Brenda Steunenberg Richards

A beautiful picture of my mother, Brenda Steunenberg Richards, taken by my sister Kris when mom was 80. I watched the video last night of our surprise 80th birthday party for her and laughed and cried. A great memory. She would have been 92 today but is now ageless.

Love and miss ya mama.

Other Blog Posts

Brenda Steunenberg Richards

A Note from Mom - May 1992

A look back-Happy Mother's Day

Mom and that's me under construction

Brenda's Footnote.com page (under construction)

Roy Steunenberg - 8/9/1946 - 8/21/2010

My Cousin Roy Steunenberg passed away quietly last night after a lengthy battle with melanoma. Roy and I had not seen each other in many years but remained in contact from time to time regarding our common family history. We both grew up in California and always reminisced about our wonderful grandparents, Julian and Francis Steunenberg, and our various holiday gatherings and family visits.

Above L to R: John (me), Cousin Roy and Cousin Ron Steunenberg circa 1966.

Roy was the son of my Uncle Cal Steunenberg. Uncle Cal passed away last year at the ripe old age of 96. Some how it seems unfair that I find myself writing so soon about the passing of Roy. He had just turned 64 on August 9th and I believe is the first of our generation of Cousins to pass away.

Roy would always talk about the great memories we have as kids and it is those fond recollections that help soften the blow of any death--and certainly one of such an untimely nature.
One thing Roy and I liked to do was eat--and he always raved about my mom's (Brenda Steunenberg Richards) holiday meals and especially her turkey gravy. We could pack it away pretty good prior to settling down for an afternoon of Thanksgiving Day football.

Below is a close-up of Roy on the right, me to the left and it looks like the stuffing bowl heading our way from Uncle Cal. You can see the focus of our attention!

I guess Roy is in a better place now and perhaps is enjoying, along with his dad/my Uncle Cal, some of my mom's turkey stuffing and gravy once again.

Roy is survived by his daughters Carri Steunenberg Carnahan, Sheri Steunenberg Beersman and wife Mary Steunenberg. We are not very well acquainted with that part of the family, but please accept our kind thoughts and condolences and take comfort in your memories.

Rest in peace Cuz.

Click on the pictures for enlarged views.

6/7/1904 - DYNAMITE OUTRAGE IN COLORADO OPENS REIGN OF TERROR

Click on the image to use my Footnote.com viewer to enlarge and read this news page.

6/9/1904 - More News Photographs of the Independence Depot.

These are a little bit different photos from what I have seen before. Refer to August 1st blog post "Unspeakable Crime Perpetuated at Independence Colo."

This newspaper article was found on my Fold3.com account. Click on the picture and be taken to the viewer where you can enlarge the photos and read the article.

Click here to check out all my footnote.com spotlights.

Latest early Idaho Songs of the Month have been posted for Idaho Songs Project from old Idaho songs guru Gary Eller (the songs & Gary are both old).

The early Idaho Songs of the Month postings for June, July, August and September are now on line. Just follow the Songs of the Month links from www.bonafidaho.com/idahosongs.htm. This time we are featuring songs based on the writing of Idaho's colorful Hannibal F. "Seven Devils" Johnson who mined, preached, politicked, wrote, and sold fire extinguishers (among other things) from the 1880s through early 1900s in the Seven Devils region of Hells Canyon. Two of his songs, "Seven Devils Song" and "Trip to Rapid River", are rendered by Gary Eller. Dale Fisk of Council came up with a lovely melody and arrangement for Johnson's poem "Grave of a Stranger". The fourth song in the new posting - "Gooding Sheep Song" - is a rant against the powerful business and political empire of Gov. Frank Gooding and his brothers, rendered nicely by John Larsen of Marsing.

A few "new" pre-1923 era songs also have been added to the early Idaho Songs Bibliography. Notable among the new entries is the very rare song "The Raging Plains" (1864) which contains some new and interesting historical tidbits.

