In the autumn of 1962 the ranchers of Arbon Valley, in Power County, Idaho, got ready for winter in a new way. Burglars and vandals had been working over the valley's empty ranch houses for several winters running, so that September the owners banded together as the Arbon Valley Property Protective Association, backing the new group with a $250 reward and with warning signs on the roads and trails that led in. The Idaho State Journal of Wednesday, September 26, 1962, told the story on page 14 with a photograph of the association's president, D. T. "Sod" Williams, on crutches, putting up one of the signs beneath the "Entering Power County" marker at the county line.
Empty houses in winter
The trouble came from the way the valley was lived in. As the Journal described it in 1962, the valley was thinly settled to begin with, and most of its families moved out to the towns around it for the cold months. Leaving for the winter was an old pattern in the valley: in the homestead years many Cache Valley homesteaders went home each fall to Mendon and other Cache Valley towns and came north again in spring. Once the snow came the valley was hard to reach, and the houses left behind stood empty for months.
Thefts from valley ranches were not new. In November 1950 the Journal reported that police had recovered four saddles, a bridle, a saddle blanket and several quilts, valued together at $600. Both ranches the paper named were at Crystal. Three of the saddles had gone missing from Henry DeValcour's place on the weekend of November 11, and the fourth was believed to have been taken from the Petersen ranch that same weekend. The goods turned up in a cellar near the 700 block of Jefferson, probably in Pocatello, since the recovery was announced by the chief of detectives, Guy Nelson. It was Power County's sheriff, W. J. Hoehnen, who brought one of the occupants and two companions in to American Falls for questioning. The headline spoke of an "Arbon Robbery", though both ranches were at Crystal. Whether anyone was charged has not been found.
In October 1954 twenty ranchers of the Arbon and Crystal valleys had organized under the Power County sheriff as the Arbon and Crystal Valley Vigilantes, meaning to patrol the valley in turns through the winter; their story is told in A Stolen Pickup, a Death and the Valley Vigilantes. Whether those patrols went out has not been found.
The association of 1962
Sod Williams, speaking to the Journal in 1962, said the losses were mounting year by year. Twelve homes had been hit in the winter of 1961–62 alone, and Williams was among the victims, out close to $1,200 for his stolen saddles and bridles. Another rancher came back in the spring to farm equipment worth thousands of dollars that someone had welded together.
The new association was the ranchers' answer. Its secretary was Claude J. Gibbons, who had grown up on a dairy farm at Logan, Utah. His obituary says that he and his wife Diane bought a dry farm at Arbon in 1962, and the article shows that by September of that year he was already in the valley and holding office. Jay Nuckles, the publicity chairman, appears with Williams in the photograph.
The plan relied on watching rather than on force. Through the winter a handful of ranchers were to keep their posts in the valley and log every incoming vehicle by plate and appearance, with the lists going to law enforcement in Bannock, Power and Oneida counties. Any later break-in or theft could then be checked against those logs to find out who had driven in. In the paper's view, raiders like these would have been chased down in the 1800s; the 1962 ranchers preferred to leave the job to the law.
Two years later the association was still at work. On November 25, 1964, the Journal reported that the Arbon Valley Protective Association, as the paper called it this time, had re-elected Williams as president. Albert Bush was vice president, and Claude Gibbons was still secretary. The directors were Louis Estep Jr., Vern Permann, Leland F. Bailey and a man printed only as "Myron", whose surname seems to have dropped out of the type. The $250 reward still stood.
The officers
Most of the officers can be placed with fair confidence. Sod Williams (1922–2001) ran a cattle and quarter-horse ranch at Arbon with his wife Nelda, of the Ward family; the papers followed them in the show ring and the arena. In 1965 Williams and Gibbons were in the drive that brought the valley its first dial telephones. Leland F. Bailey was very probably Leland Facer Bailey (1906–1995), the Arbon stock-raising homesteader of the Bailey family, whose son Gene was the subject of the 1954–55 search. "Louis Estep Jr." was probably Luther "Louie" Estep Jr. (1925–2004), who farmed at Arbon from 1947 to 1986 with his wife, Eileen Ward Estep. Vern Permann was probably the Vern Permann who married Lorita Bolingbroke of the Bolingbroke family in 1956. Albert Bush, Jay Nuckles and the director printed as Myron have not been identified.
The papers searched so far do not say whether the reward was ever paid, whether anyone was caught, or how long the association lasted.
On this site: the Arbon area and Crystal pages, and the valley's floods of March 1962, which cut the roads that spring.
The story as reported
Idaho State Journal, September 26, 1962, page 14. The original article is under copyright; this is our own report of what it said.
Arbon Valley ranchers whose houses stood empty and kept getting looted and wrecked over the winters had organized, and they were putting $250 on the line for anyone who helped catch the culprits, the Journal reported in September 1962.
Calling themselves the Arbon Valley Property Protective Association, they chose D. T. (Sod) Williams to lead the group and Claude J. Gibbons to keep its records as secretary. The money was meant for an informant: it would be paid once a tip led to someone being arrested and convicted for a break-in, a theft or vandalism on property the association covered.
The paper dated the break-ins and vandalism back several years, and said that repairing or replacing what was lost had taken a heavy toll on the ranchers in labor and cash alike. Sparsely peopled and shut off from Pocatello, to the north, by high mountains, the valley largely emptied out each winter as its residents moved to neighboring towns, which made the vacant ranches easy pickings.
Things had only been getting worse, Williams said. His count for the winter just past was twelve houses entered, and from them intruders had taken or ruined everything from bedding and saddles to television sets and pots and pans. Williams had been hit himself, losing saddles and bridles that he put at nearly $1,200. Worse still was the case of another rancher, who returned in the spring to discover that someone had welded together farm equipment worth thousands of dollars.
Warning signs were going up wherever a road or trail crossed into the valley, the high-pass routes among them, and individual ranch homes were to get smaller signs of their own. Once snow closed in, Williams said, getting into the valley took real effort, and an outsider without legitimate business would have no call to make the trip.
Several ranchers were to winter in the valley and serve as lookouts, writing down the plate number and a description of every vehicle that drove in. Those notes would be handed to the law in Bannock, Power and Oneida counties, the three counties that touch the valley. If a ranch turned up damaged or robbed, investigators could work back from the notes to the vehicles' owners.
The writer contrasted this with frontier justice, when raids like these in the 1800s would have brought on a long chase; the 1962 ranchers, the article said, would do their part and let the law take it from there.
In the picture that ran with the story, Williams, using crutches, and publicity chairman Jay Nuckles were fastening a reward sign below the "Entering Power County" marker at the county line. A short item on page 1 pointed readers to the story.