Vern Dimke
June 25, 1926 – December 22, 2014
“I Searched for Adventure…and Found it Everywhere.”
Vern was preceded in death by his sister, Vivian Eileen (Dimke) Bellemere 1917-2013, his brother Ronald Leo Dimke, 1919-1999, and his beloved daughter, Debbie Lynn (Dimke) 1955-1994. He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Shirley M (Spooner) Dimke, his brother, Joe H Dimke 1925- , and his two other children, Dan Lee Dimke 1953- and Tammy Lane (Dimke) Poole 1958-, as well as five grandchildren and 7 great grandchildren.
Vernon Everett Dimke, the youngest of four, was born in Clarkston, Washington early on the warm summer morning of June 25, 1926 – at the height of “American Prohibition”. His father, William Leo Dimke(1893-1962), known and feared in those parts as “Bill”, spent many even warmer days inside the sweating bellies of industrial steam boilers, repairing them from the inside out. After hours he used those skills on smaller boilers of his own creation, distilling and selling the precious liquid that gave “The Roaring 20’s” its name. His mother Madelene Alameta (Van Tine) Dimke (1985-1985), affectionately known as “Madge”, was the cook at Clarkston’s Old Folks Home”. After the untimely death of her mother, Madge took on the task, at the age of 12, cooking for 25 farm hands. And, by the time she married, she had transformed her simple craft into what many considered an art form.
While Bill had a reputation for settling his many disputes with his formidable fists, Madge enjoyed an even wider reputation for bringing joys and happiness into the lives of her many elderly charges and their adoring families through her loving and cheerful personality, her infectious laugh, and her culinary mastery. A testament to this was her own funeral, one of the largest ever held in Clarkston, where the crowds of mourners at Merchants Funeral Home quickly filled all available space and then spilled out to fill much of nearby Vernon Park, where hundreds listened, over hastily improvised loud speakers, to the memorial of one of town’s most beloved daughters.
Vern was still very young as the “Crash of ’29” ushered in the “Great Depression” that would sweep the nation and the world. Regular jobs were now gone. And, with the end of Prohibition, the family’s last source of income evaporated – plunging them, along with millions of families across the country, into grinding poverty. But, this turn of events would prove to be Vern’s primary, lifelong motivation for success. He found himself often repeating his own version of Scarlett O’Hara’s mantra, “As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”
Vern’s first Plane Crash – at the age of 6
Gangs of the ‘30’s spent a lot of their time street fighting. Rank was determined, not with weapons, but by pugilistic prowess. Young Vern felt driven to be the best, a goal he would reach by the age of 15. His swashbuckling boldness was more than enough to earn him the company and respect of other boys twice his age. When several teenaged guys in the gang built their own glider from old wooden crates and spare parts, they were disappointed to discover that it had insufficient lift to carry any of them aloft. “Hey, let’s let Vern try it. He’s small enough and light enough that it might just work.” Jumping at the chance, Vern climbed into the little cockpit and signaled the Model T pick-up driver at the other end of a three hundred foot tow rope. He pulled back on the stick and in seconds, to the delight of everyone, the homemade glider soared upward nearly 80 feet into the air. Never having flown before, and a little panicked at how small everything below had suddenly become, he slammed the stick forward, and plunged to the ground, crashing and utterly destroying the glider. Defiantly, Vern stumbled out of the wreckage of his first plane crash, unaware that it would not be his last. “Are you hurt?” the other guys asked as they rushed over to him.
“No, I’m tough.”, he said. It was a phrase he would repeat after a long list of outrageous stunts, too numerous to mention, that would often come close to claiming his life, all the while adding to the mystique of his seeming indestructibility.
The Bungalow Bridge Dive
“We dare you to jump off, Vern”, a group of his friends taunted the leader of their gang as they stopped on Northern Idaho’s Bungalow Bridge. A couple of them had seen “Tarzan’s New York Adventure” in which Johnny Weissmuller jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River (after a stunt man had died in his attempt). Unlike today, in 1943, the Bungalow Bridge was a steel. bridge,. Vern, who hadn’t seen the movie, looked down over the edge of the guardrail and said, “That’s not too scary..” They all laughed. “. Do it…like Tarzan did it”.(It was maybe 30 – 40 feet down but the real challenge was that it was not very deep. )
“For how much?, Vern asked, as he eyed the maze of metal girders rising above them. They dug into their collective pockets and came up with $3.67. With minimum wage at around 40 cents an hour at the time, he agreed... With his own, hard-fought reputation at stake, he took a deep breath, arms outstretched overhead, hands pressed tightly together, and plunged headfirst into the cold embrace of the Clearwater River.
