Payette County ID Archives Biographies.....Pence, Peter 1837 - 
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Joy Fisher http://www.genrecords.net/emailregistry/vols/00001.html#0000031 January 10, 2012, 11:59 pm

Source: See below
Author: S. J. Clarke, Publisher

    PETER PENCE has passed the eighty-second milestone on life's journey and yet
the years rest lightly upon him. He is a remarkable man for one of his age, his
mind keenly alert and active, his face glowing with health, and he remains an
invaluable factor in the life of Payette, to the upbuilding and development of
which he has made so large contribution. 

    Mr. Pence was born in Armstrong county, Pennsylvania, October 12, 1837, and
his meager education was confined to attendance at the country schools for three
months during the winter seasons. At the age of twenty-one years he started out
in life on his own responsibility and in the spring of 1858 proceeded by boat to
St. Paul, Minnesota, but not being favorably impressed with that city continued
his journey to Atchison, Kansas, where he began earning a living by chopping
cordwood. In 1860 he took up the work of freighting with ox teams from Atchison,
Kansas, to Denver, Colorado, and on his first trip in March of that year hauled
the merchandise for the fourth store in Denver. He made three trips that summer,
the round trip being fourteen hundred miles. On his first return trip, at a
place known as Boxelder, about one hundred and seventy-five miles east of
Denver, the party was held up by the Indians, who were determined to revenge
themselves on white people because of a cut inflicted on one of their band by
the storekeeper at Boxelder. After a long conference, however, they decided to
be pacified by a gift of various kinds of stores and no blood was shed. At this
time of the vear buffaloes were migrating and the freighters found it necessary
to shoot the animals to keep them from running over their wagons, so numerous
were they. The men were forced to stop their train and chain their oxen to the
wagons to keep them from stampeding. In the spring of 1861 an influential man by
the name of Jim Lane took to Atchison a six-pounder cannon and one hundred
rounds of ammunition to protect the town from the rebels. With his team Mr.
Pence hauled the cannon to the Missouri Heights, from which location they fired
thirteen rounds across the river at the enemy, who beat a hasty retreat. The
rebel troops were under the command of General Price and their object was to
seize the ferry. During that summer Mr. Pence engaged in farming raising corn,
which he sold at fifteen cents per bushel, and during the winter he operated a
threshing machine. At that time the country was overrun with horse thieves and
murderers, so that Mr. Pence decided to move farther west. In 1862, therefore,
with an ox team, he joined a train of fifty wagons and three hundred and sixty
people headed for Idaho. They arrived on the east side of the Malheur river,
opposite the town of Vail, September 26, 1862, and there they buried one of
their party who had died of jaundice. The following day they resumed their
journey, but three of their party soon left them to make their way to the Boise
basin. Arriving at Baker City, Oregon, the party found there the foundation for
two houses in the way of settlement and at that point awaited the report of the
men who were sent to reconnoiter the Boise basin and who returned with reports
that caused Mr. Pence to immediately start for Boise basin. He arrived just in
time to attend the first miners' meeting at Placerville in the Boise basin on
the 3d of November, 1862. 

    In crossing the Snake river, seven miles south of Payette, at what was
called the Whitley Bottom, he was charged two dollars and a half by a ferryman
for taking him across in a skiff, swimming his ponies. In order to pay this
ferryman he was compelled to borrow a dollar and a quarter from a companion, so
he arrived in Idaho truly empty-handed save for his grubstake. The day following
the meeting of the miners Mr. Pence and his associate, Samuel Kenney, went to
the present site of Idaho City and there Mr. Pence engaged in prospecting and
his partner hauled logs for the building of the town, for which he received a
wage of sixteen dollars per day. The two men built a log cabin for themselves
large enough to accommodate four people. About this time the rush started. On
Christmas day they hired a man who had a scythe to mow hay on Elk creek for
their oxen. That winter they whipsawed sluice lumber, paying forty-five dollars
for the whipsaw and sawing about one hundred feet per day, which they sold at
twenty-five cents per foot, and before their supply of lumber was exhausted they
were paid three hundred dollars a thousand for the remainder by Henry Stark and
Joe Olden, two of the picturesque gamblers of the times, who were anxious to
open a saloon. Prices were very high at that time. Mr. Pence and his partner
were paying one dollar per pound for flour, two dollars and a half per pound for
bacon, twenty-five dollars for gum boots, twelve dollars for a pick and eight
dollars for a shovel. In April, 1863, they resumed mining and lost all of their
lumber profits. The partnership was then dissolved and Mr. Pence engaged in
packing with horses and mules from Umatilla, Oregon, to Silver City, Idaho,
receiving twenty-eight dollars per hundred pounds. Later he teamed from
Umatilla, Oregon, and Walla Walla, Washington, in the years 1864 and 1865, and
in 1866 he took, his teams to The Dalles, Oregon, and went to Portland, where he
purchased a threshing machine, for by this time there was considerable grain
being raised in the Boise valley and threshers received from fourteen to
twenty-five cents a bushel, while grain was worth twenty-five cents a pound as
soon as it was threshed. 

