History’s byway

SANDPOINT – Just under the sand where beachgoers frolicked and barbecued for years at the Lakeside Inn, a treasure trove of Sandpoint history lay undisturbed. From the dirt, just below the organic layers of decaying cottonwood leaves, archaeologists

spent the summer extracting thousands of artifacts that will help historians piece together the story of the Chinese who helped build the railroads and the prostitutes popular with the men working the nearby Humbird lumber mill. The rich soil on the shore of Sand Creek also holds keys to the American Indians who used the area as a superhighway connecting various tribes to hunting grounds.

“It’s totally amazing how much is coming out of this,” said primary investigator Jim Bard. He held open a plastic tarp protecting a large exposed area of soil that had sheltered shards of porcelain pottery, opium tins, coins and bone-handled toothbrushes for more than a century.

“And it was just under people’s feet,” he said.

The dig is focused in various spots over a several mile stretch along the east shore of Sand Creek, the water that flows south past downtown and into Lake Pend Oreille.

These areas are the focal point of the cultural resources review that is required by federal law as part of the Sand Creek Byway project that will eventually reroute traffic on U.S. Highway 95 away from downtown Sandpoint. The highway department is working in agreement with the Federal Highway Administration, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the Idaho State Historical Preservation Office and the Kalispel and Kootenai tribes.

Sandpoint was initially established on the thin slice of land, squeezed between the east side of the creek and the lake.

The town, as it’s known today, relocated around 1898 to the west side of Sand Creek – which was only a trickle except during spring floods. What remained on the east side, in the area near the City Beach, Edgewater Resort and the new Seasons at Sandpoint condos, was the “restricted district,” where the Chinese and the prostitutes lived among saloons, dance halls, gambling, opium dens and boarding houses for the Humbird mill workers.

The archaeology work began in May and is now finished for the season. Crews plan to return to complete the dig in April and then will compile a full report cataloguing every unearthed item of significance. The University of Idaho will curate the more than 100,000 items and then permanently lend many of them to the Bonner County Historical Museum, giving residents an unprecedented opportunity to view their history.

Museum Curator Ann Ferguson said archaeology digs happen frequently in Bonner County but are often small and go unnoticed. That’s not the case with the Sand Creek dig.

“This site is exceptional – it’s a town,” Ferguson said. “This project has really brought a spotlight on archaeology in our local community.”

In October, the Idaho Transportation Department had an open house at the Sandpoint Community Hall to display many of the artifacts. Hundreds of locals and school children came.

Historian Nancy Renk said it has revived interest in local history.

“It seems history always happens somewhere else and to someone else,” Renk said. “But really this is a part of our history, and it happened right here on the way to City Beach.”

Bob Weaver, the project’s other primary investigator, said it’s a pristine site because old Sandpoint was basically abandoned. That means the dirt was largely undisturbed. That’s why each layer of soil is a wealth of history, especially the area where the Lakeside Inn used to stand until it was bulldozed in 2004 to make way for the byway.

The area is where the Chinese, perhaps only a dozen according to Census data, lived and worked in laundries and restaurants. Many buttons – glass, metal, bone – found in the area are perhaps further evidence of the laundry businesses. Several feet below the Chinese relics is where the archaeologists have found American Indian artifacts, mostly rock flakes – chips of obsidian and basalt used to make tools and knives.

Weaver said to their surprise they haven’t found as many Indian relics as expected. Perhaps that’s because the tribes just traveled through the drainage but camped in other areas, such as the confluences of rivers and around the shore of the lake.

Most of what the crews are finding is garbage, thrown down the banks of Sand Creek, in the days before curbside pickup and waste management.

“Their garbage is our treasure,” Weaver said, rubbing his thumb across the corroded gears of a pocket watch.

None of the items found have been extraordinary enough to stop the momentum of the controversial byway project, which has divided the eclectic resort town for nearly 60 years. Most everyone agrees that cattle trucks, log haulers and tractor trailers need a route other than the picturesque main street. It’s the location of the byway that’s at issue.

Opponents of highway and other public works projects often hope a cultural resources survey will stop or delay construction, Bard said. But it’s unlikely any surprises will come from the dirt. Crews using the historical record and artifacts already excavated know what is lurking in the soil. All construction crews are likely to find is more of the same: bottles, dishes and remnants from daily life more than a century ago.

When construction actually begins it’s possible that the team will keep an archaeological monitor on site, just in case something unusual is dug up, Bard said.

Liz Sedler of the North Idaho Community Action Network, which opposed the byway route that would disturb Sand Creek, doesn’t see the dig as a deterrent.

“There’s nothing at this point that they would find that would delay the project,” she said.

The greater obstacle for ITD is getting the permits from the corps and the state Department of Lands to dredge and fill portions of the creek. The agencies are having a public hearing on the request Monday.

There was a glimmer of hope for byway opponents when the archaeologists unearthed four skeletons and assorted other human bones. But those were attributed to the former city cemetery that was relocated to make way for the mill expansion. It’s likely those bodies, including one that still had on leather boots, belonged to unmarked graves and were overlooked in the move.

Weaver said it’s unlikely any of the skeletons were Indian.

Some items found are more of a mystery, such as the numerous bottles of black hair dye and small poison vials with cork tops.

Weaver said it’s a question for historians if mill workers were vain enough to use hair dye. As for the poison, archaeologists still must determine what kind of toxic liquid the jars contained.

Bard’s theory is it was rat poison to help control rodents in garbage heaps.

Renk wonders if it wasn’t carbolic acid perhaps used by prostitutes to commit suicide. She refers to a newspaper clipping that details a prostitute named Josie Ellison committing suicide in May 1908 by drinking carbolic acid. “It was a difficult life,” she said. “Not like the romantic Dolly Parton movies.”

She added that the women were shunned by the rest of town and were restricted to the east side of the creek.

Renk said the archaeology supplements the written and oral record. “The artifacts show the day-to-day life,” she said. “They give you information you can’t get from the written records.”