Historic Hood River
Blowers Hardware Store
10-25-2017
Notes
Here’s yet another image identified as “Blower’s Store”. From the merchandise this looks like a hardware store, while the older images show a store with dry good and groceries. The men are identified as L. M. Blowers, Joe Tompkins, and W. J. Baker. I believe the man in the middle is Lawrence Blowers.
I believe this would be Lawrence Blowers hardware store on Oak Street, not his father Amby S. Blowers general store of an earlier era.
Charlott
Seem to always come back to "our friend" Pansy DeWitt. W.J. Baker = William Baker was Pansy’s father. He was a very involved personage in H. R. Though he owned a great deal of valuable real estate he also was a real estate agent and loaned money in the agricultural industry. He was very involved in the affairs of H. R. being on both the city council and school board. We a member of a good number of the fraternal organizations.
Joe Tompkins was in the Bakers and Cooks SCH. O.M.C. in WWI. He was a native of Illinois. Parents: Jacob and Mary Tompkins.
Wife: Mary Alice Rogers.
L.E.
I am sitting here this morning in front of the TV watching the Portland news. The news features a number of break-ins and robberies. One business surveillance camera showed the glass front door being shattered and the thief running in and grabbing items.
We know robberies happened during the era of this photo, but what a haul today’s thief could have made in this store.
Kevin
The picture over their heads behind the counter looks like a military unit picture. Military precision in the way products are arranged. The butcher knives have a blade shape you don’t see much anymore. Notice the bear display in front of the shovels in the back? Looks like he’s selling something.
Arthur
Kevin, I think you’re correct about the photo being a military unit. Based on the ages of the men I’ll suggest it’s a WW I unit. Thanks for pointing out the bear cutout. I’d missed him. He is holding an open wooden box with what look like pears in it, though they are pretty blurry.
Longshot
A lot of very practical looking wares on the shelves and in the display cases. Would love to know what is in all the boxes. Have to wonder is any of the items shown in this photo are still to be found anywhere in Hood River, Co.
Jeffrey Bryant
An Illustrated History of Central Oregon, Western Historical Publishing Company, Spokane, WA. 1905, page 382
LAURENCE N. BLOWERS was a prominent business man of Flood River for fifteen years, but tiring of the exacting and arduous life of a merchant, sold his business here in March, 1904, and was appointed Deputy United States Marshall upon the recommendation of United States Senator Charles W. Fulton and Representative J.N. Williamson. He is therefore residing temporarily at Portland. His birth occurred in Iowa, on April 18, 1867, his parents being Amby S. and Ellen (Damon) Blowers, who are particularly mentioned elsewhere in this volume.
When an infant, our subject was taken by his parents to Minnesota and thence, with the family, which consisted of his parents and eight children, he came to Oregon. His education was received from the schools in the various places where he had resided and when fifteen years of age, he embarked in business with his father. In 1889, they came to Hood River, and soon there-after, they bought out E.L. Smith, a leading merchant, and since that time they have continued at the head of a large business. However, our subject has spent one year in Sumpter, Oregon, where he was in the mercantile business and while in that town, he was elected mayor. He was also, the second mayor of Hood River, and in these public capacities, as in private life, the same care and faithfulness characterized his acts. For three years, Mr. Blowers served as lieutenant of Company D, Oregon National Guards, his father being captain.
At Hood River, on August 29, 1891, Mr. Blowers married Miss Bertha Mifflin, a native of Washington, D.C. Her father, Charles H. Mifflin, was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, coming from a family well known in history for worth and prominence. One of the family, Major General Thomas Mifflin, was president of the Continental Congress and later, first governor of Pennsylvania. The county and town of Mifflin, Pennsylvania were named from this family. Charles H. Mifflin married Miss Alice Lipscomb, a native of Washington, D.C., and descended from a leading Virginia family. Mrs. Blowers has one sister, Elizabeth, wife of W.J. Parker, a merchant in Denver, Colorado. Four children have been born to Mr. and Mrs. Blowers, namely Paul Mifflin, Loyd Mifflin, Ellen and Ruth. Mr. Blowers is a member of the A.F. & A.M., and a man of excellent standing and prestige in the community.
Jeffrey Bryant
The History of Oregon, Charles Henry Carey, The Pioneer Historical Publishing Co., Chicago-Portland, 1922 Volume III, pages 481
WILLIAM JOHN BAKER
William J. Baker, a well known dealer in real estate in Hood River county, a writer of insurance and also a maker of loans for agricultural purposes and a prominent citizen of Hood River, was born across the border in Canada in 1851, of English descent, but has been a resident of the United States since he was two years old and may justly be regarded as an American product.
He is a son of William and Margaret Baker. The father, an Englishman by birth, was an extensive manufacturer and also the proprietor of a prosperous newspaper. He came to America in 1840. His wife’s people had located in Canada many years before that date and were classed among the early settlers of that country. In 1853 William Baker moved his family across the border and located in Iowa, where they lived for several years.
It was there that William J. Baker was reared and educated. His first work was in the railroad service with which he was connected for nearly twenty years, and he still holds his membership in the Order of Railroad Conductors. In 1882 he came to Oregon and entered the service of the Oregon & Washington Railroad & Navigation Company, remaining with that company for four years.
In 1886 Mr. Baker located at Hood River and commenced farming, having some thirty acres in orchard. In 1904 he abandoned the farm and opened a real estate office in Hood River, where he has been engaged in the real estate business for the past sixteen years and has aided in locating many orchardists and farmers, besides handling much city property. Mr. Baker is a large taxpayer, owning much valuable property in Hood River, where he enjoys a large measure of popularity. While in no sense a professional politician, he is an earnest supporter of the republican party and has been a delegate to many conventions. He has been a member of the city council and for several years served as a member of the school board, his interest in education being deep and abiding, believing that a nation’s greatness depends in large measure upon the education of its children.
In 1884 Mr. Baker was united in marriage to Florence H. Alford, a native of Pennsylvania, whose father in his day was a well-known hotel man in Nebraska. Mr. and Mrs. Baker are the parents of four children, namely: Mrs. H. T. DeWitt, of Hood River; Mrs. Marjorie Fouts, of Portland; William J. Baker, of Hood River; and Katharine E., a student at the University of Oregon.
Mr. Baker is a member of the Masonic order; is a Master Mason, a Knight Templar and a Noble of the Mystic Shrine, and he is also affiliated with the Odd Fellows. In connection with his real estate business, he writes general insurance and advances loans for the purpose of acquiring farming lands or city properties, and he is regarded as one of the most substantial citizens of Hood River.
Kelly Dodd
The family store.