Stranded at Rattlesnake Gulch: an auto trip toward Arbon, 1909
In May 1909 four men drove out of American Falls to view a proposed road to Arbon, and when the car broke down at Rattlesnake gulch they walked back through the night.
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Community blog · 2010–2020 · original publication order · stories from the old papers added since 2026
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The Washington people's three-day picnic in Bull Canyon, 1916
Settlers from Dayton and other Washington towns came to Arbon Valley from 1909; in June 1916 they held a three-day picnic in Bull Canyon and invited everyone.
The Jenks family's years at Pauline, 1909–1923
Obituaries printed decades later and short items in the papers of the day trace the Jenks family from Weston to Pauline, at the valley's north end, and away again.
Pauline's beginnings and Bishop Kowallis's Meadow Ward, 1910–1918
How Pauline got its store, school and post office, and how its Meadow Ward fared under its first bishop, Wilhelm F. Kowallis, from 1911 to his farewell in 1918.
Cy Smith and Frank Turner, Homestead Partners from 1910
Paul A. "Cy" Smith homesteaded with Frank Turner in Arbon Valley from 1910; valley news, school notes, the census and their 1953 obituaries follow the two men for four decades.
Mrs. Jennie Price of Arbon runs for county treasurer, 1910
In 1910 Mrs. Jennie Price of Arbon won the Republican nomination for Oneida County treasurer, in a race where every candidate for the office was a woman.
Settlers Taking Arbon Valley: the newcomers of 1910
In 1910 the American Falls Press reported that newcomers outnumbered Arbon Valley's old settlers two to one and estimated a wheat crop double that of two years before.
Nine threshers behind forty headers: Arbon's harvest of 1911
The American Falls Press followed Arbon Valley's 1911 grain harvest from the July estimates and the steam threshers to the wagon trains hauling wheat to the railroad.
District 46 and the building of Arbon's Central school, 1911–1913
In 1911 the lower Arbon valley was to vote on joining its school districts and building on Tom Evans' place; by 1913 the Central school stood on Evans land as school and meeting hall.
Mattie Nunnelley and Herman Noth elope on train No. 6
In 1911 an Arbon homesteader's daughter slipped away on train No. 6 with the brother of an American Falls doctor; the Press later followed the couple to a ranch at Arbon.
When the Bannock Creek lands were allotted, 1911–1922
As the Fort Hall lands on lower Bannock Creek were allotted, a new road was built to Michaud, Pauline farmers leased allotments, and by 1922 inherited allotments were for sale.
Pierce and Ella Hardman, fifty years on an Arbon Valley homestead
From 1911 the papers followed Pierce Hardman of Mendon to his Arbon Valley homestead, which he and his wife Ella farmed for half a century, later wintering in North Logan.
The Orisons of Summit: a family between Arbon and Logan
Charles and Jean Ann Orison came from Cache Valley to a homestead at Summit, and for eighty years the papers followed their family between Arbon Valley and Logan.
The Humphreys of Crystal, and the sons who left the dry farm
Horace and Roy Humphrey farmed at Arbon and Crystal from the 1910s, and Horace's Arbon-born sons later worked as far away as Barrow, Alaska, and Promontory, Utah.
The Flood of January 1911 and the Bannock Creek Bridges
A January rainstorm in 1911 drowned three Arbon children and took the bridges on Bannock Creek; that spring Oneida County put new bridges to a bond vote.
Around Bannock Peak in a day: an auto trip through Arbon, 1911
On July 16, 1911, four American Falls men drove 127 miles around Bannock Peak in a day, calling on Arbon's pioneers and taking pictures along the way.
A road over Moonshine: the short cut to American Falls, 1911–1912
In 1911 the county surveyed a road from American Falls over the Moonshine divide to Arbon; in 1912 town cash and valley labor built a short cut, probably on that line, for the wheat wagons.
Talk of a townsite: the makings of a village at Arbon, 1911
In 1911 the Arbon columns reported a hotel, a store, a dance hall, a village blacksmith and butcher, and talk of opening a townsite in the valley.
D. J. Bowen's later years, from Arbon bishop to ward teacher at 92
From a 1912 marriage to Maggie Young of Perry to a 1954 photograph at 92, the papers follow D. J. Bowen of Arbon through his later years as bishop, widower and ward teacher.
American Falls and Pocatello court the Arbon wheat trade, 1912
In 1912 a new road brought American Falls businessmen into Arbon Valley, Pocatello's paper sounded the alarm, and an Arbon farmer asked Pocatello for a Trail Creek road.
A minister's portrait of Bannock Valley in 1913
In 1913 a Congregational minister sent a hill of wheat and a report from Arbon on the valley's crops, land and people while starting its first two Protestant churches.
The Farmers' Society of Equity and an elevator for Arbon
Arbon Valley dry farmers joined the Farmers' Society of Equity in 1913, and from 1914 to 1917 the cooperative planned a grain elevator for the valley that the papers never report as built.
Four Nunnelley sisters, nurses from Summit, 1913–1920
Four daughters of W. A. Nunnelley of Summit became nurses; the papers followed them through a Navy enlistment, the 1918–19 influenza and a diploma at Logan in 1920.
Joseph and Louise Benson and the Summit Ward, 1913–1929
Joseph Benson led the Latter-day Saints at the Summit end of Arbon Valley from 1913 to 1924; his wife Louise, her obituary says, kept the ward's records and led its Primary.
The Kings of North Logan and their Arbon dry farm, 1913–1932
For nearly twenty years the Logan papers followed Jack King of North Logan to his Arbon dry farm and home again, through a dry 1931, a hopeful 1932 and the death of his wife Ruby that August.
Gwen and Lucille Hardman's Arbon ranch, 1913–1941
Gwen and Lucille Hardman of Mendon married in 1913 and homesteaded a dry farm at Arbon; after Gwen died in 1937, Lucille and their son Russell kept up the summers on the ranch.
Arbon Valley's Sunday school children and Cora Sorensen, 1913–1946
Valley children wrote for the Sunday School's magazine from 1913 to 1928, while Cora Sorensen of the Summit end taught the youngest Sunday school class for thirty-three years.
The Lusk brothers and the Bailey sisters of Pauline
Brothers Dave and Park Lusk of Pauline married sisters Anna and Erma Bailey of Arbon; the papers followed them through the First World War, Erma's death in 1922 and the obituaries of 1952–1960.
Walter Fredrich's Bull Canyon homestead and the teacher he married
Walter Fredrich claimed land at the top of Bull Canyon in 1913 and married the Arbon teacher Rachel Fryer in 1918; the ranch he began became an Idaho Century Ranch in 2020.
Christmas 1913 at Arbon's Central school: a tree for 125 children
On Christmas Eve 1913 Santa Claus brought presents, candy, nuts and oranges to 125 children at Arbon's Central school, and dances and sleighing parties filled the holiday week.