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JANE DANIELS’ ARCHIVES

William Ashton's Accident

Katie Lyon Looks at Ashton

Glenn Anderson remembers the hunting camp

William Ashton's Accident

Thanks to Bernetta Hanson, who took time to read the 1907 St. Anthony Teton Peak papers, we know how William Ashton had his accident. The Herald Chronicle’s 1957 special issue, celebrating Ashton's 50th birthday, gave a partial account of the event.
William Ashton was the Oregon Short Line Railroad’s chief engineer, and the town of Ashton bears his name. The railroad had reached Ashton in 1906, and was within 17 miles of Yellowstone Park. In many places, the line from St. Anthony north had required blasting rock to make a roadbed, and was time consuming and costly. However, the officials of the line were pleased because the beauty of the country would attract the tourists. William Ashton was among the railroad personnel who toured the route in June of 1907.
It was noted that interest in building a line to the Teton Basin would be explored by railroad officials when they visited the basin, which they did in July. Railroad officials and local businessmen were in the group. Traveling from Sugar City in a light buggy, Ashton was accompanied by Mr. Killpack, a Driggs businessman. A wheel slipped into a ditch at the side of the road. It broke and overturned the buggy, throwing Ashton headfirst to the ground. When others in the party reached the injured man, he was unconscious. He was taken to St. Anthony and put under medical care.
Dr. Wright of the Oregon Short Line at Pocatello suggested he be brought to Salt Lake as quickly as possible, and those in St. Anthony agreed. A special train was readied and left for Salt Lake at 10:40 that night. Engineer Chassee was at the throttle and made the 290-mile run in 7 hours and 10 minutes, averaging 41 miles per hour, a remarkable time for 1907.
After 18 hours of unconsciousness, Ashton began to recover and was able to talk with visitors.
Dr. Laudenberger concluded that his worst injury was the bruise at the side of the head. According to the July 22 Deseret News, Mr. Ashton would be able to return to the office within a week or 10 days.
The Salt Lake City Deseret News also reported that, due to the accident, plans for banquets at Driggs and Sugar City were cancelled, but the route for the branch into the Teton coalfields was carefully considered.
According to the Herald Chronicle special, William Ashton did recover but it took a long time, as might be expected from one suffering a severe head injury.



