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108 South Howard, Moscow
517 East B Street, Moscow
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House Histories
When we tell the history of a house, we are actually telling the stories of the people who once found shelter within its four walls. Perceiving our local history through the window of a house history will likely reveal to us how strongly we are connected to those who came before us.
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| Glenn and Norma |
108 South Howard, Moscow
In the early 1970’s, Norma and Glenn Lewis hosted a party in the backyard of their home on Howard Street in Moscow. One of their guests, Harry Sampson, informed the Lewises that George and Jennie Creighton had once lived in the house next door, a house which Norma and Glenn had bought in the late 1960’s. In 1896, George Creighton opened “Creightons,” the dry goods store still in business today. Sampson had worked at Creightons as a high school student.
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| George Creighton |
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| Jennie Creighton |
Later, Norma paid a visit to Moscow Title Company and learned that George and Jennie Creighton had indeed owned the house at 108 South Howard, purchasing it in 1895 from its original owners, Caroline and William Watkins. As Norma says, she had “no idea” the house had once belonged to the Watkins, the grandparents of Carol Ryrie Brink. Recognized as an outstanding writer of both children’s literature and adult historical fiction, Brink drew inspiration for her stories from the people and events of her own life. The childhood of her grandmother, Caroline Woodhouse Watkins, was captured in Caddie Woodlawn, and the events surrounding the death of Carol’s grandfather, William Watkins, are fictionalized in her most well-known adult novel, Buffalo Coat.
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| Dr. W.W. Watkins |
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| Caroline Woodhouse Watkins |
Dr. Watkins was shot to death in August 1901 while returning to his medical office on Second Street in Moscow. The mentally ill William Steffen, a Moscow butcher, killed him. Fleeing to his family’s farm on the northwest corner of White and Mountain View, Steffen encountered none other than George Creighton. Unaware that Dr. Watkins had been murdered and perplexed by Steffen’s haste, Creighton hailed Steffen who responded by shooting George in the arm. Creighton was not seriously wounded but the same could not be said for Deputy Sheriff George Cool who Steffen fatally shot before his own death in a shoot-out with authorities at his mother’s house. It is disputed whether Steffen was killed by police in the exchange of gunfire or if he took his own life; the official cause of death, however, is a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
It is likely that George Creighton returned to the house at 108 South Howard after being shot by Steffen. Norma’s research shows that the Creightons owned the house from 1895 to 1911. Mrs. Creighton makes an appearance in Buffalo Coat as Mrs. Kessler, the hypochondriacal “wife of the proprietor of the Bon ton Store.” The Creightons sold the house to Chris C. Odenberg who, in turn, sold it to Louise A. Dittman in 1913. In August 1920, Bernard and Bessie Nielson purchased the house. Bernard Nielson, better known as “Cap” to hundreds of University of Idaho Military Band musicians, died in 1933 and Bessie in 1966.
This history was first published in the 2000 edition of Cornerstone, the newsletter of the Moscow Historic Preservation Commission and is reprinted here with its permission.
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