East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current, 1914-01-07

as to who set the fire. though they
seemed to be almost unanimous thai
1t was incendiary. Soon afterward
Martin decided to move his saloon
down to a location nearer the pow
er company's works and the farmers
as they drove In from Pine creek. He
foved and the city council got after
him.
Here 1t Is necessary to consider the
city council. II. A. Stewart, OF Stew
art and Warner. was mayor. The
council included his partner. Tony
Warner, William Wiegand. who own
ed another saloon, Charles Kuntz. bar
tender o. w Parker, the teacher, and
J. J. Burns. liveryman.
CopperfieId has a restricted district
for saloons. 1t was claimed Martin
was living out of this district. Mar
tin claimed he wasn't. He was fined
$50 for moving and wouldn't pay. The
city marshal tried to arrest him, beat
him over the head with a revolver
and then gave up the job. Martin
took his case into court and lost.
November "a Mrs. Knezevich smell
ed smoke while she and her husband
were in bed, woke him and upon In
vestigation he found the rear of his
saloon afire. with a basket Of kin
ding soaked in kerosene as the cen
ter of the blaze. At the same time a
fire was found burning in the rear
of Wiegands saloon. Both were ex-
tinguished. The Stewart Wieganu
faction insinuate Martin set fire to
Wiegand's and used his own fire as
blind, while Martin said his enc
mics set fire to his place and used the
other as blind.
District Attorney Goodwin of Baker
county came to town but after listen
ing to the contradictory stories threw
up his hands and said he would pros
ecute IL anyone would bring him a be-
lievable story with a witness to swear
to it.
Citizens Are TerrOrized.
Meanwhile people who lived near
the participants were afraid to go to
bed nights for fear they would wake
up and find the town ablaZe. Sam
Akin, owner of mercantile COM
Copperfield, received a "black hand"
letter bearing a picture of bomb
and the inscription, You are next"
With dull times in Copperfield and
nothing much to do. the quarrel grew
until practically everyone became a
bitter partisan on one side or the 9TH
err
Finally worn out with the contin.
ued strife and tired of waiting for
Baker county officials to act. a num-
Der Of persons living in and about
Copperfield-say so or more-signed
a petition asking Governor West to
interfere The Stewart faction claim
many of the signers were farmers who
did not know what they were sign.
ing. Such farmers as came into Cop
perfield the past week had signed the
petition said they knew what they had
done and were glad the governor had
interfered. Y
The general feeling among the re-
spectacle people of the district seems
when other officials had failed to en-
, force law and order in Copperfield.
either through indifference or other
reasons and put the fear of the law
in the hearts of men who had grown
to believe they were SO far away from
the seat of government that nothing
they did mattered much
Copperfield is probably the most re-
mote place in Oregon. 1t is 81 miles
northeast of Huntington on the Snake
river branch of the Oregon snort
Line. and on the Idaho Oregon bound
airy line. If things became too hot
in either state 1t was easy to cross the
Snake into the other. and it was so
generally 'ornery'' that Baker coun-
| ty officials, themselves far removed
from western Oregon, considered 1t