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Katie Lyon Looks at Ashton

Who has lived in the city of Ashton the longest? If you know someone you would like to see featured call 652-3222. Hopefully during the next few months several of the "youngsters" will share their stories. Today we start with Katie Murdoch Lyon.
Ashton was thriving when Katie Lyon moved here from Farnum in 1937. Four grocery stores existed on Main Street— when she was little, there were only three. Her brother, Howard, worked for Niels Knudsen. Later Glade's parents acquired the building and it housed Lyon's for 42 years. Paul Stone's grocery had good penny candy, but the two-cent kind was wonderful. Both Knudsen's and Paul Stone sold mostly groceries. Burrall and Stone's was on the corner by the Imperial Club and there were apartments upstairs. Before it burned, it housed a butcher shop, shoe shop, clothing, and groceries.
Three years ago, Rob and Sue Knudsen visited Ashton and met with Katie and Glade. They were surprised to realize that the Lyons had the store for so many years in the former Knudsen building. Katie recalled she had been hired by Mrs. Knudsen to do dishes at night but often got sidetracked playing with the children, the youngest being Rob. Glade showed Rob his father's desk, which had burns along the edge where Mr. Knudsen laid down lit cigarettes.
People shopped in Ashton, rarely going to St. Anthony. The stores stayed open on Saturday nights until 10 o'clock. People would come to town early so they could park their cars in a good place along Main Street to sit and watch the people.
Hunts was the clothing store. There were two drug stores, the Rexall and City Drug. Katie loved every minute she spent working at City Drug when she was in high school. Katie remembers one bank and is the proud owner, thanks to Glade, of the old bench that graced the interior until a new bank was built. A Mr. Lupton ran a hardware business where Stronks in now.
"Lup" Lupton and his wife Belle loved to disagree, and since one was Republican and the other Democrat, they had interesting political arguments. Belle was a musician and gave music lessons to practically everyone in town, including Katie and her brothers. Belle's daughter, Peggy, married Tom Egbert, a local boy, and they moved to Victor where they started the Playhouse. At close to 80, Peggy continues to play the piano for the Playhouse.
Many items were rationed during the war. Katie kept her families ration books: they had stamps for gas, meat, sugar, and many other products used daily. One of the town boys came home from the service and bought a can of pineapple at the grocery, not realizing he needed ration points. A man spoke up and gave his points to cover the pineapple.
To save gas, people drove 35 miles per hour. Katie's dad delivered milk and even though he knew he could petition for more gas for the milk truck, he made do with what he had. The day the war ended, everyone came to Main Street in town. Katie remembers the crying and laughing as people celebrated.
Glade and Katie have acquired some special places during their life. As a kid, Katie and friends would walk two miles from her house down a lane to the swimming pool north of Ashton. They would pay a dime, have a refreshing swim, and then walk home. The day some older kids came to skinny dip, Katie and friends quickly left for home. It never occurred to them to complain. Katie thought the pool was huge as a child, but years later when she and Glade bought the property, it seemed to have shrunk considerably. There is a hot pool which remains at 98 degrees, but the tomatoes they were going to grow there never got planted. Today the pool is filled with debris.
Another special place the family and friends enjoy is "The Point." It is two acres where Conant Creek and Fall River come together. After they owned it for 40 years, the sagebrush and chokecherry bushes have receded and about a third of the many planted trees have survived. Katie's father started the Conant Creek Canal and was the Bishop of the Farnum Ward. The original church completely disappeared except for the concrete slab that Dick Egbert hauled home with his tractor. When the Egberts sold and moved, Dick carted the slab to The Point. Katie feels her father would be happy that part of the church survived.
For the past 67 years, Katie has lived in the city of Ashton. Most residents realize she has been active in the P. T. A., American Legion Auxiliary, Chamber of Commerce, Flea Market, and any other cause where help has been needed. Katie is the creator of beautiful quilts. Much could be said about what she has shared with others through the years, but summed up Katie has shared her sunny disposition with all of us and we have benefited by being shown how to appreciate life.

