50 years ago in Expo history: An ad man pitched a punny Spokane slogan for the fair

An advertising man came up with a proposed Expo ’74 slogan: “If Anybody Can, Spo-kane.”

Perhaps it needed some work.

Yet it summed up “the impression” that Spokane was making on the world’s corporations and nations, said William K. Pedersen, assistant vice president for advertising and promotion for Eastman Kodak Co. He came up with the slogan after talking to the other exhibitors during a pre-fair meeting in Spokane.

“They’re all surprised that this city – I guess you’d have to call it one of the smallest major cities in the world now – started out to celebrate a centennial and ended up with what will be a truly great world’s fair,” one of his Kodak colleagues said. “We’re impressed – not only with what you’re accomplishing on the site and in the city, but also with the way your community is now getting behind it. The people in the community are excited now, whereas they were not a year ago.”

From 100 years ago: A lumberjack named J.L. McAbee was riding a freight train and attempting to move from car to car when he somehow missed his footing and fell off.

The wheels badly maimed his leg. Then he had to lie next to the track all night, bleeding and in shock. He said he tried to flag down some passing trains, to no avail.

Finally, the next morning, railroad section workers spotted him and took him to Odessa, Washington, where railroad company officials amputated his leg.

He was being taken to Sacred Heart Hospital in Spokane to recover.