http://www.dnews.com/story/Slice/57049
Moscow-Pullman Daily News - DNews.com
HISTORY REPEATED: New book gives a glimpse into Pullman's past
By Brandon Macz
Moscow Pullman Daily News
November 13, 2010
When I started as the Slice of Life editor for the Moscow-Pullman Daily News, my predecessor was long gone, which meant getting the lay of the land through old issues of the paper. There were menus, lists, columns, etc. And then there were these old, black-and-white photos that, at first glance, seemed out of place in a newspaper where current events were its bread-and-butter.
But let's remember that the old expression, those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it, while great for use in political rhetoric, has an evil cousin - those who forget the past will eventually be it. The world keeps spinning and too often the past is demolished to make way for the future.
But these "pictures of the past" encapsulate the memories that should not be paved over. That's why I was happy to have the book, "Images of America: Pullman," by Robert Luedeking and the Whitman County Historical Society, dropped in my lap, compliment of Arcadia Publishing.
The book is takes a chronological look at the history of Pullman through 222 photographs of the community from past to present with detailed descriptions of the people and places frozen in these black-and-white moments that all add up to the here-and-now.
The Daily News published many photos Luedeking dug up from archives from the Whitman County Historical Society's Esther Pond Smith Collection until others took his place upon his death last year. Though I was not lucky enough to meet Mr. Luedeking - so I will not make assumptions - my city editor, Murf Raquet, told me this former WSU professor would bring these photos into the newsroom no matter the weather, in "rain, snow or shine."
"He had a single-minded determination to get those photos here," Raquet said. I now receive pictures of the past through e-mail, and Ed Garretson provides me with my Whitman County fix. In a recent e-mail from Ed, he alluded to the throughness of Luedeking's work as a historian. "He so wanted it right," his e-mail states, "correct in expression and in fact."
"Pullman" is set to be released for sale on Monday, and if you like the pictures of the past that run every Saturday in the Slice of Life, imagine 222 of them in one package. I like to compare it to old cartoons, when a squirrel is trying to get a nut, gets fed up, kicks the tree, and is suddenly hit with the entire bounty. No doubt I will have plenty of ideas for history columns to come.
The cover to the book is from 1909 and was found by Luedeking in the Pullman Herald and published in the Daily News on March 4, 2000. It shows Pullman's entire fleet of automobiles - 15 - in a parade. A photographer had been scheduled to document this then-historic event.
There are so many photographs like this that really illustrate a point so many, I guess you would call them "whippersnappers," seem to forget. There was a time when people weren't born with iPods in their ears or an Internet to reference everything from politics to the newest, Youtube disaster. It was a time when kids played outside and the community was bonded by the simple fact that entertainment wasn't compiled onto a center in people's livingrooms.
The world as we know it was built on the backs and with the blood of people we so often forget to remember, and I commend Luedeking and those that will follow him for preserving pieces of that history by bringing these photos and their histories to light.
So, for those young people - who I'm sure pore over this column every chance they get - listen when grandpa or grandma want to tell you a story about the good'ol days. It might just help you appreciate what you have now and think about how outdated the present will be in the future if you don't.
Brandon Macz is the Slice of Life editor for the Moscow-Pullman Daily News
"Images of America: Pullman," by Robert Luedeking and the Whitman County Historical Society
Arcadia Publishing
$21.99
Available at local retailers, online bookstores or through Arcadia Publishing at (888)313-2665 or at www.arcadiapublishing.com.
