Ninety years ago today, May 15th, 1935, was graduation day for students at Palmer and Matanuska.
Spring had sprung: the ice went out on the Nenana River, colonists from Minnesota went trout fishing at local lakes, and the dirt roads of the Valley were prodigiously muddy.
Reverend Bingle was in the thick of it – the activity, the news, and the mud. Seeing a need for news reporting FOR the colonists, not just ABOUT them, and having a radio (with excellent reception, thanks to Jim Felton’s wire pig fence), he started Palmer’s first newspaper. The “Palmer Daily” consisted of local reports by Bingle and what he heard from the outside world (with the caveat “if we did not get all the news we just guessed. – Columbus took a chance”), typed on carbon paper and posted on the camp bulletin board.
“The graduation exercise of the Palmer school was held at Matanuska yesterday in conjunction with the graduation exercises of the school at that railroad city. The program was slightly detained due to the Palmer school bus getting in the habit of getting in the ditch, at various intervals, coming in with the graduates. At last, the patience of the Supt. of schools was exhausted and a fleet of A.R.R.C. pickups was sent in search. It seems that the last the Chief Skipper, Mr. Troast, was located with his craft he was sitting crossways of a grease puddle, the starboard side headed toward a boxcar. Mr. Biggs who had just driven 18 miles for a bath was also out and under, singing some beautiful songs while he made slight adjustments by means of chains. The sky-pilot [Rev. Bingle] was shifted from car to car, depending on who wanted the dirtiest work done, arriving home about 1:00A.M. with clerical togs looking rather uncerimonial. Mr. Sheeley, the orator, was finally allowed to give his speech in order that the pupils would be properly graduated. Aside from the interesting experiences getting to and from said graduation we wish to say the graduates from both schools manifested an unusual display of talent, compliments going to the orator and to other Valley residents as well.
. . .
Notice has just been given to the camp by the Supt. of Matanuska Experimental Station that Mr. Biggs will not be allowed to take any more baths at the government farm. It is also reliably reported that the plumbing fixtures had to be taken apart this morning before the drain could be made to work.”
From the “Palmer Daily,” May 16th, 1935
Photo:
“School bus stuck in the mud near Palmer. Note crude stove made from an oil drum.”
From the ARRC photo album, Mary Nan Gamble collection, Alaska State Library. Taken spring or summer 1935.
T.A. Smith, homesteader and talented fixer of machinery, built and operated the school bus that hauled Palmer-area students to the school at Matanuska before the Colony. The second sailing of the St Mihiel would bring a fleet of new school buses to Palmer.
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From “The First Three Years” by B.J. Bingle. A copy of this booklet is in the Juster Hill collection held by the Palmer Historical Society.