In other news, as a member of the Idaho Humanities Council I am supporting with Idaho Songs programs each of the six sites around Idaho that are hosting the Smithsonian Traveling Exhibit "Journey Stories" which highlights stories of immigration to and migration around America. So far I've done programs at the Boundary County Historical Museum in Bonners Ferry and the National Oregon/California Trail Center in Montpelier. The other programs will be as follows:

Blaine County Historical Museum (Hailey) Sept. 7

Olde School Community Center (Fruitland) Oct. 27

Jerome Public Library (Jerome) Dec. 18 and Jan. 22 (2011)

Hayden Public Library (Hayden) Feb. 12 (2011)

You will not be disappointed by taking the effort to view this wonderful exhibit.

And finally, if you are in the Stanley area, I am doing a Speakers Bureau program at the museum in Stanley on Friday evening August 13th.

Regards - Gary Eller

Check out the website and if in any of the above areas, view the exhibits and catch Gary(aka Slim, the Banjo Man from Pickles Butte) live if you can. jr

"Unspeakable Crime Perpetrated at Independence, Col."

Click on the image below to utilize my footnote.com viewer and read the full article.



Some related blog posts:

Harry Orchard Blows-up the Independence Colorado Train Depot

Independence Depot Blown-Up June 6, 1904

True West Magazine: A CASE FOR MURDER

Gunfighters in Boise-D.C. Scott & Bob Meldrum

Other Links

Victor Heritage Society (see the old Victor Union Hall then & now).

My Footnote.com History Spotlights

The Testimony of Julian P. Steunenberg

As a follow-up to the previous short newspaper account of the testimony of my grandfather, Julian Steunenberg, here is the transcript of that portion of the trial. Click on the pages to enlarge for reading or go directly to the Haywood Trial Transcript, Volume I, page 70 (page number on the left lower corner of the transcript) at the University of Minnesota Law Library and use their viewer.



This is of course a very short sample of the Haywood trial transcript courtesy of the University Of Minnesota Law Library. You can view all 5,000 plus pages of the transcript at: Clarence Darrow - His Life, Legal Career & Legacy.

Visit this great website if you haven't already.

Other blog entries of interest:
Did the Steunenberg children favor commuting Orchard's sentence?

Julian Steunenberg riding in a carriage

Letters from Assassin Harry Orchard (to Julian)



One of many memorable walks with my grandpa Julian (circa 1954)

Steunenberg Son (my grandfather Julian) On Stand

Click on the picture below and be taken to my Footnote.com viewer to enlarge the article for easier reading.



A couple other links:
Julian Steunenberg Footnote Page (in development)

Frank to son Julian...a favorite personal letter

Similar New York Times Account of Julian's testimony

Check out more of my Footnote.com Spotlights

Clarence Darrow - His Life, Legal Career and Legacy

Darrow_Photo_Idaho_Daily_Statesman_5_14_1907

It had been quite a long time since I last visited the University of Minnesota Law Library online. I received a Google alert today about the Clarence Darrow Digital Collection. Wow, they have really updated and added a lot of material. A great collection of documents, court transcripts, photographs, etc. You have got to check it out. Click on the link below.

Clarence Darrow - His Life, Legal Career and Legacy

And of course don't miss within the above collection:
The Bill Haywood Trial

Lots and lots of resources and photographs. Should keep me busy for awhile.

The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America

Here is the complete text of the Declaration of Independence.
The original spelling and capitalization have been retained.

(Adopted by Congress on July 4, 1776)

The Unanimous Declaration
of the Thirteen United States of America

When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.

He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.

He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature.

He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states:

For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing taxes on us without our consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury:

For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses:

For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies:

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments:

For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends.

