Clatsop County OR Archives Biographies.....Hurd, Erle Nolton September 8, 1876 - 
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Ila L. Wakley iwakley@msn.com May 12, 2010, 6:47 pm

Source: The S. J. Clarke Publishing Company
Author: History of the Columbia River Valley From The Dalles to the Sea, Vol. III, Published 1928, Pages 279 - 282

     ERLE NOLTON HURD, postmaster of Seaside, to which position he was 
appointed January 3, 1925, has long figured prominently in public affairs of 
his community, his fellow citizens electing him successively to the council, 
to the mayoralty and then to the state legislature, in which he represented 
his district for three terms. In journalistic circles, too, his name became 
well known as owner and editor of the Seaside Signal, a weekly newspaper which 
he published for seventeen years prior to disposing thereof in 1928. He was 
born at New Lisbon, Wisconsin, in the center of a prosperous dairying country, 
September 8, 1876, his parents being Frank E. and Elizabeth (Gibbs) Hurd, who 
were married at New Lisbon in 1868 and still reside there. Members of the Hurd 
family, which is of Scotch-Irish stock, participated in the Revolutionary war. 
Frank E. Hurd, the father of E. N. Hurd, fought as a soldier of the Civil war. 
During his active business career he was engaged in merchandising, owning a 
store at New Lisbon, Wisconsin, as well as stores in two nearby communities. 
He served as postmaster of New Lisbon and also made a splendid record as a 
member of the legislature for two terms.

     As a boy E. N. Hurd obtained employment with the American Express Company 
and eventually was promoted to the position of night money clerk at Milwaukee. 
Attracted to newspaper work, at the age of seventeen he secured the position 
of printer's devil on the Juneau County Argus, which had been established in 
1856. He learned the business, bought the paper and published it for a decade. 
L. R. Fields, general superintendent of the Southern Pacific, advised him to 
go to Oregon, and heeding this counsel, he closed up his business in Wisconsin 
and made his way to Portland. Mr. Fields offered him a good berth with the 
Southern Pacific, but Mr. Hurd had no desire to abandon the "art preservative" 
and therefore went to work at the case in the shops of the Oregon Journal and 
the Oregonian, for Mr. Kilham, and the James Printing Company. His subsequent 
experiences are best told in his own words: "A young chap who had learned his 
trade under me in Wisconsin was working on the Seaside Signal. He wired me to 
come on down and buy it, as he wanted to work for me again. I went down to 
Seaside. At that time it had a population of around four hundred, and some of 
its older citizens didn't see much future for it. The Signal was a little four-
column, four-page weekly with but few subscribers and limited advertising 
patronage. The more I sized up Seaside the more I believed it had a future, so 
I leased the paper for six months with the option of buying it. Times were 
tight, and the bank failed. This was followed by the shutting down of the 
sawmills here. The revenue from the paper almost reached the vanishing point. 
Along came the big fire and wiped the business district out, from my office 
clear to the Necanicum river. Everything was put on a cash basis. If you 
didn't have the money to buy bread and meat you ate clams and turnips. People 
thought the town was dead. Depression was well-nigh universal. You could buy 
property at your own figure. I could have gone back to Portland and made good 
money at my trade, but I couldn't bear to be a quitter, so I hung on. My wife 
turned her old dresses and I claimed that I felt more comfortable in old 
clothes. I preached the gospel of optimism and assured my readers that it was 
always darkest just before the dawn, and that the longest lane had a turning 
if followed long enough. They took me at my word, and elected me president of 
the city council on a platform of a bigger and better city. This involved 
sewers, sidewalks, streets and consequent higher taxes. * * * I served six 
years on the council and was then elected and reelected mayor. We put in six 
to eight miles of sewers at a cost of about two hundred thousand dollars. We 
spent five hundred thousand dollars for improving our streets. * * * We put in 
about fifteen miles of concrete sidewalks. We replaced the old boardwalk along 
the sea front with a concrete promenade eight thousand and forty feet in 
length, which, with the Turnaround, cost about one hundred and fifty thousand 
dollars. By the way, this 'Prom' is the only one of its kind in the country, 
and we have furnished the plan of it to several seaside communities in 
southern California. We are willing to concede that we have the best hotels, 
the most progressive citizens and the finest and most accessible beach in the 
Pacific northwest. We have had as many as fifty thousand people here at once 
on special occasions. Our normal summer population varies from twenty thousand 
to twenty-five thousand. How has this growth and development affected me 
personally? When I came to Seaside the Signal office had a few cases of second-
hand type and two old job presses. Today we have a linotype, mat service, 
casting equipment and an up-to-date plant. When I came, the only wheeled 
vehicle I could afford was a wheel¬barrow. Now I have a good automobile. The 
people here have elected me their representative in the legislature three 
times, have made me their mayor, have let me indulge my hobby along 
educational lines, have backed me up in securing the best schoolhouses, an 
athletic field, beautiful school grounds and the ablest corps of instructors 
to be had."

     To Mr. Hurd also belongs the distinction of having founded the first 
newspaper at Lapine in central Oregon, and for several years he conducted a 
large job printing plant at Astoria. As stated in the beginning, he sold the 
Seaside Signal in 1928, after seventeen years of service as its editor and 
publisher. Appointed postmaster of Seaside in January, 1925, he has since made 
a most commendable and creditable record in that office and at all times has 
exerted his efforts and influence on behalf of the cause of education, good 
roads and all movements looking toward community welfare. For fourteen years 
he has served as president of the Union high school board. In the Oregon 
legislature, where he has served three terms, Mr. Hurd introduced and had 
passed a bill designating Seaside as the western terminus of the Lewis and 
Clark expedition, and also of the Old Oregon Trail. He also secured an 
appropriation of twenty thousand dollars out of the general fund to build a 
fish hatchery on the Necanicum river near Seaside and gave his time to 
surveying and laying it out. He was for two years president of the Seaside 
Chamber of Commerce.

     Mr. and Mrs. Hurd are the parents of three sons. Elliott E., who was born 
at New Lisbon, Wisconsin, and has attained his majority, attended the 
University of Oregon for one year following his graduation from the high 
school at Seaside and is now a student at the University of Washington in 
Seattle, specializing in foreign commerce. Douglas L., who is also a native of 
New Lisbon, Wisconsin, and is now a youth of eighteen, has completed a high 
school course at Seaside and is attending the Oregon Agricultural College. 
Carroll, who was born at Seaside, Oregon, and is now thirteen years old, is a 
grammar school student.

     A worthy exemplar of the teachings and purposes of the Masonic 
fraternity, Mr. Hurd has membership in the following bodies: Juneau Lodge, No. 
103, A. F. & A. M., of New Lisbon, Wisconsin; Oregon Consistory, No. 1, S. P. 
R. S., of Portland; and Al Kader Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S., of Portland. He is 
likewise affiliated with Astoria Lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order 
of Elks, with the Modern Woodmen of America and the Knights of Pythias. He 
joined the last named a quarter of a century ago and is the possessor of a 
veteran jewel. Both he and his wife are members of the Order of the Eastern 
Star at Seaside, she being past matron. Mrs. Hurd is also a past president of 
the Woman's Club of Seaside and has long been active in club work. She takes a 
leading part in the activities attending the annual flower show at Seaside, 
and among the most admired exhibits are blooms from the charming garden, 
enhanced in beauty with fine shrubbery and a lily pond, which is a feature of 
the attractive home of Mr. and Mrs. Hurd. 

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