    In the fall of 1866 Mr. Pence sold his threshing outfit and on the 9th of
January, 1867, left Boise for Walla Walla, Washington, to buy cattle. In the
spring he brought to the Payette valley one of the first bands of cattle. With
every phase of pioneer life in this section of the state he is familiar. The
town of Boise was just being staked out when he arrived in 1863. He tells a
story which indicates the conditions that existed in those days. He and his
partner, returning to their mine from Idaho City, stepped into the butcher shop
to get a steak. Just at that time a fight broke out in the street and Jones, the
butcher, decided to interfere. Being a powerful man, he threw the fighters apart
and in so doing stopped a bullet by his head, resulting in his instant death. He
was left lying where he fell until the next day, when a rope was put around his
neck and he was dragged away — such was the little value placed upon a man's
life at that time. In the summer of 1867 Mr. Pence gave Bill Hill fourteen
hundred dollars in gold bars to vacate his claim at the mouth of Big Willow, in
Payette county in favor of Mr. Pence, who has since developed the land into one
of the best stock ranches in this section. It is now the property of his two
youngest sons and is known as the Pence Brothers ranch. Thereon they cut
annually eight hundred tons of hay, which is fed to stock, which they are
raising extensively. All of Mr. Pence's children save one were born upon that
ranch. 

    When the Oregon Short Line Railroad was completed into Oregon, Mr. Pence
removed to Payette, where he has since lived. For some years he handled real
estate and at the same time raised cattle and sheep on his ranch. Later he
turned his attention to banking, acquiring a large amount of stock in the Bank
of Commerce, while subsequently he became one of the chief owners of the First
National Bank, into which he merged the Bank of Commerce, and since then he has
been the president of the First National Bank of Payette. He owns an interest
with William A. Coughanour in the First National Bank building and they are both
largely interested in the Idaho Canning Company of Payette, the only canning
plant west of Utah, Mr. Pence being the president. He has also been connected
with the irrigation interests and was president of the Lower Payette Ditch
Company, which has one of the best irrigation plants and the lowest water rate
in the state, this being twenty-five cents per acre. 

    In 1872 was celebrated the marriage of Peter Pence and Annie Bixby, a native
of Nebraska, who passed away July 18, 1906. They were the parents of eight
children, two of whom are deceased. Mrs. Belle Satoris, the eldest, is the
mother of two children: Harline, now attending the normal school at Moscow; and
Fred, a high school pupil in Payette. Edward C., who is connected with the
Graves Transfer Company of Boise, married Besse Venable, of Boise, whose brother
is private secretary to Senator Borah at Washington. Edward C. and his wife have
two children. Earl and Mildred. Albert Lloyd married Cady Taylor, of Missouri,
and they have six children: Katherine, Gladys, Peter M., Pauline and Albert
Lloyd, all attending school in Payette; and Margaret. Harry D. married Delia
Applegate, of Idaho. Walter G. married Ada Cram, of Payette, and they have one
child, Lucile. Grace E. is the wife of R. D. Bradshaw and they have a daughter
and two sons, Edith, Douglas and Kenneth, all attending school in Payette. Mr.
Pence is very proud of his grandchildren and presented each one of them with a
hundred-dollar Liberty bond at Christmas time of 1918. 

    While Mr. Pence has conducted most extensive and important business
interests that have constituted valuable elements in the up-building of his city
and state, he has also further advanced the public welfare through service in
office. In 1890 he was elected to the state legislature and he was chairman of
the school board of Payette when the first brick schoolhouse was built in the
city and was largely instrumental in buying the block where the school stands.
For several terms he served as mayor of Payette, being its first chief
executive, and he labored earnestly in the execution of his official duties to
advance the general welfare. He is a charter member of the Masonic fraternity of
Payette and throughout his life has been a worthy follower of the craft. His is
a notable career of activity and efficiency and to him the lines of Victor Hugo
may well be applied: 
"The snows of winter are on his head, 
But the flowers of spring are in his heart." 


Additional Comments:

Extracted from:

IDAHO
DELUXE SUPPLEMENT
CHICAGO
THE S. J. CLARKE PUBLISHING COMPANY

1920


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