What happened next was completely unexpected. In the few seconds it took to fall to the raging river below, Vern vividly recalled that his entire life passed before him - seeing every major event in his young life’s story stream by like a high-speed motion picture. This rare moment of reflective reverie was abruptly shattered by the sting of impact of the shallow waters. When he finally surfaced, to the delighted and relieved cheers of his friends, he remembered thinking, “I can top this!”.
The Eagle Cap Mountain Incident
Perhaps is most spectacular stunt was entirely unplanned – yet one that Evel Knievel himself might have been proud of, even without a motorcycle. He and his long-time friend, Dan France, They, had just finished climbing Eagle Cap Mountain (9595 feet). It is not a difficult climb, from the southern face. In fact, in earlier years, working with the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) Vern had even helped to build part of the hiking trail that led up the back slope to the top. But the Northern face, is another matter - a spectacular view from the summit punctuated by sheer, “El Capitan-like” drop of hundreds of feet straight down. As Vern stepped out fearlessly onto the snow covered edge for a better view, Dan called out to him, “Be careful, Vern…”
Too late. At that moment, the edge of the icy crest collapsed beneath him, and he felt himself falling, along with several tons of snow and ice, to the valley below. Fortunately, the grade half-way below the summit is a steeply sloped glacial moraine, and in the early winter, it was already covered with a thick blanket of snow. Vern struck this steep, but narrow, natural ski slope with his back pack on a glancing blow, and found himself sliding downward feet-first at more than 70 miler per hour. Amazed that he had survived the initial fall, he used the shotgun clutched in his outstretched fists to steer and brake, managing to stay on the narrow slope and avoid another sheer drop, off to the left, of hundreds of feet more. But, at the base of the slope, centuries of fallen boulders had accumulated beneath the blanket of snow. It was there that his decent came to an abrupt halt. His shotgun discharged as it snapped in half, along with his left leg.
“Vern!”, Dan called out to him in horror. The only reply was the echo of Dan’s own voice bouncing off the hard face of the surrounding rock cliffs. Scrambling down the back of the mountain, it took more than two hours for Dan to reach him, wondering, all that time, how he was going to haul Vern’s lifeless body back to civilization. But, Vern’s reputation for indestructibility had not been earned lightly. Few people have ever fallen from such a height and lived.
They found a small trapper’s cabin a short distance away where their perplexed host offered them what little he had, some food and a warm fire. This gave them a chance to get a little rest before setting Vern’s leg and tying a crude splint around it. Of course, Vern couldn’t walk. Fortunately, even with misgivings about their chances for survival, the old trapper gave them one of his game sleds that Dan used, to drag Vern for a day and a night and another half day, back to their truck on the main road.
In late spring, they returned to Eagle Cap Valley to thank the trapper again for his help. They were disappointed to find his cabin empty and they never met him again. But, they were grateful that he had been there when it really mattered.
Naval Battles in the Ring
World War II had already been raging for four years when Vern’s invitation from Uncle Sam arrived in the mail in the summer of 1944. Given the choice of services, he chose the Navy, where is older brother, Ronald Leo Dimke, then a Navy Chief, had already served with distinction through one of its darkest days, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941.
Vern, hoped to follow in his brother’s footsteps, bringing his local street fighting experience to bear on a conflict that really mattered. But, as he was completing basic training, in San Diego in early 1945, the war in Europe was all but over and the war in the Pacific Theater would also be coming to an end in a matter of months
So, compared with his teenage years at home, Vern was disappointed to find his military life as a gunner’s mate aboard a destroyer in the Pacific fleet to be comparatively uneventful. But, one thing did fascinate him. The naval boxing ring – the first actual ring he had ever seen. And, his years of experience, fighting his way to the top position in the gangs of Clarkston and Lewiston, had unexpectedly prepared him to compete in a far wider arena. He won his first boxing match handily. And, his successes continued to mount as, one by one, with surprising ease, Vern defeated virtually everyone he faced. His self-taught form was ragged and unpolished. But, connecting with his right-cross was most opponents’ last memory, until after the final count. He became a favorite of the fleet and narrowly lost his final bout in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, against the navy’s reining Brigade Champion. The decision was awarded on points - since, during the match, neither managed to land a single punch on the other. Not a bad beginning for a small-town street fighter without a single day of formal training. Yet, this would turn out to be only the first chapter in Vern’s boxing career.
