Two Telephone Companies Race to Wire the Pend Oreille Valley
Newport expected telephone connection to Metaline and the Calispel country in 1908, with two companies promising to build the line.
It now appears certain that the Calispel and lower Pend Oreille valleys will have telephonic connection with Newport this year. In fact, they may have more telephones than they know what to do with, as both the Interstate and Pacific States Telephone Telegraph Companies have announced their intention of building to Metaline from Newport this year.
The Interstate Company is at the present time engaged in building a line from Rathdrum to Newport, and the next leg for the extension is to be put into Metaline.
The valley country has long felt the need of telephonic connection with Newport. The development of the country tributary to Newport, down the Pend Oreille, will cause large sums of money to be expended for public utilities during the next few years.
“It now appears certain that the Calispel and lower Pend Oreille valleys will have telephonic connection with Newport this year.”
The fight to connect isolated Pend Oreille valleys by telephone echoes today's rural broadband gaps. Then as now, utilities followed the promise of development—and communities waited on infrastructure that outside companies controlled.
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