Scandalous.
Earl Fehl, Southern Oregon Historical Society Archives
Let’s take a break from the updates and let me fill you in on a little history of the house. After we walked through the house at the end of October 2020, I couldn’t help myself - I started digging into the history. This house is in a designated Historical District in Southwest Medford. Lucky for me and my history-loving self, this district has been well documented by the amazing people of the Historical Society (of which I am becoming a member, of course.)
It was easy for me to research the history of this Victorian and what I discovered was juicy. JUICY. And terrible. Super, super terrible.
Earl Fehl (1885-1962) and his wife Electra (1909-1949) owned the house in the early 1900s. I haven’t figured out exactly when they lived here, but I will, don’t worry. Fehl was a local contractor with projects under his belt like the local Holly Theater (drama there as well, and not the theatrical kind.) He also ran a local paper. Fehl always wanted to be in government, particularly a judge, but never won an election. Upset with the way local government was being run, he hitched his horse (not literally) to a guy named Llewelyn Banks. Fehl and Banks used their respective papers to publish attacks on the government, calling for organization to overthrow the existing leadership in Jackson County. In 1932, they started the Good Government Congress, later known nationally as the Jackson County Rebellion, a group of people who wanted to overthrow the government (sound familiar?)
Fehl and another local man associated with the Good Government Congress ran for political positions: Fehl for judge and this other man for sheriff. They both won…not legally, of course. Locals and local officials called for a recount of the ballots, and state officials was found that many rural votes had been tossed into the Rogue River or burned at the courthouse. The election was rigged. in 1933, Fehl was arrested and charged with ballot theft and for conspiracy to commit criminal syndicalism (I had to look this up - it means “a doctrine of criminal acts for political, industrial, and social change. These criminal acts include advocation of crime, sabotage, violence, and other unlawful methods of terrorism. Criminal syndicalism laws were enacted to oppose economic radicalism.”) He served four years in prison for his crimes. His wife, Electra, was also arrested for ballot theft, criminal libel, and attacking witnesses and juries during the trials, though I can’t figure out if she did any time.
Banks, the leader of the Good Government Congress, and Fehl’s…mentor?…was also charged with ballot theft. When the police went to his home to arrest him, he shot the police officer and killed him. The Good Government Congress fell apart after that, as members wanted to distance themselves from Banks, the murderer. He received a life sentence for killing the officer.
In 1937, Fehl was retried in the courts and was committed to the Oregon State Hospital for the Criminally Insane.
Now do you see why we were a bit hesitant to name the house after these folks? Bad, bad people. But the name is just so cool.
SCANDALOUS.
Sources:
Southern Oregon Historical Society
Offbeat Oregon
Wikipedia
