Hopping a Freight Train to Idaho By Max Jenkins Photos Courtesy of Max Jenkins My dad, Wes Jenkins, loved farming. But to find his first paying job, he had to live through the Midwest Dust Bowl, overcome the Depression, and … Continue reading
The Curb Ditch Project By Max Jenkins In the spring of 1958, I finished my sophomore year in pharmacy at Idaho State College in Pocatello and returned to my folks’ home on the south side of Grangeville. A month earlier, … Continue reading
Good at Everything Story and photos by Max Jenkins “They’re a fantastic dance team,” people kept saying. I wasn’t the jealous type, but it was hard not to be a little worried. This was in the 1950s at Idaho State … Continue reading
A Thunderbird Convertible By Max Jenkins On a pleasant evening in Grangeville in July 1955, I came home early from work and was helping Mom set the table when Dad pulled into the driveway. He’d been honking halfway up South … Continue reading
Private or Public Potatoes? By Max Jenkins Photos Courtesy of Max Jenkins On a Saturday morning early in 1950, as I dusted the new cars in the Jordan Motors showroom, a big black vehicle pulled up and parked across the … Continue reading
Tracing the Origins of Contemporary Idaho Story and Photos by Max Jenkins For a long time, I didn’t understand why the terrain varied so widely throughout much of Idaho. This mystery arose in my boyhood, after our family moved to … Continue reading
In a Forty-Below Winter By Max Jenkins My Dad, Wes Jenkins, became part-owner of an auto sales company in Grangeville in the spring of 1948, when I was in third grade. He was always a good salesman, and he also … Continue reading
And at 120 m.p.h. By Max Jenkins Last year on the afternoon of Sunday, June 24, my wife Jean and I drove to the Star Airport to skydive. It was a beautiful sunny day with no wind. People from our … Continue reading
And a Lot of Idaho Talk Story and Photos by Max Jenkins When we left Idaho in June 1967, the sign at the outskirts of Boise read: “Population, 36,800 something.” Meridian’s population was about twenty-two hundred and mostly farmland. The … Continue reading
And Why Are Idaho’s Wheat Crops the Best? Story and Photos by Max Jenkins My dad, Wes Jenkins, was known as a character in Idaho County. He loved kidding his many friends, and they loved kidding him back. For shock … Continue reading