The Great Eskimo Whale Hunt
Vern’s tour of naval duty ended in a naval supply depot in Anchorage, Alaska. He stayed on in Alaska for awhile to help build radar stations, at triple the hourly rate being offered in the lower 48 - due to difficult working conditions – ruthless icy winds interspersed with moments of calm accompanied by clouds of hungry mosquitos. But, he met another young man who seemed to be remarkably unfazed by the weather or the insects. He was an Eskimo from the nearby Slooko tribe. After finishing his building contract, Vern accepted the invitation to visit this young man’s tribal village and spent the next three months living with these native Inuit people.
To relate this entire experience in Alaska would require a book all its own. But, one adventure needs to be recounted. One morning while, jogging on the beach, playing nip and tuck with the surf, he nearly ran head long into a Right whale that was scratching his belly against the stones along the beach. Startled by, what to him was a most singular wildlife experience, he ran back to the village and announced proudly, “Guess what I just saw.” The response was unlike anything he had expected.
These normally quiet, calm, unemotional people became uncharacteristically excited. And, in all the time he had spent with them, he had rarely seen any of them actually make eye-contact. But now, for almost two minutes, he watched as Howard, the tribal chief, gazed unblinkingly into the eyes of the tribe’s lead hunter.
Before, living with them, Vern had never heard of the extraordinary extra-sensory perception skills of the native Eskimo people. But, since his arrival he had been witness to numerous examples of their amazing psychic abilities.
In these two minutes of eye-contact, the chief and the master harpooner had planned the intricate details of one of the most complex and dangerous Eskimo activities, a whale hunt. And, time was incredibly precious. At the close of this intense telepathic conversation, chief and harpoonist moved off quickly to complete their separate tasks. Within less than ten minutes, five skin boats filled with hunters, weapons and provisions were off in pursuit of one of the largest and most powerful animals on the planet.
As Vern was about to discover, the traditional Eskimo approach to hunting whale was both simple and elegant - perfected over countless generations and using nothing more than native, handmade tools. A more modern weapon, such as a rifle, was useless against these giants of the deep, since a bullet would do little more than lodge harmlessly in the thick layer of blubber that also protects it from the cold arctic water, as it calmly plunges beneath the waves of the Bearing Sea to safety.
Instead the Eskimo used bone-tipped harpoons tethered to walrus bladders that were filled with air. When they encountered the whale, less than an hour later, they were able to thrust three of these harpoons into its side before it dived into the inky arctic deep. A whale sounds to a depth of up to a thousand feet when attacked, going instinctively to a place it knows that no pursuer can follow. But, the Eskimo use its behavior to their advantage. The walrus bladders attached to the harpoons give the whale far greater buoyancy making it more difficult to dive deep and remain submerged. The Eskimo has a second psychic advantage of always knowing the whale’s exact location. Each time the whale surfaced for a breath, the hunters in their skin boats were right there, ready to plant another harpoon and then another, until after dragging more than two dozen walrus bladder floats, diving had become an insurmountable effort. The whale began to tire. It was only then, in desperation that the great marine mammal employed a second elusive strategy – hiding beneath a cluster of ice bergs. Here, between a cleft in the towering blocks of floating ice he could breathe and rest, before attempting his escape.
But, the Eskimo knew this tactic well. In response, the hunting party pulled their skin boats up onto the very ice the whale was hiding beneath, using the time to eat, drink and rest as they waited. As Howard Slooko, the tribal chief sat pensively on the one of the overturned skin boats, Vern decided to use this opportunity to explore their frigid floating island which was more than a thousand feet across. He had only walked about a hundred yards, when the usually soft-spoken leader shouted, “Stop!” with such emphasis that Vern froze in his tracks. Howard walked over to him, and with his whale-bone cane he tapped the ice directly in front of Vern’s feet. It fell away into a deep crevasse that groaned as one great island of ice ground relentlessly against the other. With just another step, Vern now knew that he would have been crushed and shredded between these two great walls of moving ice. “I was standing right here and I didn’t see any difference between the ice I was standing on and the ice in front of me. From so far away, how did you know of the danger here?”, Vern asked with a nervous mixture of fear and wonder.
