A lot of readers recognized this photo in front of Boise High School, and sent me some tips that helped me learn a bit more about it. I found it at Boise Bodega, but some recognized it from the Ram or 13th Street Pub & Grill — it’s been circulated quite a bit.
The picture was taken by R. Harold Sigler, a local photographer who worked from the 1910s to the 1950s and has his own digitized collection at the Idaho State Archives. I learned about it thanks to a reader who works at the Idaho State Historical Society, who found the photo in their digitized collections and shared it with me.
The photo depicts Boise High’s 1933 eleven-member girl’s tumbling team. I’d have loved to find out whose idea it was to spell out “BOISE,” but that remains a mystery. The tumbling team got the only non-traditional photo out of the nine Boise High sports teams Sigler photographed that year.
While several people knew of connections to one or more of the girls, I haven’t been able to track down a 1933 Boise High yearbook yet, and I only got one name from readers.
Lucille Eason is one of the girls comprising the “E,” according to her granddaughter and a former neighbor, both of whom wrote in about the photo. Eason passed away at the age of 100.
“She was a firecracker of a person and we miss her in the neighborhood,” her former neighbor Alita said. “Never a dull moment with that one.”
Apparently, there’s also a museum being planned for the basement of Boise High, where this photo will be displayed.
If you find out or know more about this photo, I’m still curious, so send it my way!
