Salem in 1934

World Events

• Hitler becomes National Socialist (NAZI) Fuhrer in Germany, meets with Mussolini, dictator of Italy.
• The Long March of the Communist Liberation Army in China marshals a force, in retreat, to combat the government of Chiang Kai Shek that had machine-gunned Communist members and broken up labor unions.
• The U.S. control of Haitian mixed-race culture ends after 19 years as a part of Roosevelt's "Good Neighbor Policy".
• The International Telecommunication Union is established to co-ordinate  technical standards of global communication. 
• Dionne Quintuplets born in Canada, the first to survive, become a worldwide entertainment attraction.
• John Dillinger and his gang rob banks. Outlaws Bonnie and Clyde are ambushed and killed by police in Louisiana. ("Bonnie and Clyde" film, 1967)
• Academy Award: "It Happened One Night". Pulitzer Prize: Lamb in His Bosom, Carolina Miller. 

 From the collection of Carole Smith

In Salem
Households during the Depression had to learn to "Make do, make over, or do without". A local effort is glimpsed in this photograph. In the extreme right can be seen the corner of a frame building. It is Marion County Housing Authority Demonstration House. Originally located at Union and Liberty Streets, the modest 1860 William Beckett house was chosen as a demonstration project to promote the new Federal Housing Authority across the nation. Moved to the Marion County Courthouse lawn, and facing Court Street, it was remodeled to demonstrate how older homes could be modernized. Residents were encouraged to come inside and learn from the renovations underway. Architect Clarence Smith redesigned it in the Colonial Revival style; eight unions provided the plumbing, electrical, carpentry and other labor. When completed in 1935, the house sold for $1,295 and was relocated by the owner.

When you visit
The former Demonstration House was placed on the National Register in 1988. Today it can be seen at 140 Wilson Street in the SCAN neighborhood.
The photograph above recalls a two-block section of High Street that once was the center of municipal activity. At the left are the Odd Fellows Lodge, the Grand Theater and Hotel Annex. The theater and hotel buildings are still there and, after a period of declining use, have been refurbished and renovated for new commercial purposes. (Although the central tower is gone, victim of high winds.) The low, white building to the right is the Bligh Building, still Olson's Florist as it was then. The Old City Hall, demolished in 1971, can be seen in the background of the photograph. The Senator Hotel, rising behind the house on the courthouse lawn, has also been demolished and that site now houses the Courthouse Square transit terminal. On the lawn itself is the 1924 Doughboy statue, now located at the memorial park of the Oregon Department of Veteran Affairs on Summer Street. The Victorian Courthouse, out of the photograph to the right, is also gone. It was demolished in 1952 and the modern building currently in use replaced it.

Other Events

• In 1938, Harry Read and a group of West Salem residents founded Salem Electric. A franchise was eventually obtained from the City of West Salem, Oregon for the distribution of electricity within its boundaries. IN 1934, Harry Read goes into the radio business with local station KSLM.
• The centennial of Jason Lee's arrival in Salem is celebrated at the state fair with a caravan re-enacting his journey westward. The wagon train left Boston in April and arrived in Salem in time for the fair.
• On April 15, the newspaper reported that Reuben P. Boise,74 , a native of Salem and prominent journalist and businessman, died as the result of an accidental discharge of a shotgun he was carrying during a hunting expedition in Polk County. He was the son of Judge Reuben Boise (1818-1907) and husband of Minnie Louise Breyman, daughter of local merchant and real estate investor, Eugene Breyman (1834-1903). The newspaper reported, "The tragedy occurred at his ranch, known as Ellendale, west of Dallas. With his son, Breyman, and A. McFettridge, who had recently leased the farm, Mr. Boise was walking along a rough road used years ago as a means of getting out logs. He stumbled into a hole along the road. The shotgun, an automatic without the safety attachment set, went off...A week ago, when the Boises were looking over the place, they saw a red fox. Hoping to get him and some greydiggers, they took their guns on their inspection trip Sunday."(See profiles of the ladies of this family.)

Salem's small hospital staff in 1934

• The staff of the Deaconess Hospital, (now the Salem Hospital) about forty employees, line up for a photograph.
• Movies are the popular entertainment of the Depression years. With admission only a dime, the State Theater is where you want to go on a Saturday night date.
• A Colonial Revival style house at 787 Cross Street is built this year for Custer Ross, a prominent attorney. Designed by Clarence L. Smith, the result was collaboration between the architect and the landscape firm of Lord and Schryver, although the gardens contain no elaborate design. It was the home of Wayne and Shirley Hadley from 1950-2000. It a contributing property in the Gaiety Hill/Bush's Pasture Park Historic District and is featured in that SHINE Walking Tour.

Daniel Fry, Jr. residence

• A home for the second generation of the Daniel Fry family is built at 565 Leffelle Street. This brick Georgian house was built for Daniel Jr. and Rita Fry. He was a pharmacist in Salem, the son of Daniel Fry who established the business. Jamison Parker of Portland designed the house. It is a Local Landmark in the SCAN neighborhood.

