In October 1892, Boise had many reasons to be proud of its achievements. Not only did it have the magnificent new Natatorium on Warm Springs Avenue, but electric street cars would take you there from Downtown for only 5 cents.
The city had electric lights, telephones and a Western Union telegraph connection with the rest of the country. There was a brand new railroad station on Front Street where you could take the train to Nampa for connections east or west via the Oregon Short Line Railroad, a part of the Union Pacific system.
1892 was a year of great optimism in Boise, reflected by an age of mansion-building in the picturesque Queen Anne style of architecture. Banker C.W. Moore’s big brick house at the corner of Warm Springs and Walnut was the first in the country to be heated with geothermal water, and others along the avenue were quick to connect to the system. Wealthy pioneers William Ridenbaugh, Frank Coffin, James Bush, and Selden Kingsbury built impressive mansions of their own in the ’90s.
The new Natatorium had a narrow escape in July 1893, when fire broke out in its kitchen. Damage was not serious, however, and was mostly caused by the water used to put it out. In October the Idaho Statesman reported that although the water in the great Natatorium plunge was constantly changing, the management was having it drained and scrubbed every 10 days.
The nation’s attention was focused on Chicago in 1893 where the World’s Columbian Exhibition opened to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the landing of Christopher Columbus in the New World. It opened a year later than planned because it took longer than anticipated to build what was by far the largest and most impressive world’s fair to that time. Nearly all of its buildings were neoclassical in style, painted white, a feature that soon had it dubbed “the Great White City.” (The Idaho Building was a notable exception. It was a big log cabin made of giant red cedar logs from the forests of North Idaho.)
Many things that year took their names from Columbus, including a Professor Pasmore’s Columbia orchestra that played for dancing every Saturday night at the Natatorium. The Statesman called it “excellent” and added, “The dancing room at the popular resort is very fine and these dances under this management will be delightful. The professor desires to keep the orchestra together, and to do this it is necessary to provide means of revenue for it. All are interested in maintaining the orchestra, and it is hoped the Natatorium enterprise will be well patronized.”
There is a suggestion in this plea that Boise was beginning to feel the pinch of what would soon become the worst depression of the 19th century, one in which some Boise businessmen went broke. Pasmore couldn’t keep his orchestra together unless people supported it by coming to the Natatorium dances.
In January 1894, the dance floor at the Nat was improved by replacing the columns that supported its ceiling with a Howe truss, a change, the paper said, “that will add greatly to the comfort and pleasure of the dancers.”
Semi-classical concerts at the Nat were offered by the Boise Band on Saturdays, followed by dancing to the music of Chrisman’s orchestra, successor to Pasmore’s group of the previous year.
Through good times and bad, for 40 more years, the Natatorium kept going as a center of Boise life, but in 1934, in the depths of the Great Depression, a freak summer storm sealed its fate. On the morning of July 31, 1934, a Statesman headline proclaimed “BRIEF HURRICANE SPILLS TORRENT ON SWELTERING CITY. Many Trees Down… A section of the roof at the Natatorium at the end of Warm Springs Avenue broke in, carrying a multi-globed chandelier into the plunge at the deep end. Nobody was struck.”
Two days later the city building inspector condemned it as unsafe.
On Aug. 19, 1934, the Statesman reported, “What expectations Boise had that the venerable, rickety Natatorium would become a city swimming hole were blasted Saturday by an announcement from T.B. Jackson, local executive head of the Natatorium company, to the effect that the proposal was “out of the question. The company can by no means afford to give the plant to the city,” he said. “There is a big investment tied up in the Nat. It cost about $150,000. Even though it isn’t worth that much now, and not making a great deal of money, it is too much of a gift.”
The Natatorium itself had been demolished by the end of October 1934, but its owners decided to fix up the pool and continue to operate it in summer months, with only the blue Idaho sky as a roof. The Statesman commented: “The Natatorium is dead. Long live the Natatorium!” The pool is still there and still in use.
Arthur Hart writes this column on Idaho history for the Idaho Statesman each Sunday. Email histnart@mindspring.com.
