Pauline's beginnings and Bishop Kowallis's Meadow Ward, 1910–1918

In March 1917 the American Falls Press printed a long history of Bannock Valley by Mrs. E. A. Logan, and one short section told how Pauline, at the valley's north end, had begun. The papers of those years fill in her account, above all the story of Pauline's Latter-day Saint congregation, the Meadow Ward, and its first bishop, Wilhelm F. Kowallis.

The lower end of the valley

Her section begins: "The settlement now known as Pauline comprises the lower end of the Bannock valley." Lower here means downstream: Bannock Creek runs north out of the valley, and the Pauline neighborhood lay along it, next to the Fort Hall Reservation. She wrote that John Noble had started a store there about 1911. For a time it was the partnership of Noble & Kowallis, until a notice dated at Pauline in November 1913 announced that Noble had bought out his partner (the first store at Pauline).

Her account of the first school reads:

In 1910 Mrs. George Butler taught a small number of pupils in a little log cabin on West Fork. The following year Mr. Perry Howell opened school in a small log cabin of Ed Pellum's, later moving in the L. D. S. church building which was completed for that purpose. His services were highly satisfactory.

L. B. Howell then taught at Pauline for four years. In 1913 School District No. 13 voted a bond for a two-room schoolhouse, built that year (the first schools at West Fork and Pauline).

On the post office her account and the records differ. She dated it to 1912, with John Noble as postmaster; the Post Office Department's records, summarized on this site, show Fanny E. Noble appointed on September 25, 1911 (the first post office at Pauline). By 1917, she added, it had moved to the home of a Kowallis "whose wife is postmistress." The records on this site name Hestella Kowallis as postmaster from 1914. She was very likely the Estella Abrams who, according to the 1949 obituary of the bishop's brother John Kowallis, had married him.

A ward called Meadow

Mrs. Logan wrote that a Latter-day Saint Sunday school was organized at Pauline in 1910 under J. H. Hansen, and that in 1912 a ward was formed with W. F. Kowallis as bishop, Charles Myler and W. W. Jenks as counselors and W. E. Dawson as clerk. A ward is a local congregation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, led by a bishop; a stake is a group of wards.

The papers of the time put the ward a year earlier. In March 1911 the Press's Arbon news reported: "The new meeting house at the north end of the valley will be completed this week and a big dance is being planned for Friday night." It was probably the Latter-day Saint building at Pauline, though the item does not say so. On June 28, 1911, the Salt Lake Herald-Republican reported a new ward in the Malad Stake, with Wilhelm Kowallis (printed "Kowalles") of Arbon, Oneida County, as bishop and William Dowson, probably W. E. Dawson, as clerk. Arbon was in Oneida County until Power County was created in 1913. The digitized page is badly scrambled, but the words "New Meadow" and "Ward" can be picked out of it.

His obituaries say Kowallis was born in Berlin, Germany, in 1884, came to the United States as a small boy, served a mission in Indiana and married Bertha J. Abrams there in 1907. His mother's name was Pauline, and church tradition, as this site records, holds that the place was named for her (the first ward at Pauline).

The bishop's years

In January 1914 the Logan Republican found Bishop Kowallis (spelled "Kawallis" in its headline) in Logan on farmers' business. Bannock Valley, he said, had raised 300,000 bushels of wheat that year, but without a railroad some farmers hauled their grain twenty-two miles to market. He named one more setback: "Another set back is a dearth of young ladies as many farmers' boys desire to be joined in wedlock."

In March 1915 the Press reported that the bishop had canvassed Arbon, Pauline and Crystal and had the names of the heads of 345 families (346 in the digitized text of the article) who wanted a mail route to American Falls; a route from Pocatello came the next year.

The meeting house served for more than Sunday meetings. In May 1915 it held the funeral of "Grandma" Horton, wife of Elias Horton (the first burials in the Pauline Cemetery). "The house was crowded with friends who came to pay their last respects," the Press reported. Later that month an entertainment was held there to raise money to fence the church grounds.

A new bishop

On April 9, 1918, the Pauline news column carried this notice:

Meadow ward at Pauline is to be reorganized next Sunday, April 14th. It is desired that all members of the ward be present as conference will also be held the same day.

Later that month the Arbon column reported a farewell party at Pauline for the former bishop and his family; the name is garbled in the digitized text but appears to be Kowallis. In June the Press noted that "Mr. Kowallis of Logan and formerly bishop of Pauline" had visited Crystal.

The 1918 items found for this post do not name the new bishop. By August 1919 a Bishop Howell came to the stake conference at American Falls "from the Meadow ward at Arbon." Later reports call him H. Perry Howell, almost certainly the teacher who had opened the Pauline school. That October the Pauline correspondent wrote of stake Relief Society visitors coming to "our little ward," and the next spring Bishop Howell sent in this report:

Due to the small number and rough weather, the members here are only attempting to hold the regular Sabbath sessions (Sunday school and Sacrament meetings.)

Work in all the organizations, the report added, would resume when there were more members and the weather improved. In May 1920 W. E. Dawson and Robert W. Heatley, as the digitized text reads (probably Robert Wheatley), were sustained as his counselors in place of Edward Pohl and Clarence Knowles, who had moved away. By March 1922 a Bishop Robert Wheatley led the ward, and at Erma Lusk's funeral Howell, by then living at Clifton, Idaho, spoke as a former bishop of Pauline.

Wilhelm Kowallis became a hardware and implement merchant in Logan and died there in June 1940; his Logan obituary recalled his years as bishop of the Meadow Ward. According to this site's history of Pauline and West Fork, the ward was dissolved in 1929 and its remaining members were transferred to the Arbon Ward.

The article as printed

American Falls Press, March 29, 1917, second edition, page 7. Transcribed from the page scan.

PAULINE.
The settlement now known as Pauline comprises the lower end of the Bannock valley. Six years ago John Noble erected a building and established a good merchandise business which has been of great assistance in the development of the valley.
In 1910 Mrs. George Butler taught a small number of pupils in a little log cabin on West Fork. The following year Mr. Perry Howell opened school in a small log cabin of Ed Pellum's, later moving in the L. D. S. church building which was completed for that purpose. His services were highly satisfactory. He also taught at the Central school when first completed. L. B. Howell was then engaged for the Pauline school and taught with success for four years.
In 1913 School District No. 13 voted a bond to build a two-room school house which was erected that year and a very efficient grade school has been maintained. Perry Howell and Miss Mary Evans are the present teachers.
In 1912 a post office was established and named Pauline. John Noble acted as post master. The post office was later moved to the residence of [illegible] Kowallis, whose wife is postmistress.
David Ripley and the Dawson brothers, also William A. Nunnelley have done their share in lumber business in making it possible for farmers of the community to erect many new buildings.
Albert C. Thomsen runs a blacksmith shop which has been a useful factor in the progress of the farming industry.
The L. D. S. Sunday school at Pauline was organized in 1910 with J. H. Hansen as superintendent, with John W. Lusk and John Bischoff as his assistants. In 1912 a ward organization of the L. D. S. church was formed with W. F. Kowallis as bishop, Charles Myler and W. W. Jenks, his counselors. W. E. Dawson, clerk. The Sunday school was reorganized at this time with J. D. Dawson as superintendent and F. E. Fredrickson and C. W. Knowles his assistants.