THE HORSEMEN

This picture was taken in 1916 - we believe. It was included with a group of pictures, one of which was positively dated by a gentleman who was in one of them. If you click on "Archives" and then "March 2006" you can see one of the other pictures in which the two gentlemen shown here can be recognized.

This photo was taken in front of the Eherenman's Mercantile which was on Sacramento Avenue in the building which is now the Brown Trout Gallery. Jacob (Jake) Eherenman and Frank Tetreau were partners in the business which evolved into our Dunsmuir Hardware. We don't know the names of the two gentlemen in this photo but can surmise that they were draymen working for the mercantile. They probably made trips to the railyard close by to haul merchandise to the store, perhaps to Yreka or Redding over what must have been mighty rough roads to haul shipments of merchandise, and perhaps delivered merchandise to customers. Today we grumble about late or damaged shipments, and about cost of shipping, without giving a thought to what it must have been like before the interstate freeway, UPS, FedEx, air freight, and instant ordering via computer. We recently tranmitted an order to a supplier with the computer and it was delivered the very next day. Amazing when you consider that in 1916 an order would have been transmitted by mail and delivered by wagon such as these. Could have taken weeks.