Mom and Daddy went through the Great Depression while living at the ranch in Paradise Valley, and they would tell me stories of the hardships of the depression. They had a milk cow, and would carry the milk down an old back road (no longer used) that went into the town of Bonners Ferry, and came out near where the old Southside School was at. They would either sell or trade the milk for other items that people were selling and they needed.
I remember they said that many days the only shared a little bit of bread between them for the day's food.
Both of my folks were excellent shots with a rifle, and hunted deer for meat, and shared it with other families who had none. They were considered such good hunters that the Game Warden would give them extra bullets to bring home deer for other hungry families in the area.
When I was almost three, my folks moved to Sandpoint because my dad worked for Northern Lights, Inc., and he was one of the very first linemen for the newly formed Rural Electrical Co-op. Our REA was one of the very first ones in northern Idaho, and Mom and Daddy had both worked together getting the rural farmers signed up for electric power.
My family owned a little grocery store, The Ella Avenue Grocery, and together with Bill Bailey (who was like a grandfather to me), they provided the people in the area with a convenient place to shop, for many years. We lived next door to the store, and the Baileys lived next door to us.
I attended schools in Sandpoint, belonged to the Bonner County Horseman's Association, and rode in the mounted Drill Team; and enjoyed trailriding , swimming, and fishing in the summer.
All in all, you could not ask for a much better childhood, and a nicer place to grow up at than Sandpoint.
This is my dad and I in the driveway of the old ranch at Paradise Valley.
Perspective is an interesting thing. I remember talking with Grandpa Smith about the old school building that is near the Kootenai River Inn. I call it the Old High School. Grandpa thought of the South Side School as the old high school. My children think of what is now the Bonners Ferry Middle School when they hear the term old high school. My youngest son goes to school in what I think of as the New High School, a building that he thinks of as simply the high school.
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