It is difficult to keep a productive person, such as Gordon Ebbert, out of the newspaper. There he was in the news last week and earlier this week and on April 21, 1950, too.

E-mail from Cheryl

Facts from the past gleaned from the Moses Lake Herald, Columbia Basin Herald and The Neppel Record by Cheryl (Driggs) Elkins:

From the Columbia Basin Herald on April 21, 1950:

CAP drill contest postponed

The state Civil Air Patrol competitive marching drill has been postponed until April 30, 1st Lt. Gordon Ebbert, local commander, announced this week.

Scheduled for last Sunday, the delay came when Air Force planes scheduled for state-wide ferry service for the competitors were unavailable for duty. Finals in the drill competition will be held at Hamilton Air Force Base in California in May, as scheduled, he said.

Wilson Creek area history

The Rev. David H. Crawford compiled and published a history of families in and surrounding Wilson Creek titled, "Family Memories of Wilson Creek Area." The book was printed in 1978, which was the 75th anniversary of the town. David's son, John Crawford, has given permission for those memories to be a part of this column.

Today we begin the story of Donald Kennedy McDonald, by Donald A. MacDonald:

McDonald next turned his attention to the Wilson Creek area, where he reversed the process, this time draining swampy land and making it suitable for farming. The land was Crab Lake, part of which his three brothers, Simon, J.H. and Hugh were associated with him.

Dennis note: So where is...or, rather, was Crab Lake?

In May, 1928, one month before his 67th. birthday, Donald McDonald was inspecting the dykes, part of the Bonners Ferry Reclamation Project, when his car left the road and plunged into the Kootenai River. He was drowned in 20 feet of water.

D. K. McDonald had two ranches at Wilson Creek, one near town was the Early Dawn Dairy, which was Aunt Maud's project. This was called the Lower Ranch and is where the stone barns are with the big letters "Early Dawn Dairy" painted on the roof. Uncle Henry's (J .H.) lived there for a year or so when they first moved to Wilson Creek from Cheney. Then they bought and moved to the "Upper Ranch," about three miles east. This is where Cris and Clara Mordhorst lived.

P.E. Seelye and his wife, Irene, Aunt Maud's brother, managed the "Early Dawn Dairy" for awhile. The milk was put on the train each morning and then delivered to 220 E. Mission where it was bottled and deliveries were made from there. Harold G. Anderson found a barrel of old bottle caps bearing the name "Early Dawn" in the defunct dairy building located on Mission Avenue and used this name for the dairy he started in 1921.

Grant County history

The Grant County Historical Society has compiled several volumes of Grant County history. The books are available for purchase at the Historical Society Museum gift shop in Ephrata.

I bought the series in 2009 and secured permission to relay some of the history through this column. Memories of Grant County, compiled from taped interviews by the Grant County Historical Society.

Today we backtrack a bit and then continue the story of Coulee City by Verne Adams, recorded March 8, 1977:

The wheat was hauled in there by horses and teams from the Del Rio country and the Grand Coulee country for forty miles. So you can imagine how many horses were tied around there when they just came in one day and went back the next, staying all night. That's where the business came from. It wasn't from Coulee people. But there would be 1,000 horses tied around there at the feed racks at times.

Clyde Gilbert ran a livery barn. I wondered how many people would know what a livery barn was, but in looking around here I think most eyery body does. He had teams for hire and he was a special friend of mine, too, and we got along real good.

I was just a kid and broke most of his colts to ride for him. I don't mean I was a bronco rider, but we didn't let them buck in those days. He'd snub them and I'd ride them. We'd go out through the rocks aways.

At that time they were developing a big ranch down the Coulee by Lincoln Stock Farms and he said, "You'd just as well haul these men down."

There would be three or four men come in on the train at night to go down there to work and so he'd give me an old team, Bill and Barney , and a three-seated hack. I'd go down and have dinner with them and then come back at night. They would always be a man or two quitting and they'd come back . So that was quite a deal. Every night he'd give me a dollar. So I was making more money than any kid in town. But, Clyde Gilbert was really some fellow.

Adolph Young had a feed barn. He didn't have any horses for hire. So he thought he'd sell little whiskey on the side. So he got to bootlegging around there. People would go over there and get it, he wouldn't peddle it, but when people went over there he'd have it hidden in the mangers or somewhere.

One day a couple of Federals came in and asked him, "Aren't you afraid you'll get caught?"

He was an old German. He said, "Oh, no, I will never get caught. I'm too slick for 'em." So that ended his bootlegging days and I don't know what became of him from there on.

We had two shoe repair shops and three pool halls, and they all had a little gambling game going in them and two barber shops with two men in each one were busy all the time. So in those days there was really something going on. It is about all closed up there now.

The Standard Oil came in in 1915, delivering gas and oil with a team of horses. Dr. Gregg built a big dance hall and we used to have dances every Friday night and smokers and wrestling matches and an orchestra from Spokane and we really had a ball around there.

We had an auctioneer, W . L. Fox. Some of you people might have remembered him. Two garages later; John Tucker and a man by the name of Bill Gilley. I remember that John Tucker in his garage had the first radio I ever heard. Everytime there was anything doing, everybody filled that garage up to hear what was going on over that radio. That was quite a long while ago, too.

Down in the lake bottom where Banks Lake is now, there was a homesteader on every 160 acres. That's where the people, came from. Also up on the hill there were people all over the country, where now one farmer will have 40 homesteads up there.