Millenium Countdown: 1929

Paper: Carson City Daily Appeal - 70 days to the millennium - Friday, March 22, 1929

Editor and Publisher: Henry Rust Mighels Jr.

Address: 102 E. Second St.

Published daily except Sunday at Carson City.

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REWARD

A reward of $10 will be paid for information leading to the arrest and conviction of persons stealing the APPEAL from the premises of a subscriber.

Seventy years ago Hal Mighels was writing editorials about George W. Malone's work to protect Nevada's interests in the construction of the Boulder Dam, which we know today as the Hoover Dam.

Construction was estimated to cost $125 million, but exceeded $175 million by the time it was finished in February 1935. The dam on the Colorado River creating Lake Mead supplies electricity to Arizona, California and Nevada.

In the Appeal of March 22, 1929, Mighels wrote: "DESERVED RELIEF" The passing of a relief bill for George Malone for personal moneys expended in the promotion of Nevada interests in the Boulder Dam legislation, is one of the outstanding deserved relief bills that went through the legislative session.

It was Malone who suggested the amendments that have made the bill worth while to this state. At the outset he was criticized by some for his action, it being the belief that he was asking too much and would only hamper the bill. By his determined insistence and not giving an inch he landed the amendments to the bill which is to be of so much benefit to this state.

It was Malone who spent his own money in carrying on the entertainments and the forced sessions, and while other members of the commission assisted, it was Malone who was quoted in the press dispatches as the moving spirit. There yet remains much work to be done and "Molly" Malone will be representing Nevada at the hearings. He is entitled to the refund of moneys taken from his own pocket.

Though Malone seems to have weathered the storm, gaining acceptance by six of seven states on the agreements that led to the dam's construction, the weather in Carson isn't so grand.

"A TOUGH DAY" With a high windy blizzard condition for a time and some sunshine it has been a tough day, one of the most disagreeable during the legislative session.

During the noon hour a blizzard was in force only to be followed by sunshine within the hour. Parties driving from Washoe Valley later in the day found rough going with snow and a high wind. It has been a tough day all round.

Today, we again take a peak at Carson City's Annie Martin. Since Thursday's edition was sent to press more information surfaced that clears the cobwebs regarding her birth and adoption.

Annie was the first woman to be appointed as superintendent of a federal assay office having outscored the other applicants on the civil service examination. Prior to her work at the former Carson City Mint, she taught school for 13 years quitting to purchase the Carson City Daily News May 17, 1892 until October 1895. She then managed a dry goods store and a stationary store before returning to the News as city editor and bookkeeper. In 1908, she was appointed a clerk at the mint and in 1913 as superintendent.

Carson City resident Kenneth Plummer moved to Carson to live with Annie and take advantage of the city's school system, an improvement over the one-room, eight-grade school house at Hobart Mills.

After Wednesday's interview, Plummer, nephew of Annie Hudnall Martin, found a short biography written by Martin.

Martin wrote she was born Annie Martin Hudnall Feb. 1, 1857, in Memphis, Mo., but later changed her name to Annie Hudnall Martin though she did not make the change through legal channels.

Her father John Randolph Hudnall as born Sept. 16, 1834, and died in October 1918. Her mother Ann Maria Knott was born March 20, 1836, but died when Annie was six days old.

"I was immediately taken by my father's sister, Mrs. Mary Hudnall Martin, and reared as the own child of herself and her husband, Charles Martin, a prominent merchant of Memphis, (MO.)

"At the age of six years the Martin family came to Nevada, traveling overland and reaching Virginia City in August, 1863. Three months later we moved to Carson City where I have resided ever since. I was never legally adopted but I was always considered the eldest child and given the preference over the Martin children. My father Martin was deputy secretary of the territory under Orion Clemens, elder brother of Mark Twain, and continued as deputy secretary of state for seventeen years. He was county recorder for several years and died in 1885. My mother Martin died in 1891."

Charles and Mary Martin had three children: two sons Charles Fred, Henry "Harry" Edwin and a daughter Helen V. Though the three are Annie's cousins the four were raised together as siblings.

Harry was born in February 1866 in Carson City, but died March 2, 1911, in Hobart Mills, where he was postmaster. He died at the age of 41 after losing a battle with Brights disease. His grave is near Annie's in the family plot at Lone Mountain Cemetery.

Charles Fred was born in Memphis, Mo., Nov. 15, 1862 and died July 19, 1920 just a few months after Plummer came to live with Annie in Carson City.

He died after at least two attacks of influenza.

Helen V. Martin is married and living in Long Beach, Calif., at the time of Charles death. She was born in Carson in about 1869, and is listed as in school for the 1880 census.

The Appeal article noting Fred Martin's called him a "retiring, reticent man, making but few friends but always loyal to those few. For several years he was a telegraph lineman for the V. & T. Railway, resigning May 1, 1020, when he found he was unable to attend to the duties of the position."

The paper lists survivors as two sisters, Miss Annie H. Martin of this city, and Mrs. Helen Martin Johnson of Long Beach, Calif., two nephews, Webber M. Calvin of Stockton and Harry Erle Martin of Hobart Mills, and two grand nephews, Kenneth Plummer, Jr. and and Erle Martin Plummer of Alameda.

Funeral and interment was strictly private.

Apparently, the burial was kept private from even the cemetery as no other graves are located in the family plot.

The records of George E. Kitzmeyer say he was buried in the family plot.

A headstone saying only Martin is near the family plot, but no other information is available and it is not in the same plot.

Plummer said Webber Calvin lived with Annie before he did and that she spent