Chapter 16

Having written briefly of Middle Valley and its pioneers. I will now endeavor to write up Mann Creek and its first settlers. As told before, John Saling and John Anderson having been snowed out of Middle Valley, went over the hill and became the first permanent settlers on the creek. Anderson did not remain long until he moved to Indian Valley where he lived the remainder of his days. Saling, Anderson, a man by the name of Elms and two others were the locators of the first ditch taken out of the creek and thereby secured for themselves and their successors in interest the first water right. The early settlers on the creek as I knew it, beginning at the upper end of the valley, were 0 Sunner, a man by the name of Johnson, T.C., M.T. Langley, A. Warner, John Saling, G.W. Adams, S.M. Taylor, Wm. Hartley, John and Giles Sater. Geo. Maxwell,  Dave Webb, L. Lansdon, A.F.Hitt, Ellett Murphy, V.D. Hannah, Tom Powell, W.C. Taylor, Wm. Gilderoy and Heinrich Ottman. Near the head of the valley and further hack from the creek than the others, E.M. Joslin, Dave Michaels and Dr. Giles Sater were later settlers, yet they came there many years ago. The Galloway ranch is now operated by Otto Cronwall, the Langley place by the Pedro family and the Warner ranch is now the property of J.A.Tarter estate. I believe the Saling and Adams places are in the main, owned by heirs of the families. Russ Jackson now has the Taylor and Hartley ranches but as to the present ownership of the others I am unable to say, as most of them have been divided up into smaller holdings. Hitt, Hannah and Lansdon were the largest landowners on the creek, each having a half section. It is rather a singular fact that as most of these early day settlers had large families, descendants of only two of them are now living in that valley; they are of the Saling and Adams families. The largest families on the creek were those of Galloway, Saling, John Sater, Lafayette, Lansdon and H. Ottman, in none of which were there less than eight children and those now living are scattered far and wide with the exceptions before mentioned.

Mrs. A.F. Hitt Remains

Only one of the old settlers on the creek is now living, and that is Mrs. A.F. Hitt, now of Portland, Oregon. Mrs. Hitt is a niece of the William Logan, who with his wife and brother-in-law were the first white people to settle in what is now Washington County. Her father and mother were also pioneer settlers on the Weiser River and also of Indian Valley. M.T. Langley was an ex-mule skinner on the Kelton road when he settled on the creek. When well along life's journey he married a Miss Jones, daughter of C.M. Jones, one of the Monroe Creek pioneers and a sister of Johnson Jones, janitor of the West Side school. He sold out his ranch many years ago and moved to California. A. Warner was a man who lived unto himself and his neighbors were perfectly willing to let him have his way in that regard. John Saling, before mentioned as one of  the earliest to make his home on the creek had a large family and more of his descendents live here in the country than of any other person who has ever lived here. One of his sons, the older, left here many years ago and I believe lives somewhere in Oregon. Elmer, the other son, lives near Thousand Springs valley where he has a large orchard.

Mrs. Harvey Jones, Mrs. James Jones, both widows, and Mrs. Martin Calwhite all live here in Weiser, but as to where the others are I cannot say. Kate Saling Adams passed away less than a year ago.

Four Adams Children

G.W. Adams had three sons and one daughter, all dead except the daughter, Mrs. Lora Michael, who lives here. The sons were Willoughby, who died here a few years ago; W. E. and Dudley, the youngest, who died first. His widow was Mrs. Kate Adams, one of the Saling family. Sol Taylor had two sons and three daughters. Fred , the oldest died here some years ago and Cester lives here. Mrs. Jas. Lauer and Mrs. Lloyd Pence live at Payette and Mrs. Mary Hinze, whose husband. Herman died a few years ago, lives somewhere in the state. Mr. Taylor served a term as county commissioner back in territorial days.

Win. Hartley had two sons and one daughter. Both the sons, Geo. and Dick are dead and, Lizzie, the daughter, the wife of Dan Kerfoot, a former sheriff of this county, lives in East Portland, Oregon. The John Sater family is badly scattered, only one remaining here, John, the oldest. None of the Giles Sater family remain here, and I do not know where they are located. Those living of the large Lafe Lansdon family are scattered everywhere and two, Henry and Bob, were accidentally killed near Boise some years ago. The Hitt family are all away from their native country. One daughter, Mrs. Poteet, lives in Boise and another daughter lives in Portland. Where the other daughter and three sons are I do not know.