We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

--Source: The Pennsylvania Packet, July 8, 1776

More

The Unfinished Revolution

History is a Weapon - The Meaning of July 4th for the Negro

Great Grandson of Albert Horsley (aka Harry Orchard) Speaks Out

Over the years, I have had the pleasure of a couple of brief contacts with descendants of Albert Horsley, better known as Harry Orchard. Several years ago I learned of a great grandson of Orchard but was never able to establish direct contact. At times, there seems to be a reluctance to come forward, to make contact or to start a conversation. I can certainly appreciate if that is the case. As one of Orchard's ancestors once said to me (paraphrase of my recollection),"Albert was not the subject of conversation around the dinner table."

I am very pleased that Mr. Larry Taylor, a great grandson of Harry Orchard, has stepped forward and responded to the feedback page on the Idaho Public Television (IPTV) website for Assassination: Idaho"s Trial of the Century. Mr. Taylor's contribution to the historical record is an important one. Until now, views from descendants of Harry Orchard have generally been missing from the discussion of these tragic events that brought murder and misery to so many. I encourage Mr. Taylor, other descendants of Harry Orchard, or descendants of any of the many participants in this saga, to continue expressing your views and your opinions regarding this troublesome time in our history.

At a moment in time that I shall never forget, Bruce Reichert, of Idaho Public Television, stated at the premiere of Assassination: Idaho Trial of the Century, "John Richards has helped all of us realize how a murderous deed does not simply vanish. It can resonate for a century, its treachery touching many innocent souls."

I would now add that Larry Taylor has helped us realize it too.
Feedback Page: Assassination: Idaho's Trial of the Century

First Photograph Of Jury That Will Render Judgement On Haywood

This newspaper photograph is similar to other views of the jury we have seen before but is reportedly the first. A good view of each juror along with the names. Click on the photo to enlarge for viewing.

--Fort Wayne News, Fort Wayne, IN, June 10, 1907, page 1

"The most remarkable aspect of that dozen was their relative homogeneity. All were or had been farmers. Nine still tilled the land, while one was a real estate agent, one a building contractor, and one a foreman of fence construction. Eight were Republicans, three were Democrats, and one was a Prohibitionist. All but one were fifty years old; most were in their late fifties or their sixties. All wore beards, chin whiskers, or mustaches, or a luxuriant combination of the three."
--From Big Trouble by J. Anthony Lukas

To see a couple of more pictures of the jury and inside the Haywood courtroom, click here.

6/24/2010 - From Idaho Statesman.com

Click on the link below. Of course I stopped on the page regarding Frank Steunenberg and "Idaho's Trial of the Century" but be sure to check the rest.
New Idaho historical exhibits at the Capitol

1889 - Pinkerton Advertisement

"James McParland, Supt. Denver, COLO"

"Men specially adapted to work among Miners and in Mining Camps can be furnished; also men to Procure Evidence in Mining Suits."

Click image to enlarge and view unitizing my Footnote.com viewer.

The Martyr of Idaho

A familiar scene, the statue of Governor Frank Steunenberg across from the capitol building in Boise, Idaho. That is Frank W. Steunenberg, Jr., standing next to the statue of his father. My great uncle Frank was five years old at the time of the assassination, the youngest child of Frank and Eveline Belle Steunenberg. He died August 12, 1990. I am not sure of the date of this photo. Perhaps circa 1970? The photograph came from among my mother's belongings as it was not in the family photo albums.
Frank Jr. wrote a couple of books: Greater Love  was written in 1952. Frank Jr., in my interpretation, later indicated that the attention on Orchard, including parts of this book and Orchard's alleged redemption, and Frank's own visits to see Orchard in prison, became too much the focus of this story.
The Martyr of Idaho (text of the book not available online but click on the link or book cover to be taken to another blog post). Click again on the newspaper article to enlarge for reading. Martyr, written in 1974, placed the focus back on the Steunenberg family from our roots in Holland, to a future governor as a young boy in Iowa (see A Teenage Future Governor), to life in Idaho, the governorship and ending with the assassination.