Digital Bob Archive

APRIL 1918 - PART 1:

April Fool's Day arrived on a Monday and many residents of Gastineau Channel had not quite accepted the fact that Daylight Savings was not a joke. President Woodrow Wilson had ordered clocks throughout the nation set ahead at midnight on Saturday, March 30, as a wartime conservation measure, and the Council of Defense in Juneau and Douglas had urged all citizens to comply. Newspaper stories on Monday indicated that not everybody had done so.

There was no fooling about April 2 that year, either. It was City Election day and it was a hotly contested one. The incumbent mayor, Emery Valentine, headed the Welfare Ticket, with Peter Carlson, John Perelle, E.J. Ellingen and Charles Hanson running for the four council seats that were to be filled. Allen Shattuck, a member of the council, was the mayoral candidate on the Citizen's ticket, with W.G. Johnson, B.A. Rosselle, J.H. Montgomery and Andrew Lagergren for the council. Jorgen Nelson, William Short and C.J. Sullivan were independent candidates for the council, and Grover C. Winn was unopposed for reelection to the school board.

The principal matter of contention between the two tickets was the purchase by the city of waterfront property for use by fish processing plants and facilities to be used by fishermen. Shattuck was for the proposal, Valentine opposed it.

There were two polling places - the City Hall at Fourth and Main Streets, and the Brunswick Building (now the Harrisburgh Building) on South Franklin - for the 1059 registered Juneau voters. The polls were open from 9 a.m. until 7 p.m. and 971 voters cast ballots, or just over 90 per cent of those registered.

Valentine won the mayor's race by 17 votes and Carlson, Hanson and Ellingen won council seats. Only Montgomery was elected from the Citizen's ticket. The two holdover councilmen were Nels Sorby and Gunnar Bloomgren.

In Douglas incumbents Elmer E. Smith, Oliver Olson, J.W. Martin, August Olson and H.E. Murray were re-elected to the city council and were joined by F.A.J. Gallwas and Alex T. Nelson. Jack Henson and William Robertson were unopposed for the school board. Douglas had not yet adopted the direct election of its mayor and the council picked Elmer Smith for his second term in that office.

April 6 was the first anniversary of the entry of the United States into the World War. War news occupied much of the front pages of Juneau's two daily newspapers, the morning Dispatch and the evening Empire, and war-related activities occupied much of the time and attention of residents of Gastineau Channel. The third Liberty Loan bond drive was getting started and the two Juneau banks reported subscriptions of $15,000 the first day of the drive. The sale of war savings stamps continued in the schools and the home Guard turned out 90 strong to shovel snow from one of the docks to provide a place where they could drill. They had not yet received their guns and ammunition but word was received that those items had been shipped and would soon arrive.