When Susannah Smith Evans died in Pocatello on March 26, 1953, her obituary in the Salt Lake Tribune listed a long run of roles: early settler of Arbon Valley, storekeeper, postmistress, keeper of the first telephone office and Power County Republican chairman. The American Falls Press of her own day called her "Mrs. T. B. Evans". It recorded most of those roles, along with several the obituary left out.
A cabin open to travelers
She was born at Brigham City, Utah, a daughter of Samuel and Jane Ingraham Smith, and married Thomas B. Evans in the Endowment House in Salt Lake City. The couple lived at Ogden before moving to Arbon Valley, southwest of Pocatello. The obituary puts the move in 1900 and calls them "among the first settlers there". The Press's farm writer, who signed himself the Pilgrim, said 1899 in his 1917 profile of her husband. The valley, then called Bannock Valley, was part of Oneida County until Power County was formed in 1913.
The Pilgrim wrote that the family's first home was a dugout, followed by a cabin of sawed logs where they lived for sixteen years. For many years, he said, the Evans cabin was the only place in the valley where a traveler could get a meal and a bed. He went on:
During the political campaigns of the earlier days candidates of all parties were guests at the old cabin. For two years the Arbon postoffice was located in the cabin Mrs. Evans being the postmistress and for three years Mr. Evans conducted a general merchandise store in it. ... Indians from the reservation were steady customers at the store and they were friendly and easy to deal with.
"Indians from the reservation" means the Shoshone and Bannock people of the Fort Hall Reservation, which borders the valley. Mrs. E. A. Logan's history of the valley, printed in the Press in March 1917, appears to date the Evans store to 1902, though the year is blurred in the scan.
The Salt Lake Tribune of November 7, 1903, reported that Susannah Evans had been appointed postmaster at Arbon, in Oneida County, in place of James R. Bailey, who had resigned. The accounts differ on how long she served. Mrs. Logan said one year, the Pilgrim said two, and the obituary said she held the post "several different times". The site's first post office entry gives her one term in the appointment registers, from 1903 to 1906.
The Press recorded that their son Bert died on February 16, 1909, at twenty-two, after an illness of five days.
At the central
The valley's first telephone exchange, its "central", was put into the Evans log cabin about 1913. About two years later the central moved into the family's new frame house, just west of the Arbon post office, and a connection through the Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph company linked it to the outside. In April 1915 the Press reported the wedding of the Evanses' daughter Ruth to Jess Keeler, adding that "Mrs Keeler was formerly telephone operator here." By November 1917 the paper named Mrs. T. B. Evans as operator at the Arbon central of the Falls-Bannock Telephone company. The line had about 36 miles of wire and 35 local subscribers, and she had been in charge for the past four years. On election night in 1916 the central had drawn the biggest crowd it ever held, taking messages until three in the morning.
In the 1922–23 holiday season the stockholders and patrons of the telephone company gave her a surprise party at Central Hall. The Press explained why:
Mrs. Evans has been telephone operator of the company here since it was first installed in the valley, and been an efficient and kind capable central to the patrons and community at large and has always been at her post of duty in business, social, sickness, etc.
They gave her a pair of silver candlestick holders and candles. She "was completely surprised and gave the people a vote of thanks." The 1923 report and the 1915 wedding notice differ on who first worked the board; the site's first telephone operator entry sets the two side by side. The obituary credits her with 23 years at the telephone office. That figure does not quite match the Press's 1917 statement that she had been in charge of the central for four years, or the site's account that she ran the switchboard from December 1915 until 1940.
Beyond the switchboard
The Arbon Red Cross auxiliary was organized in August 1917 with fifteen members and chose Mrs. T. B. Evans as its chairman. On New Year's Eve that year the auxiliary gave a turkey supper, program and dance at the Central school under the direction of "our efficient president, Mrs. T. B. Evans." In October 1918 the chapter was called to meet at her home to reorganize. Earlier that year, in April 1918, the Power County commissioners named her registrar for the Arbon precinct, because a change in the law at the legislature's last session required every voter to register anew.
In April 1919 she was listed with D. B. Ripley for the Bannock district in the county's spring loan drive, with a quota of $4,000. She led the Red Cross roll call at Arbon in 1919 and again in 1921, and in December 1920 she had the tuberculosis Christmas seals for sale. Her obituary adds that she was active in the Church and had been "Power County Republican party chairman". No newspaper report found so far says when she held that post.
Later years
The Evanses moved to Pocatello in 1940, according to the Deseret News version of the obituary and the family history. T. B. Evans died there in April 1942. Susannah died early on Thursday, March 26, 1953, at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Don Jensen. Her survivors included three daughters: Mrs. Maude Affleck of Boise, Mrs. Ruth Murphy of Idaho Falls and Mrs. Connie Jensen of Pocatello. Mrs. Ruth Murphy was very probably the Ruth who had been Arbon's operator before her 1915 wedding. A 1964 obituary of Mike Albert Murphy records his marriage to Ruth Evans Keeler at Boise in 1929, and says he farmed in Arbon Valley after coming to Idaho that year.
The article as printed
American Falls Press, January 11, 1923, page 7. Transcribed from the page scan.
SURPRISE FOR MRS. EVANS ARBON TELEPHONE OPERATOR
Beautiful Candle Sticks and Candles Given as Present by Many Friends.
One of the main social events of the holiday season, was a surprise given to Mrs. T. B. Evans, of Arbon at Central Hall. The stockholders and patrons of the Falls-Bannock Telephone Co., were the host and hostesses, and Mrs. T. B. Evans, the honored guest. Mrs. Evans has been telephone operator of the company here since it was first installed in the valley, and has been an efficient and kind capable central to the patrons and community at large and has always been at her post of duty in business, soical, sickness, etc. For her very efficient work, the telephone company gave a surprise party in her honor at which time they presented her with a pair of silver candle stickholders and candle. Mrs. Evans was completely surprised and gave the people a vote of thanks. Games and various amusements were indulged in and followed by a delicious luncheon.
On this site: Thomas Bowen Evans & Susannah Smith, the first store, the first long-distance call and the Arbon area.
Sources
- Salt Lake Tribune, November 7, 1903, page 3
- American Falls Press, March 20, 1909, page 8
- American Falls Press, April 29, 1915, page 4
- American Falls Press, March 29, 1917, page 7
- American Falls Press, November 9, 1917, page 3
- American Falls Press, November 13, 1917, page 1
- American Falls Press, December 14, 1917, page 3
- American Falls Press, January 8, 1918, page 4
- American Falls Press, April 23, 1918, page 1
- American Falls Press, June 25, 1918, page 3
- American Falls Press, October 22, 1918, page 4
- American Falls Press, April 18, 1919, page 6
- American Falls Press, November 7, 1919, page 1
- American Falls Press, December 10, 1920, page 7
- American Falls Press, November 18, 1921, page 1
- American Falls Press, January 11, 1923, page 7
- Deseret News, March 26, 1953, page 22
- Salt Lake Tribune, March 27, 1953, page 46
- Salt Lake Tribune, March 24, 1964, page 25