Ada-Owyhee County ID Archives Biographies.....Eatman, Hosea B. 1843 - 1919
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Author: S. J. Clarke (Publisher, 1920)

Hosea B. Eastman

BEFORE Idaho was organized as a territory Hosea B. Eastman took up his abode
within its borders and for many years he remained a most active and prominent
factor in the upbuilding of the capital city. Every phase of pioneer life is
familiar to him. All of the hardships and privations occasioned by remoteness
from the advantages of the older civilization of the east, also the Indian
fighting in an effort to plant the seeds of civilization on the western frontier
and in fact every form of activity that led at length to the establishment of
the great empire of the northwest, are to him not a matter of hearsay or of
history but a matter of actual experience. He came to be one of the most
forceful factors in the financial and commercial development of Boise, where he
took up his abode in 1863, and just as his ancestors aided in the establishment
of civilization upon the Atlantic coast, he has borne his full share in the work
of development upon the Pacific coast.

   Mr. Eastman is a native of Whitefield, New Hampshire. He was born in the year
1835 ar>d is descended from a family that was founded on American soil in early
colonial days, when this country was still numbered among the possessions of
Great Britain. His grandfather, Ebenezer Eastman, was numbered among the
colonial troops that fought for the independence of the nation. Following the
surrender of Lord Cornwallis he returned to his home and devoted his attention
to the occupation of farming. Among his children was Caleb Eastman, father of
Hosea B. Eastman.

   The last named spent his youthful days upon a New England farm and attended
the public schools of the neighborhood, but the opportunities of the west
attracted him when he was a young man and in 1862, he crossed the continent,
taking up his abode in Idaho, although the territory was not yet created. The
following year, however, Idaho came into existence and at that time embraced the
greater part of the states of Montana and Wyoming. It was on the 21st of
October, 1862, that Mr. Eastman, accompanied by his brother, Benjamin Manson,
sailed from New York city and at Aspinwall they started across the Isthmus of
Panama and thence made their way up the Pacific coast to California. For a brief
period they were connected with ranching in that state and in 1862, with a
thirty mule pack train, started for Canyon City, Oregon. A few months later
Hosea B. Eastman was at Silver City, Idaho, where he gave his attention to
mining for a number of years, mining and milling some of the first gold quartz
ever sold in the state. The journey to Idaho had been made with a company of
adventurous miners, who traveled on snowshoes from Canyon City, Oregon, to
Auburn. While en route they lost their way and for several days Mr. Eastman had
no food save bacon rinds that had been retained to rub on the bottoms of the
snowshoes to keep them free from packed snow. At Silver City the brothers, H. B.
and B. M. Eastman, owned and conducted the old Idaho Hotel for a number of years
and on disposing of that property came to Boise, where they purchased the
old-time Overland Hotel, long one of the best known hostelries of the west.

   Before coming to Boise, however, Mr. Eastman had taken part in various fights
with the Indians and on one occasion, at the time of the South Mountain fight,
he was wounded. He felt that the bullet should be removed, but there was no one
to undertake this task. He insisted that a hospital steward, who knew nothing of
surgery, should do it. The man at first refused, but Mr. Eastman insisted,
placed himself on a small table and without any anaesthetic permitted the crude
probing by means of which the bullet was finally extracted. He and four
companions had stood out against a band of more than three hundred Indians. It
was in such ways that the courage and valor of Mr. Eastman and other heroic
pioneers was continually manifest.

   Removing to Boise, Mr. Eastman became a prominent factor in the development
and upbuilding of the city, with which he has been connected in many ways and
through many years. He took up his abode in the city when it was a small and
inconsequential village. He aided its advancement in every possible way and as
the years passed became a dominant figure in its business circles, connected
with many commercial and financial enterprises which have had to do with the
upbuilding of the capital and the establishment of its high civic standards. He
became the president of the Pacific National Bank of Boise and was also one of
the organizers of the Boise City National Bank. When the old Overland Hotel,
which was long a popular hostelry under the management of Mr. Eastman, was torn
down he erected upon that site the Overland office building, one of the fine
structures of the city, and remained president of the company owning the
building for an extended period. He was the general manager of the Boise
Artesian Hot and Cold Water Company and installed the first water system in the
old Overland Hotel. It was this company that also built the great Natatorium on
Warm Springs avenue in Boise. He became a prominent factor in the ownership and
conduct of an extensive hardware business conducted under the name of the
Eastman & Teller Hardware Company, of which he was vice president and a member
of the board of directors until the business was sold on the 1st of August, 1912.

   While a resident of Silver City, Mr. Eastman was married in 1872 to Miss Mary
Ann Blackinger, who shared with him in all of the privations and hardships
incident to the struggles of the early days and also lived to enjoy the fruits
of their later prosperity. To them were born two sons. Frank M., who was born
May 30, 1878, attended the Phillips Academy at Andover, Massachusetts, and
afterward completed the full literary course in Yale University, where he won
the Bachelor's degree. He passed away May 5, 1912. The younger son, Ben Sherman
Eastman, was born in Boise and, like his brother, attended the Phillips Academy
at Andover, while later he entered Yale and completed the scientific course in
that institution, being graduated as a member of the class of 1902, on which
occasion the Bachelor of Philosophy degree was bestowed upon him.

   Such in brief is the life history of Hosea B. Eastman, a man whom to know is
to esteem and honor. For much more than half a century he has resided in Boise
and there is no phase of development and progress in the northwest with which he
is not thoroughly familiar. At all times he has borne his share in the work of
development and improvement and has met the changing conditions, ready for any
emergency and for any opportunity. There are no esoteric phases in his entire
career, nothing sinister and nothing to conceal. He has been straightforward in
all of his business relations, has stood loyally by his honest convictions and
in the development of his business affairs has employed constructive methods
that have made his efforts a feature in the upbuilding and progress of the
community as well as a factor in the promotion of his own fortunes.


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IDAHO

DELUXE SUPPLEMENT

CHICAGO
THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY
1920


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