[Vision2020] First electrical power to Moscow, Idaho

[Ron Force]

Several publications mention the "electric light plant" . Here's a couple
of pictures from the UI Special Collections.
https://digital.lib.uidaho.edu/digital/collection/ott/id/453/rec/1
https://digital.lib.uidaho.edu/digital/collection/ott/id/454/rec/1

The story:
https://books.google.com/books?id=qLJNIiwGuVUC&pg=PA78&lpg=PA78&dq=michael+j+Shields+moscow+id&source=bl&ots=ZqQqFvjlls&sig=ACfU3U0It0Ut3OsTFCufQfTw98s6fiIg1A&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwin8NKFp_7jAhVJlFQKHZbbBFsQ6AEwBXoECAkQAQ#v=onepage&q=michael%20j%20Shields%20moscow%20id&f=false


Sadly, Shields died at 57, and was preceded in death by his children:
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/24033911/michael-joseph-shields

He had gone bust in the 1893 depression but had recovered somewhat:
https://accessgenealogy.com/idaho/biography-of-michael-j-shields.htm

One of his buildings lives on:
 Use of the Italianate style for downtown buildings was also relatively
common as in the Shields Building on the intersection’s southeast corner.
Michael Shields developed the Shields Building North as Moscow’s first
three-story brick building with an elevator in 1889. The building has since
lost some of its original ornamentation and has been modified at the street
level.
https://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/ID-01-057-0003



Ron Force
Moscow Idaho USA


On Mon, Aug 12, 2019 at 5:33 AM Kenneth Marcy <kmmos1 at frontier.com> wrote:

> Thank you.
>
> That's nice, and an information improvement in that it pushes the timeline
> back fourteen years and seven months, but it still doesn't answer my
> original question to myself: "When was electric service first publicly
> available in Moscow, Idaho?"  At the moment, my answer is "before March,
> 1890," but apparently that is not the end of the story.
>
> Related questions now occur to me: Has publicly available electric service
> ever been generated in Moscow, Idaho?  If so, what are the details and
> dates?
>
>
>
> Ken
>
>
>
> On 8/11/19 9:32 PM, Ron Force wrote:
>
> There was electrical power in Moscow earlier:
> *...At the end of March 1890, with Idaho statehood only weeks away,
> electric light plants were in operation in these cities, with the number of
> lights each of them could supply: Boise, 1,000; Moscow, 750; Wallace, 650;
> Blackfoot, 500; Hailey, 500; Caldwell, 500... *
>
> https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/northwest/idaho/history/article143560899.html
>
> Edison built the first centralized power plant in 1880. It appears to have
> been rapidly adopted.
> Ron Force
> Moscow Idaho USA
>
>
> On Sun, Aug 11, 2019 at 7:11 PM Kenneth Marcy <kmmos1 at frontier.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> *First electrical power to Moscow, Idaho*
>>
>> Here is a one-paragraph news item recovered from the archives of the
>> Internet:
>>
>>
>> From the third column on page 18 of Western Electrician, dated July 2,
>> 1904:
>>
>>
>> The Moscow Electric Light and Power Company of Moscow, Idaho, has secured
>> a 10-year contract
>>
>> from the City of Genesee for lighting the streets and pumping the city
>> water, and will put in a substation in that town,
>>
>> taking the current from the new transmission lines being run to Moscow by
>> the Lewiston Water Power Company.
>>
>> It is expected that the line will be complete to Genesee before September
>> 1st and to Moscow October 1st.
>>
>> Power is being transmitted at 22,000 volts over a 60-mile line from
>> Asotin, Wash.
>>
>>
>>
>> Ken
>>
>>
>> =======================================================
>>  List services made available by First Step Internet,
>>  serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
>>                http://www.fsr.net
>>           mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
>> =======================================================
>
>
> =======================================================
>  List services made available by First Step Internet,
>  serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
>                http://www.fsr.net
>           mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com <Vision2020 at moscow.com>
> =======================================================
>
> =======================================================
>  List services made available by First Step Internet,
>  serving the communities of the Palouse since 1994.
>                http://www.fsr.net
>           mailto:Vision2020 at moscow.com
> =======================================================
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