Salem in 1908

World Events

• Japanese emigration to U.S. is forbidden under terms of the "Gentlemen's Agreement" by administration officials of Japan and United States, easing the fear that a legal treaty against Japanese might cause hostilities
• Sentiment against Chinese labor in America grows as part of the fear that cheap Asian labor was taking America jobs.
• Young Turk Committee of Union and Progress issues ultimatum to Sultan Hamid II to restore the Ottoman Constitution of 1876: it is done the next day.
• Tunguska Event (or Russian Explosion) in Siberia is believed to be caused by air burst of meteorite or comet 3 miles above the earth surface.
• Grand Canyon National Monument was established due to Roosevelt's enthusiasm for preserving America's natural assets.
• Henry Ford introduces the Model T, the first affordable automobile.
• Related inventions: Fountain pens become popular after Walter Schaffer patents a vacuum ink filler. The Hoover Company acquires manufacturing rights to an upright portable vacuum cleaner.
• New Books: The Circular Staircase, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame and Room with a View, E.M. Forster.

In Salem
The Oregon Electric Railway runs between Portland and Salem with a terminus at the Hubbard Building on the corner of High and State Streets (as seen above) in the hub of our city. A block to the north is the City Hall. The Grand Hotel, the Grand Theater and the Marion County Courthouse are just steps away. One block to the east is the First Methodist Church and the Post Office. Beyond that are Willson Park, the State House and Willamette University. Truly, this is the center of the city. There are 35 daily trips, each taking an hour and a half and costing twenty-five cents.

When you visit
The building remains, painted a light color. The Grand Hotel Annex and Theater are still there. Gone are the City Hall, the classic Courthouse, the Post Office and the State House of those years. The trains and even the rails are also gone: victims of the Depression years and the growing convenience of the automobile. The trains stopped running in 1935 and the rails were gradually removed. In 1972, the final Trade Street rails were dug out for the new Civic Center and improvements to Willamette University campus.

Other events

• Local boy, A. C. Gilbert, wins an Olympic Gold medal. He qualified for the 1908 Olympics in London, but his victory there was disappointing. After a controversy with the judges about his use of a pole of his own invention, he used the same pole as his rival, E. T. Cooke - and still won. However, the judges ruled that Cooke had reached the same height in the preliminaries, and that the two should share the medal. Cooke graciously let Gilbert have the medal which was presented to him by Queen Alexandria of England.

The Chinese float in the annual Cherry City Parade

• The local Chinese community, active in Salem life, enter a float in the annual Cherry Festival Parade.
• Eaton Hall is built on the Willamette University Campus. This classroom building was built with a $50,000 grant from Mr. A.E. Eaton, the owner of Union Woolen Mills.

The Gottlob and Wilhelmina Pade House

• On 15th Street, the Pade House is built by Gottlob and Wilhelmena Pade, recent immigrants. This was also home for their son, Bernhardt, a partner in Simon and Pade grocery store. He operated Pade’s Market until retirement 1965. After his death in 1975, his widow, Leona, lived here until 1985. She was well known for her garden of rare plants. This Local Landmark is also in the NEN neighborhood.

Walter and Grace Gerth House in West Salem

• Another 1908 house to become a Local Landmark is the Gerth House. Walter and Grace Gerth operated their Edgewater Street store for 35 years, from 1911 to 1946. During this time he served several terms as mayor of West Salem, built the first two-story commercial building in West Salem, started the first grocery delivery and loaned the city money to pay its bills.
• An ornamental concrete block house is built at 1724 Chemeketa Street using Sears Modern Home Plan #52. This year the Sears catalog had 8 pages advertising machines that could stamp out blocks that were "cheap, quick and practical" building materials. This house was probably built by C. B. Stone, who had purchased the lot in 1907 and was listed in the City Directory of 1909-10 as a "cement worker" with a next-door address as his residence. See it in the Court-Chemeketa Walking Tour.
• The Oregon State Institution for the Feeble Minded opens in December. Renamed as Fairview Training Center, it continued as a Salem institution until its closing in 2000. A 1920s photograph shows the LeBreton Cottage (the 1908 administration building), the 1919 Hoff Cottage and the 1910 Chamberlain Cottage. All were, despite their names, sizable buildings resembling hospitals.

From the Capitol Journal:

• Spectators pronounced the fistfight witnessed on State Street in front of the Spa as "one of the finest". Even the street car stopped to allow combatants, who were slugging it out in the mud along the tracks, to continue their battle.
• W. B. Gibson, who had operated a barber shop at 147 Commercial Street for the past three years, moved to a larger and more elegant quarters at 364 State Street. His new shop would be one of the largest outside Portland with 11 chairs, two suites of bathrooms and club and card rooms in the basement.
• This newspaper advertized for a carrier boy on a route that required he own and ride a pony.

(See Ben Maxwell's Salem, Oregon, edited by Scott McArthur, 2006)

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