Howard’s answer was as brief as it was unsatisfying. “Me know”, he replied. “Me know”.
By nightfall, the whale emerged from beneath the ice and the pursuit continued through the night and much of the next day. Twice it nearly capsized one of the skin boats as they gave chase in the open sea. But, the final result was inevitable. In a state of total exhaustion, the great animal was subdued and quickly dispatched. Then, using the combined power of the five skin boat teams they towed the animal back to the village over the next two days. Of course, the entire village already knew they were coming and were ready to celebrate having enough meat and blubber to feed and warm every household for another full year.
Winning the Golden Gloves Title
When Vern returned from Alaska, he entered WSU (then called, WSC Washington State College) in Pullman, under the G.I. Bill. He’d been a football star in high school and hoped to make the college team. But, when he entered the athletics building, the first door on the hall was the boxing door. And, overcome by curiosity he walked in. The coach, Ike Deeter, took one look at the arresting steely-blue-eyed gaze of this unusually intense young fighter and said, “Let’s see what you can do in the ring.”
Over the next two years, 1947-1948, Vern literally fought his way to the Pacific Coast Golden Gloves Tournament Title, using an approach rarely seen in professional heavy-weight bouts and never before witnessed in the 175-pound division of collegiate boxing. Despite the lack of style and finesse, when Vern’s right fist connected with his opponent’s jaw the sheer force of the impacts would often drive the fellow over the ropes, out of the ring, and into the second or third row of the fans – to their sheer amazement and delight. “I learned to throw a punch by harnessing the strength in every muscle of my body, from my toes to my fist”. The result spoke for him. He was quickly pledged to SAE fraternity, whose members willingly tutored Vern, who had never been much of a scholar, in exchange the thrill of having among their ranks one of the best fighters they had ever seen.
The bout to decide the national Golden Gloves title pitted Vern Dimke, WSC Sophomore against Calvin Vernon a black Sophomore from (then) Wisconsin State University. The match was eerily similar to his last Navy fight. Vernon, a talented boxer with an artful dancer-like form had heard of Dimke’s wicked right and deftly prevented him from landing a single decisive punch in three rounds. The bout ended in a technical decision for Calvin Vernon on points - again. The rematch was scheduled in Kalamazoo, MI, but never fought. (No money for transportation.)
The Building Years
Vern returned to Clarkston, working for PFI (Potlatch) and other home builders before deciding that he liked building, but definitely wasn’t cut out to be an employee. So, shortly after marrying Shirley Spooner (who had grown up in Clarkston, just a few houses away from his own) on March 25th of 1953, with a loan of $1000 from his father, they built their first house on Ninth Street. While living there, they built the second of the total of 50 houses that they would construct together over the course of their career.
To this, they added the construction or renovation of 100 apartment units in various locations in Lewiston and Clarkston. Then, and by far, their most ambitious and memorable project, they purchased and renovated of Lincoln Junior High – a classic 1930’s era building that had been slated for demolition. This building held special significance since Vern and Shirley and all three of their children had attended this school. So, without significantly altering the vintage exterior design, Vern transformed each of the classrooms into an apartment, and carved the school Gym into eight more. The finished 40 units are now called ‘The Lincoln Estate”, preserving a structure and a legacy that is fondly remembered by three generations of Clarkston students.
His own home, affectionately known as Rafter Square Ranch, was also home, over the years, to a menagerie of horses, cows, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pigeons, peacocks, and many rescued birds of prey, as well as the Saddeliters 4-H club arena, and a treehouse, with electric lighting and a working elevator, that Vern helped build with his son.
Some of his lesser known projects included:
• Patronage of local artists – resulting in dozens of original works, including a life-sized oil painting of the Crucifixion of Christ.”
• An attempt to organize the construction of a locally-owned dam across the Snake River, the revenue from which would flow into community projects for Lewiston and Clarkston.