Hannah and family moved to Canyon county a number of years ago, and the living ones are still there as I am informed. Tom Powell moved to the Meadows years ago, where he married and raised two boys. The Maxwell family are all away from here and have been for several years. Murphy had no family except his wife, who had one son who was grown before she married Murphy.

The W.C. Taylor family, if any are living. are gone from this county.

Of the Gilderoy family, George and Allie live here and Emery, the youngest of the family lives at Meadows, and Belle Fisk lives in Oregon. The Ottman family lives in four different coast states. Henry is the only one in Idaho and makes his home in Weiser and Fannie Johnson, a widow, lives at Huntington, Oregon.

Dave Webb and wife had no children but they were as much attached to the children of Mrs. Webb's brothers and sisters as if they were their own. They raised two girls, children of other families and raised them right. Dave was a peculiar makeup in many ways. He was a good friend to his friends but woe to tlrose who did not treat him right, as he would never forgive them. He was a civil war veteran and had the best war record I ever saw. He had two discharges; the first as a volunteer in the ninety-day call for 75,000 volunteers and the next as a volunteer for the remainder of the war. On his second discharge is listed the principal engagements in which he took part during the rebellion and among them are some of the greatest battles fought during that period. He remained in the service to the end of the war when he was honorably discharged. He contracted disease while serving in the far south, from which he never fully recovered. He made application for a pension, not for the money that was in it but for recognition and it was 11 years before it was awarded, when he was granted the munificent sum of four dollars per month. Later, Senator Heyburn succeeded in getting a private pension bill through congress under which he drew $50 per month until he died. The government was certainly as niggardly in those days as it is liberal now, extremely so, both ways.

This story of Mann Creek and its early pioneers, incomplete and crude as is is, would be more so, were I to omit special mention of good old Doctor Sater, who came to the valley in the latter half of the 1870 decade and made his home there the remainder of his life. The doctor was not a graduate of any medical school but was of the type of the old country doctor of whom we read in the early history of our country. He could quite accurately diagnose an illness and knew the simple remedies to be administered. but unlike the old practitioners of a century ago he did not prescribe bleeding a patient to death when he needed more of lifes fluid than less. He understood proper nursing and dieting for the sick, and  with his simple remedies his batting averages for cures was as good as that of the more learned of the profession. He did not pretend to perform major surgical operations, yet he could set broken bones with success. No night was ever too dark or stormy for the doctor to remain at home when called to minister to the ailing, and it was a matter of perfect indifference to him whether they had money or not. 

His means of travel was on the back of an old blue mare, and whenever old "Blue" was seen traveling faster than a walk, it was almost a certainty that there was about to be an addition to the population or something had happened. He was a devout member of the Primitive Baptist or "Hardshell" church as it is sometimes irreverently called, and always attended its meetings unless called away by professional visits. The doctor had two sons and four daughters living in the neighborhood. The sons were John and Giles  already mentioned, and the wives of Dave Webb, John Sallee, Sol Taylor and George Maxwell were his daughters and all except Mrs. Webb had quite large families of children.

The old doctor remarried in his advanced age and one child was born to the union, a son who died about the time he had attained manhoods estate. His widow still lives on the old place where the doctor had lived for many years and where he passed away. All of his children have followed him and his grandchildren are scattered through several slates and none remain as residents of the valley, where most of them were born.

Mann Creek valley is particularly adapted to fruit growing, although there are no large orchards there. Seldom is there a winter when the cold is intense enough to destroy the peach and apricot crops and spring frosts rarely if ever effect them. The little valley, like all other parts of the country, not having storage reservoirs to rely on, has an insufficient water supply for late irrigation, although there is water enough runs off every spring to supply every ranch there, but "the mill will never grind with the water that has passed". If a reservoir were constructed at the head of the valley there wasted waters could be stored for summer and fall use, and the increase in crops and late pasturage would alone pay the price of construction in 10 years or less. An irrigation district was formed there some years ago with the purpose in view of building a storage dam but for some reason the scheme was abandoned. It would appear that now was the time, before the present administration has passed away, to act as the present liberal policy toward reclamation may not survive it. This is not ancient history but I sincerely hope that it will be future history.

First Pastor

The Rev. L.L. Shearer, pastor of the Weiser First Bapist Church from 1885 to 1890, was born in Scranton, Penna., in 1853, and graduated from Bucknell University In Pennsylvania with degrees in Latin, Greek and theology. He married Nancy Emmaline Carson in 1889 In Weiser, and the couple raised five children.