100 years ago in Spokane: Some 65% of Hillyard residents supported annexation, and the city’s streetcar merger was not proving profitable

An informal survey showed that 65% of Hillyard residents would vote for annexation to Spokane.

A group of Hillyard businessmen came to this conclusion after they surveyed Hillyard’s business and industrial leaders. Most of them saw “annexation as the only step to ensure stable conditions.”

As things stood, Hillyard’s civic station was anything but stable.

Because of hostility between Hillyard’s new mayor and the city council, the “internal affairs of the municipality is fairly seething,” and “many governmental functions practically suspended.”

“The sooner we go in with Spokane, the better off we’ll be,” said Phil D. Burton, a jeweler. “We’ll always have these fights because of the presence of a politically pugnacious class of voters.”

A hardware dealer said that “people are disgusted with living in the uproar.”

Others said annexation was the only way to solve a more pressing practical problem: Hillyard’s sewage situation.

From the streetcar beat: The downward spiral of Spokane’s streetcar system continued, with yet another dispiriting monthly financial report.

The July books for the Spokane United Railways showed a loss of $16,719. This was partially offset by a healthy profit from Natatorium Park, yet the numbers showed that the streetcar system itself continued to lose money at an alarming pace.

The numbers also indicated that consolidating Spokane’s two competing streetcar systems a year earlier had not been enough to solve the larger problems. Put simply, more people were driving autos.

The only bright spot was that the July deficit was lower than any month since consolidation – but only because of the strong Natatorium showing.