Today’s mystery is a photo-mystery. What is this (obviously a hill!) and where is it and why is it important to Washington history?
With last week’s mystery, I was musing about how a little wooden image of an ancient Hindu elephant god came to be floating along the western-end-edge of Long Lake where I found it among the driftwood. Two possible solutions were offered….love ’em!
Sonji Ruttan: A group of Hindus were holding a seance on a luxury houseboat on Long Lake and offered this to the river god.
Bettye Hull: There was a very old Hindu man traveling by wagon train in the 1880s through these parts. The wagon train was raided by Indians and many things were stolen. Obviously, this fell out of the bag of “loot”, or was discarded by the Indians because they had no idea what it represented.
While Basque Gypsys were following the sheep around the Lost Lake, the Fortune Teller was given the little statue of Hindi for her palm reading. In their rush to escape the sheriff who was telling them to “move on,” the treasure fell from their colorful wagon as they were leaving!
Steptoe Butte in Whitman County near Plaza? Col Steptoe was involved in an indian battle here and the butte was named for him. Later there was a resort hotel at the top, then an air force military communications site. Now it’s pretty much deserted but there’s a great view of the countryside from the top. The area is also on some sort of ecological thing going on and most of the area has been privately purchased to safe-guard it.
Steptoe Butte, Palouse Whitman Co,
Step-toe Butte southwest of Spokane. There was a battle there – don’t remember the particulars. My dad drove the family up there one time on an outing, back in the 1960’s.