Glenn Anderson remembers the hunting camp

Dan Reiman and Adolph Reickert were probably the first to hunt on Wyoming Creek where we later had our camp. I was a kid then. My brother and Claude Lee were good friends, but my brother was not able to hunt due to poor health. Claude and Dan were brothers-in-law and with myself started the camp. My friend, Gene Morrison, Vic and Glenn Phillips, and Gene Hemming were some of the others. Our camp was in existence between 25 and 30 years. Many years we had eight hunters in camp.
We bought a tent that was 26 feet long, 12 feet wide, had sides five feet tall so you could stand up in it, and we put a stove in each end. There were partitioned spaces about three and a half feet wide for each man's bedroll or sleeping bag. First we put straw down under the bedrolls for comfort. Each hunter had his own footlocker, which held the straw in place at his feet and gave him a place for his personal belongings. Discarded grain doors from railroad cars served as the head of our sleeping space.
Horses were needed to pack out the meat. We usually kept four or less in camp. A surplus teepee style tent was used for a horse barn. Poles were added and hay was hauled in to make mangers.
We could drive to the camp. Dan Reiman had a 4 x 4 surplus command car and we had Jeeps that could buck the snow.
Claude Lee, who owned a restaurant, found a big caf� grill powered by propane. A long table with benches on each side served as a dinner table A canvas cubicle was made to serve as an outhouse. When Glenn's cousin, Walt Greene, came from Arizona to hunt, he brought his wife, Lois, who liked to hunt as did Ruth. For the ladies convenience, Glenn and Walt purchased a special tent and furnished it with rollaway beds.
Each year we'd set up camp at the first of the hunting season which was usually in August. Someone had to stay at the camp to see that nothing was stolen. Often I was the one who stayed and my wife, Ruth, would take time off work to accompany me. We would hunt a little when the season first opened and then would do our serious hunting after the snow fell and the animals moved out of Yellowstone Park.
When there was a mild fall, Ruth and I would go over to Sheep Falls on Fall River, get our limit of fish, and then head for Cave Falls to catch our limit of five there. Besides our usual food, lots of fish were eaten at camp and meals cooked in big pots and Dutch ovens.
Evenings were spent playing poker or pinocle, or we'd sit around and talk. If the weather wasn't too bad, we'd have a campfire. When it got to ten below zero we would dress for the weather. I had wool shirts, a pair of plaid wool pants and a cap with ear flaps. The stoves kept the tent warm.
Some years we checked out the animals in the park by air. Those who used their planes included Jack Steinman for several years and Sherman Hess one year. Glenn was lucky to go along on several of the rides.
Glenn killed his first elk at 16 while hunting with his uncle. Glenn tells the following hunting story about one of his early years. Chet and Marie Smith lived in Ashton and both enjoyed hunting as did the Andersons. Chet and I went hunting on Wyoming Creek and ran into Dan Reiman and a party with horses already saddled. It was dark when we started walking up the snowy trail that went over the hill, past a lake and down into Winegar Creek. We could hear Dan's party coming on their horses and they quickly passed us. We decided to cut across country to where the elk came out of Winegar's Hole. We climbed a fairly steep hill and came out on the ridge and found three elk lying down. We each shot a cow, dressed them out and headed back to camp to figure out a way to get horses to bring our elk out.
In the meantime Dan's group went on the trail. Some elk had come out of Winegar Creek. The men rode down the ridge to where the elk had entered the timber. Dan tossed his reins to Claude Lee and told the group to wait for 15 minutes and then follow him. Several shots were heard as they waited. When they rode down and found elk, they thought Dan had shot them. They could have gone down the steep hill, but chose to drag the elk back by the trail. We met them at camp and thanked them for bringing our elk to us. Dan had not fired a shot and returned to camp while we were hanging out our elk. They didn't think wasting a day bringing in someone's elk was a bit funny, but over the years we've had a good laugh over the memory.
We had names for some of the trees. Adolph Reickert from Pocatello had Adolph's tree. He invariably got turned around and was lost. He would be put by Adolph's tree and told to stay there. That way everyone could find him. Glenn had Glenn's tree although he did not get lost.
Gene Morrison had a special tree with a special ending to his story. The Morrison's came from California and bought the Log Cabin Motel in Ashton. Gene helped Glenn with building and worked for the canal company in the spring.
To kill an elk was Gene's greatest desire. Gene was extremely nervous and had to be on the move. Out hunting he was like a bull moose chasing a rabbit. Not sure Gene could follow directions, Glenn told him to sit by a certain tree, not to smoke often and get the smell in the air, and keep his rifle ready. It was part of our hunt for someone to check the "point" early in the morning for tracks to see if elk had come out of the Park. Gene was to sit under his tree near the rocky crossing. Over several seasons, Gene was able to shoot three elk. The tree he sat beside was known as Gene's tree. After a day of sitting, he would come back to camp ready to explode.
When Gene Morrison died he was cremated. His daughter had instructions to scatter his ashes on Wyoming Creek where he shot his elk and Glenn could show her where, which he did.
When they were married, Ruth bought Glenn a hunting knife. Through the years Glenn added a notch on the knife for each elk he killed starting with the one at 16. The days of the hunting camp have passed, but Glenn can look at the 43 notches on his knife and recall all the wonderful memories.
Dan Reiman had passed away before the group divided up the camp. When the large tent was sold, Mrs. Reiman was remembered with Dan's portion of the proceeds. Glenn and Ruth have visited the old camp site many times and not one trace of the camp has survived.
Years of hunting have brought Glenn to the conclusion that to become a good elk hunter, it helps
to know what an elk is going to do before the elk does.


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