• The early stages of a metals reclamation facility, an artistic glass foundry, a wheat bran laboratory, a fiberglass tank plant, an ammunition factory, a Hawaiian pineapple plantation, the attempted construction of a practical flying saucer, plus a few other fanciful misadventures that might begin to strain credibility.
Life in Retrospect - Again
In his later years, Vern expanded the backyard of his Rafter Square Ranch, originally hewn from the heart of a one-time 18-acre apple orchard, to include a Modern Western-style guest house, a small mountain with several waterfalls, two koi ponds, an observation tower, and something rarely found in any backyard, anywhere in the world - a thriving Seventh Day Adventist Church with more than 17 million members.
He survived two plane crashes, the sinking of three boats, four fires, countless car crashes (including, but by no means limited to, a single day of driving at the stock car races – in which he managed to destroy several vehicles along with a wide swath of arena fence) and the loss of a snowmobile over a cliff – later rescued by helicopter. (His reputation for being rather hard on equipment was legendary.)
The final chapter of his exceptional life came to an uncharacteristically quiet close at 9:43 on Monday morning, December 22nd in Clarkston, surrounded by loved ones. He was 88.
June 25, 1926 – December 22, 2014
“I Searched for Adventure…and Found it Everywhere.”
Vern was preceded in death by his sister, Vivian Eileen (Dimke) Bellemere 1917-2013, his brother Ronald Leo Dimke, 1919-1999, and his beloved daughter, Debbie Lynn (Dimke) 1955-1994. He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Shirley M (Spooner) Dimke, his brother, Joe H Dimke 1925- , and his two other children, Dan Lee Dimke 1953- and Tammy Lane (Dimke) Poole 1958-, as well as five grandchildren and 7 great grandchildren.
Vernon Everett Dimke, the youngest of four, was born in Clarkston, Washington early on the warm summer morning of June 25, 1926 – at the height of “American Prohibition”. His father, William Leo Dimke(1893-1962), known and feared in those parts as “Bill”, spent many even warmer days inside the sweating bellies of industrial steam boilers, repairing them from the inside out. After hours he used those skills on smaller boilers of his own creation, distilling and selling the precious liquid that gave “The Roaring 20’s” its name. His mother Madelene Alameta (Van Tine) Dimke (1985-1985), affectionately known as “Madge”, was the cook at Clarkston’s Old Folks Home”. After the untimely death of her mother, Madge took on the task, at the age of 12, cooking for 25 farm hands. And, by the time she married, she had transformed her simple craft into what many considered an art form.
While Bill had a reputation for settling his many disputes with his formidable fists, Madge enjoyed an even wider reputation for bringing joys and happiness into the lives of her many elderly charges and their adoring families through her loving and cheerful personality, her infectious laugh, and her culinary mastery. A testament to this was her own funeral, one of the largest ever held in Clarkston, where the crowds of mourners at Merchants Funeral Home quickly filled all available space and then spilled out to fill much of nearby Vernon Park, where hundreds listened, over hastily improvised loud speakers, to the memorial of one of town’s most beloved daughters.
Vern was still very young as the “Crash of ’29” ushered in the “Great Depression” that would sweep the nation and the world. Regular jobs were now gone. And, with the end of Prohibition, the family’s last source of income evaporated – plunging them, along with millions of families across the country, into grinding poverty. But, this turn of events would prove to be Vern’s primary, lifelong motivation for success. He found himself often repeating his own version of Scarlett O’Hara’s mantra, “As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”
Vern’s first Plane Crash – at the age of 6
Gangs of the ‘30’s spent a lot of their time street fighting. Rank was determined, not with weapons, but by pugilistic prowess. Young Vern felt driven to be the best, a goal he would reach by the age of 15. His swashbuckling boldness was more than enough to earn him the company and respect of other boys twice his age. When several teenaged guys in the gang built their own glider from old wooden crates and spare parts, they were disappointed to discover that it had insufficient lift to carry any of them aloft. “Hey, let’s let Vern try it. He’s small enough and light enough that it might just work.” Jumping at the chance, Vern climbed into the little cockpit and signaled the Model T pick-up driver at the other end of a three hundred foot tow rope. He pulled back on the stick and in seconds, to the delight of everyone, the homemade glider soared upward nearly 80 feet into the air. Never having flown before, and a little panicked at how small everything below had suddenly become, he slammed the stick forward, and plunged to the ground, crashing and utterly destroying the glider. Defiantly, Vern stumbled out of the wreckage of his first plane crash, unaware that it would not be his last. “Are you hurt?” the other guys asked as they rushed over to him.
