SPOKANE 



5505 



SPONGE 



at the lowest stage of water provides immense 

 power for manufacturing purposes. At this 

 point the river is crossed by several bridges; 

 the one at Monroe Street, constructed at a cost 

 of $530,000, has one of the longest single spans 

 of concrete found in any bridge in the United 

 States (281 feet). 



Buildings and Institutions. Most of the 

 buildings are of modern construction; the Fed- 

 eral building, erected in 1909 at a cost of $500,- 

 000, the city hall, the county courthouse, the 

 Auditorium, Masonic Temple, the $2,250,000 

 Davenport Hotel, Elks' Lodge and the Paulsen, 

 Old National Bank, Spokane Club and Review 

 buildings are the most noteworthy. There are 

 more than a hundred churches, the finest of 

 these being the Roman Catholic and Protestant 

 Episcopal cathedrals. Educational institutions 

 include, besides the public schools, five pa- 

 rochial schools, Gonzaga University, Academy 

 of the Holy Name, Brunot Hall for girls, Saint 

 Stephen's School for boys and a public library 

 containing 65,459 volumes. Saint Luke's and 

 Sacred Heart hospitals, Saint Joseph's Orphan- 

 age, Home of the Friendless and the Deaconess 

 Home are among the benevolent institutions. 

 The Spokane division of the government postal 

 inspection service is located here, and Fort 

 Wright, a United States military post, is close 

 to the city. 



Commerce and Industry. Spokane is the 

 commercial and industrial center of the "inland 

 empire," a territory which embraces Eastern 

 Washington, Northern Idaho and Western 

 Montana. It is a region of rich mineral and 

 agricultural resources, containing some of the 

 largest silver-lead mines in the world, and 

 valuable mines of gold and copper. Here the 

 greatest area of pine timber forests in the 

 United States is found, and crop failure in the 

 territory is practically unknown. The region is 

 also well adapted to stock raising (especially 

 sheep) and dairying, and is a highly productive 

 cereal belt, yielding large quantities of wheat. 

 Spokane, through its shipping facilities, is the 

 distributing point for this industrial district. 

 One of the leading factors in the city's pros- 

 perity is vast water power, which supplies light 

 for the city and power for the manufactories. 

 Electric power, generated here, is transmitted 

 to the famous Coeur d' Alene silver-lead mines 

 a hundred miles distant. Lumber mills, flour 

 mills, cereal food plants, sewer and water pipe 

 works and paper mills are the largest establish- 

 ments; jewelry, gloves and canned meats are 

 also produced here. 

 345 



History. Spokane is an Indian name mean- 

 ing children of the sun; hence the city is lo- 

 cally referred to as Sunny Old Spokane. It was 

 settled in 1872 by James N. Glover, and was 

 originally called Spokane Falls. There were 

 only 350 inhabitants in 1880. The next year 

 it was incorporated as a city. It became the 

 county seat in 1882, and the present name was 

 adopted in 1890. The great natural resources of 

 the region needed only the cooperation of rail- 

 roads for the building of a city, and in 1883 

 the Northern Pacific Railroad constructed its 

 line to this point. In August, 1889, the business 

 section was almost completely destroyed by 

 fire, but was quickly rebuilt. Spokane soon be- 

 came a distributing center, and by 1892 eight 

 railroads were entering the city, but the ship- 

 ping facilities scarcely met requirements. Since 

 1884 growth has been steady and rapid. In 

 1910 the commission form of government was 

 adopted. j.s.c. 



Consult Powell's Historic Towns of the Western 

 States. 



SPONGE, spunj, a sea animal whose skele- 

 ton, in a certain species, gives the world its 

 commercial sponges. People used to consider 

 it a plant; this was perhaps due to the fact 

 that it cannot swim, but grows attached to 

 shells, rocks, wharves or the sea bottom. It is 

 curious to note that when it roots in mud it 

 develops a stem in order to keep from being 

 smothered. Living sponges are brilliantly col- 

 ored, different varieties showing various shades 

 of red, yellow, purple, blue and green, as well 

 as brown and gray. While they are found in 

 practically every zone, they develop best in 

 tropical or the warmer temperate regions. 

 They make their homes at all depths close to 

 shore and as many fathoms deep as the ocean 

 has been explored by man and have existed 

 in all ages, for we find sponge fossils in the 

 oldest rock, many of them corresponding to 

 species that are common to-day. 



Structure. The sponge is just one step 

 higher than the simplest form of animal life, 

 the single cell. Beginning with a tiny egg, it 

 develops into a soft mass of slimy flesh made 

 up of many individual cells, all formed through 

 the continued division of the original cell a 

 process called budding. Each of these cells is 

 like a bit of white of egg, and the group forms 

 a colony which is bound together and sup- 

 ported by a strong, fibrous skeleton. The outer 

 membrane of the sponge is extremely porous. 

 From this fact the family derives its special 

 name of Porifera meaning, literally, bearing 



