are tolerant women, and not liable to be critical and fault-finding with their husbands. As far as I can see, there is absolutely no ground for the statement that school teachers do not make good wives and should not marry."

The paper went so far as to put the question to a woman teacher, who replied, in essence, that she doesn't know what all the fuss is about. She said she knows many women teachers who are happily married.

It fell to J.A. Tormey, the school superintendent at the time, to give the most enlightened reply to the question.

"Personally, I think the school teachers are the best class of women we have and make the best wives," said Tormey. "They are intellectual and take life seriously and when men come to know them, they are attracted by these qualities."

But then we go back to Mr. Shuff, who summed up his argument by saying, "Teaching school is a man's business and women should be kept out of it. It is no more right to compel a man to compete with cheap female labor in teaching than with cheap Chinese labor in another line of work."

Ooooh-kay.

So, here's my question: Have attitudes come a long way since 1905? Or not?

Photo: The students of Greer School, west of Cheney, pose with their teacher, Mrs. Van Brunt, in 1937. Mrs. Van Brunt taught all eight grades in the one-room school.

This week, I've been reading the 1977 book "In Search of Butch Cassidy" by Larry Pointer, which attempts to prove this startling theory: That Butch Cassidy did not die in a shootout in Bolivia in 1908, but assumed a new name, William T. Phillips, and lived a quiet life in Spokane until his death in 1937.

It's fascinating thesis. I'm still on the fence about the conclusion, but it certainly makes a compelling yarn. The author's theory is largely based on a long, rambling manuscript written by the elderly Phillips entitled "The Bandit Invincible."

It purports to be a biography of Cassidy, who Phillips claims to have known "since childhood." It is written in the third person. Yet Pointer is convinced that it is a thinly disguised autobiography, and that Phillips writes only as Cassidy himself could have written.

The facts themselves are contradictory. Yet, as I approach the two-thirds point of the book, I find the psychological aspects of the manuscript intriguing. It essentially sounds like a long apology, in which the writer is keen on explaining that Cassidy was forced into the bandit life by powerful interests (large stockmen, railroads, bankers) and that once he was forced into it, he had no choice but to play that life as well as he could. He is at pains to say that Cassidy was loved by kids, dogs and the "little people" of the West and did not harm anyone in his escapades. It often sounds more like a self-confession/rationalization than a biography, and it rings true with Pointer's contention that Phillips was Cassidy himself.
The manuscript also lapses, briefly, into the first person a couple of times.

Yet after Pointer's book came out, a number of other articles and books refuted his theory, some of them claiming it was all nothing but a fraud.

This Butch Cassidy mystery will be the subject of one of my bi-weekly history columns in The Spokesman-Review in the next month. Meanwhile, I am interested in hearing if anybody familiar with this controversy has any opinions on the veracity of Pointer's claims.

Was William T. Phillips actually Butch Cassidy?

Speaking of Bing Crosby, I thought people might want to see what gave Harry Lillis Crosby the nickname of Bing. According to the most reliable sources, including Bing himself, he was a fan of the Sunday newspaper comic feature titled, "The Bingville Bugle." One of his neighbors, a teenager, took to calling him "Bingo from Bingville."

The "o" was later deleted.

Here's an edition of the Bingville Bugle printed in the Spokesman-Review in 1909, right around the time Bing was acquiring that nickname. It's a parody of a backwoods newspaper, complete with creative spellings.

Spokane's two daily papers sent reviewers to the Gonzaga Dramatic Club's play, "It Pays to Advertise" on Nov. 8, 1923.

These reviews were of the "good time had by all" variety and would be of little note today except for the fact that Harry Crosby, age 20, played the role of Ambrose Peale. Here's what the reviewers said about young Crosby:
Spokane Chronicle: "Michael Pecarovich and Harry Crosby took the leading roles in the play and both were tremendously successful. ... They added extemporaneous comedy bits to their lines and their situations ... resulting in one uproar of laughter after another."

The Spokesman-Review: "(Pecarovich) and his partner in crime and advertising, Harry Crosby, carry off all of the play's hilarious moments. Mr. Crosby bursts over with spontaneity in getting his amusing lines across the footlights."
Harry Crosby was, of course, Harry Lillis "Bing" Crosby, who later became famous for his "extemporaneous comedy bits" in the "Road" movies with Bob Hope.

He also went on to win an Academy Award for Best Actor in 1945.

In July 1913, when the 33-year-old Will Rogers was at Spokane's Orpheum Theater for a week headlining a vaudeville tour, he showed a reporter what kind of money he was making: A check for a cool million.

Well, not exactly.

Let's allow Will tell the story, as related in the July 2, 1913 edition of The Spokesman-Review:
"I went out with the other acts to play a show at an insane asylum benefit one afternoon ... When we got to the asylum, the attendant told us one of the harmless patients believed himself to be manager of the program. The patient came along and looked us over. He decided to pay me right away and drew out an old blank check which we had found somewhere. He then inquired my name and wrote me a certificate for $20,000. Then the show started and I didn't see him again until we were about to leave, when he came around and paid everyone off. I told him he had already squared with me, but he insisted he liked me better since my stunt, and insisted I take a check for a million."

Rogers was flattered that the man liked his lariat-twirling stunt so much.

"That sort of proves something or other," Rogers drawled.

Here's another bit of Spokane cigar-store history, to go with the posting immediately below.

Reader Paul McNabb wrote in to tell me about the surpring evolution of a Spokane cigar store, originally located in the 900 block of West Sprague. The owner then opened another location at 1019 W. First, in the old Odd Fellows Hall, now CenterStage dinner theater.

He started making candy, which he sold right alongside the cigars. In 1913 he officially launched the Riley Candy Co.. which made sweets in Spokane for many years.

"He was my grandfather," wrote McNabb. "The company was sold by his son in 1966 and the company is now called Spokandy."

Spokandy, of course, remains beloved by many of the region's sweet tooths.

In the Nov. 6 print version of the Inland Northwest History column, which appears bi-weekly in the Spokesman-Review, I wrote about Spokane's vanished cigar stores. That was a surprisingly rich subject, since there were 122 cigar stores in Spokane in 1910.

One of those stores was P.M. Jacoy's, established in 1903 and which remained a popular hangout for cigar smokers, Racing Form fans and newshounds all the way through the 1980s. Seen at right in about 1916, Jacoy's is still doing business at the corner of Sprague and Washington.

After that story came out, I got a call from a descendant of Pete Jacoy's. She told me that the family no longer owns the store, which has become, more or less, a convenience store. You might be able to get a pack of Swisher Sweets, but it now resembles the old P.M. Jacoy's in name only.

However, as if to prove that everything comes around again, downtown Spokane does have its own cigar store again, Smokin' Smoke Shop at N. 2 Post. It joins Jimmy'z, Tobacco World in the Flour Mill and Topps Tobacco Square in Northtown Mall as Spokane's cigar and tobacco emporiums.
They hardly resemble the bustling cigar stores of 1910, which sometimes doubled as illicit gambling joints. But they are continuing a smoky tradition: stogies in Spokane.

Does anyone out there have any memories from Spokane's cigar-store past? I'd love to hear them.