Bold Spirit - Linda Hunt [13]
Just one month later, on July 16, another major storm caused havoc seven miles northwest of Canby, very near the Estby homestead. In a three-mile destructive sweep, a new barn was blown flat, another barn almost full of hay was lifted off its foundations, a falling tree killed a man, a barn struck by lightning burned down and killed two horses, lightning caused three houses to be consumed by fire, game was killed in great abundance, and most growing crops were greatly injured by the storm.14
That was enough for Helga and Ole. Scared of future tornadoes and cyclones, the Estbys began planning a move to the West, a region promoted actively by the Northern Pacific Railroad. The assurances in brochures of a better climate, available land, affordable housing, and educational opportunities in “the promised land” lured many an immigrant to the West. So many immigrants came in the 1880s, they established a vibrant Scandinavian presence in churches and organizations in urban centers in Washington State, such as Seattle, Tacoma, and Spokane Falls, the new “gem” city of the Pacific Northwest. One brochure particularly addressed the quality of educated people who lived in Spokane Falls and the educational opportunities for children, a topic that would have drawn Helga’s attention. Educated in America, and fluent both in written and spoken English and Norwegian, she had more schooling than many of the Scandinavian farm women. She longed for her children to have the chance to better themselves in every way, intellectually, spiritually, and materially.15 In the Canby region, she saw that young girls often began working for families instead of attending high school. The brochure boasted: “The permanent population of Spokane Falls is of a very highly intellectual and moral character.… They recognize the fact that intellectual culture is the genius of the age in which we live, and constitutes in itself a true exponent of wealth and power.”16
The brochure then elaborated on the new public schools and the superintendent of education with a doctorate, the high school literary society, the two private schools, the establishment of Gonzaga University (a Jesuit institution), the four-year Spokane College and the Methodist-Episcopal College, which aimed to “provide thorough scholarship and a high standard of moral and Christian character.” All three colleges insisted they offered education equal to those of the East and included modern languages, Latin, Greek, philosophy, higher math, logic, and bookkeeping in their curricula. For Helga, familiar with urban life, a city that grew from less than three hundred to more than two thousand in just thirty months must have sounded remarkable. Spokane Falls offered churches, newspapers, an opera house, good hotels and a high percentage of college-educated citizens.17
What most likely precipitated their final decision was a September 21, 1886, newspaper from Spokane, Washington, that caught their eye, especially an advertisement for twenty-five carpenters wanted to work for $3.50 a day on the Spokane and Idaho Railroad.18 Tired of the drudgery and unpredictability of farming, with a young wife frightened to live on the prairie, Ole likely found this new option to practice his original trade appealing. It was enough enticement to get the Estbys to join the vast group of Norwegians and other immigrants who participated in the “second migration” to the Northwest, a movement that grew to more than 150,000 Scandinavians