HUCKLEBERRIES: People, performances, parties and passing time

Perhaps you've noticed that North Idaho is white. And possibly getting whiter.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. 

In 2009, Rich Benjamin included us in his book about this country’s demographic white spots: “Searching for Whitopia: An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America.”

Coeur d’Alene and Sandpoint were featured along with Bend, Ore., and St. George, Utah.

It wasn’t a hatchet job.

“These are communities that were already very white, and they were growing more white,” Benjamin told the Coeur d'Alene Press on Nov. 16, 2009.

Benjamin classified Whitopia as whiter than the nation, with at least 6% population growth since 2000, and at least 90% of that growth from white immigrants.

The Black political science scholar and journalist did his homework.

Between 2007 and 2009, he traveled more than 26,000 miles to study Whitopia.

He stayed four months in a cabin on Hayden Lake, hosting dinner parties, fishing, bowling and playing golf, according to The Press. He hobnobbed with then-Mayor Sandi Bloem, attorney Norm Gissel, retired Los Angeles police officers and even white separatists in Sandpoint.

Most of the people, he said, were very welcoming.

Benjamin told The Press that Coeur d’Alene’s reputation at the time was “very complicated.”

“That reputation is balanced by the area’s gorgeous beauty and almost utopian draw,” he said.

The author dedicated much of the North Idaho chapters to the migration of Californians.

He described most ex-Californians he met as “delightful.” But said some who fled after the 1993 Rodney King verdict and Los Angeles riots brought their racial anxiety with them.

It’s the longtime non-natives of Idaho, he wrote in “Whitopia,” who moved to the region from more ethnically diverse areas, who weren’t always as friendly.

“Richard Butler wasn’t the first person to move here from California,” he said.

His book, Benjamin told The Press, isn’t about racial relations. It’s about the future of this nation.

The last chapter calls for a recommitment to the common good and “away from accepting segregation and class divides as the American way of life.”

And that’s a clarion call that rings as true today as then.

Flying high

Gladys Buroker didn’t shatter the glass ceiling for female aviators. That honor goes to Dorothy Hester of Portland, Ore. But Gladys came close.

The aviation instructor from Rathdrum was the second woman inducted into the Museum of Flight Hall of Fame, according to The Press on Nov. 16, 1989.

Her exploits were legendary.

At age 16, she got hooked on flying after six seconds on her first airplane ride, according to Richard Sheldon of the Museum of North Idaho. A year later, she made her first solo flight after only five hours of instruction.

Afterward, she earned a living as an aviation instructor and as an air show performer. She was a wingwalker, parachutist and daredevil exhibition pilot.

But she and her husband, Herb, were best known for their flight instruction.

They were held in such esteem that the U.S. Army Air Force hired them to teach young men how to fly during World War II. And they did so at Weeks Field in Coeur d’Alene (now site of the Kootenai County Fairgrounds).

According to MONI’s Sheldon, “Her skill elevated her to legend status among the trainees.”

Gladys was 76 and had been flying for 58 years when she talked to The Press. She said: “I’ll keep flying as long as I pass my medical exam necessary for commercial flying.”

In 1997, Gladys and co-author Fran Bahr published an autobiography about her exploits: “Wind in My Face.” She died at age 88 on Nov. 8, 2002.

RIP: Last stoplight

Quirky Wallace is always looking for a reason to party.

And an opportunity presented itself in September 1991 when the town lost its stoplight at Bank and Seventh streets — the only one on Interstate 90, from Seattle to Boston.

Until 1991, motorists were funneled off the freeway onto side streets and then Bank Street for three blocks before returning to the interstate. Wallace business leaders enjoyed the drive-by business. But knew the heavy traffic would end when the proposed Wallace bypass was built.

By Nov. 18, 1984, Mayor Frank Morbeck and other boosters began planning for life without an operating stoplight. They asked the Idaho Transportation Department for the old light when the time came for removal. And ITD officials said: OK.

“It doesn’t have a great deal of value as modern equipment,” said ITD official Hugh Lydston.

In fact, the ITD was willing to remove the obsolete light then. But Wallace demurred.

Seven years later, with forlorn local VIPs and ITD officials sporting top hats, the city staged a funeral service and slowly marched the light to its final resting place: the Wallace Mining Museum.

Huckleberries

• Poet’s Corner: As shoppers grapple hand to hand/in stores and malls across the land,/all the economists quite agree/virgin births are good for GDP — The Bard of Sherman Avenue (“Black Friday”).

• Fabulous Shadows: The local boy band of the 1960s was fabulous within a year after its debut at the 1963 Demolay Senior Prom. Sixty years ago (Nov. 13, 1964), a Press cutline promoting a high school dance for the band described it as the “Fabulous Shadows.” The late KVNI broadcaster Bob Hough added the adjective that stuck.

• Who’s No. 1? On Nov. 17, 1964, the county license bureau was bracing for a run on 1965 plates. Early Birds had traditionally lined up all night for a chance to win the “Famous Potatoes” plate No. 1. Arnold Olson had claimed the number a year earlier. In 1964, the bureau borrowed 80 plates from Shoshone County when demand exceeded supply. And issued a record 17,426 plates.

• Berni’s Turn: For 48 years, the late Berni Dami worked as Duane Hagadone’s secretary. And more. She was also the company’s goodwill ambassador. On Nov. 26, 2004, she handed one special assignment from her boss with pride and professionalism: the Holiday in Lights countdown. On her word, the downtown welcomed Christmas. She brightened things up. 

• Has It Been — five years (Nov. 16, 2019) since the historic J.C. White House was moved from Eighth and Sherman to the base of Tubbs Hill, south of City Hall? Soon, very soon, it will become the forever home of the Museum of North Idaho. Can’t wait.

Parting shot

When you’re my age, milestones come and go quickly. Forty years in Coeur d’Alene as of September. Forty years writing this column come January (although it was a much different beast for most of those years). Fifty-five years of newspapering come 2025. And now? The magic number is 75. That’ll be my age on Wednesday, Nov. 20, a birthday I share with former Coeur d’Alene Mayor Sandi Bloem. She’s holding up better than I am. I see 75-ish numbers frequently on the obituary page. But the God who knows the number of hairs on my head hasn’t called my number yet. Against the odds, my wife of 50 years (June 2025) loves me. And our beagle, Huckleberry, likes me. And enough of you still read my scribblings for me to conclude: I’m blessed.

• • •

D.F. (Dave) Oliveria can be contacted at dfo@cdapress.com.

    During World War II, Gladys Buroker teaches eager students how to fight from the air.
  

    Gladys Buroker in 1989.
  

    In 1984, Wallace Mayor Frank Morbeck stands with the last Interstate 90 stoplight between Seattle and Boston.
  

    In 1964, the Fabulous Shadows prepare for a dance. Front row, from left: Tom Dotzler and Jack Fullwiler. Back row: Mike Bolan, Doug Wanamaker, Pete Shepperd and Dexter Yates.
  

    In 1964, staffers of the county assessor’s license bureau prepare for a rush on 1965 plates. From left, Emogene Shively, Veronica Schaffner and Gertrude Person.
  

    In 2004, Berni Dami is picked to lead the Holiday in Lights countdown.
  

    In 2019, the J.C. White House is moved to the base of Tubbs Hill.
  

    In fall 2024, Dave Oliveria and his prized beagle, Huckleberry, enjoy the sun at City Beach.