New Lecture Series Based On Historian’s Book

Coeur d’Alene around the turn of the Twentieth Century taken from the top of Tubbs Hill. Regional historian Robert Singletary will begin a series of lectures Sept. 27 at the Coeur d’Alene Public Library based on his upcoming book, “Coeur d’Alene: Beautiful and Progressive, 1878-1990.”

A new lecture series of Inland Northwest Milestones at the library will be based on material researched for Robert Singletary’s upcoming book, “Coeur d’Alene: Beautiful and Progressive, 1878-1990.”
The first program in the series will Sept. 27, at 7 p.m., and will examine Fort Sherman and the Beginning of Coeur d’Alene.
Singletary, regional historian and Program and Marketing Director for the Museum of North Idaho, said the description of the Lake City as “beautiful and progressive” was first used in a booklet written in the 1920s by George Weeks, former president of the local Chamber of Commerce.
“Even as a village of tents and log cabins, the emerging town next to Fort Coeur d’Alene was noted for its beautiful location,” Singletary said. “It was also known for its ability to adapt and grow, even in difficult times.”
The book and lecture series will give the reader and audience an overview of Coeur d’Alene’s major economic, political, social/cultural developments and some of the people that that made it happen, he said.  The time period covered will be from the town’s very beginning, with the founding of Fort Sherman up to 1990.
Most of the series presentations will be on the fourth Thursday of the month. The October program has been scheduled for Wednesday, Nov. 7, and another program will follow on Nov. 27, to avoid the Thanksgiving holiday. There will not be a December program.
The subjects for the rest of the programs will be:

► Nov. 7: The Timber Boom, then World War I.
► Nov. 29: The Dynamic Twenties.
► Jan. 24: The ’30s in Coeur d’Alene.
► Feb. 28: Farragut’s Influence on Coeur d’Alene.
► March  28: Coeur d’Alene After the War and Into the '50s.
► April 25: Coeur d’Alene in the ’60s and ’70s.
► May 23: The Turbulent, but Progressive ’80s.