“No, I’m tough.”, he said. It was a phrase he would repeat after a long list of outrageous stunts, too numerous to mention, that would often come close to claiming his life, all the while adding to the mystique of his seeming indestructibility.
The Bungalow Bridge Dive
“We dare you to jump off, Vern”, a group of his friends taunted the leader of their gang as they stopped on Northern Idaho’s Bungalow Bridge. A couple of them had seen “Tarzan’s New York Adventure” in which Johnny Weissmuller jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River (after a stunt man had died in his attempt). Unlike today, in 1943, the Bungalow Bridge was a steel. bridge,. Vern, who hadn’t seen the movie, looked down over the edge of the guardrail and said, “That’s not too scary..” They all laughed. “. Do it…like Tarzan did it”.(It was maybe 30 – 40 feet down but the real challenge was that it was not very deep. )
“For how much?, Vern asked, as he eyed the maze of metal girders rising above them. They dug into their collective pockets and came up with $3.67. With minimum wage at around 40 cents an hour at the time, he agreed... With his own, hard-fought reputation at stake, he took a deep breath, arms outstretched overhead, hands pressed tightly together, and plunged headfirst into the cold embrace of the Clearwater River.
What happened next was completely unexpected. In the few seconds it took to fall to the raging river below, Vern vividly recalled that his entire life passed before him - seeing every major event in his young life’s story stream by like a high-speed motion picture. This rare moment of reflective reverie was abruptly shattered by the sting of impact of the shallow waters. When he finally surfaced, to the delighted and relieved cheers of his friends, he remembered thinking, “I can top this!”.
The Eagle Cap Mountain Incident
Perhaps is most spectacular stunt was entirely unplanned – yet one that Evel Knievel himself might have been proud of, even without a motorcycle. He and his long-time friend, Dan France, They, had just finished climbing Eagle Cap Mountain (9595 feet). It is not a difficult climb, from the southern face. In fact, in earlier years, working with the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) Vern had even helped to build part of the hiking trail that led up the back slope to the top. But the Northern face, is another matter - a spectacular view from the summit punctuated by sheer, “El Capitan-like” drop of hundreds of feet straight down. As Vern stepped out fearlessly onto the snow covered edge for a better view, Dan called out to him, “Be careful, Vern…”
Too late. At that moment, the edge of the icy crest collapsed beneath him, and he felt himself falling, along with several tons of snow and ice, to the valley below. Fortunately, the grade half-way below the summit is a steeply sloped glacial moraine, and in the early winter, it was already covered with a thick blanket of snow. Vern struck this steep, but narrow, natural ski slope with his back pack on a glancing blow, and found himself sliding downward feet-first at more than 70 miler per hour. Amazed that he had survived the initial fall, he used the shotgun clutched in his outstretched fists to steer and brake, managing to stay on the narrow slope and avoid another sheer drop, off to the left, of hundreds of feet more. But, at the base of the slope, centuries of fallen boulders had accumulated beneath the blanket of snow. It was there that his decent came to an abrupt halt. His shotgun discharged as it snapped in half, along with his left leg.
“Vern!”, Dan called out to him in horror. The only reply was the echo of Dan’s own voice bouncing off the hard face of the surrounding rock cliffs. Scrambling down the back of the mountain, it took more than two hours for Dan to reach him, wondering, all that time, how he was going to haul Vern’s lifeless body back to civilization. But, Vern’s reputation for indestructibility had not been earned lightly. Few people have ever fallen from such a height and lived.
They found a small trapper’s cabin a short distance away where their perplexed host offered them what little he had, some food and a warm fire. This gave them a chance to get a little rest before setting Vern’s leg and tying a crude splint around it. Of course, Vern couldn’t walk. Fortunately, even with misgivings about their chances for survival, the old trapper gave them one of his game sleds that Dan used, to drag Vern for a day and a night and another half day, back to their truck on the main road.
In late spring, they returned to Eagle Cap Valley to thank the trapper again for his help. They were disappointed to find his cabin empty and they never met him again. But, they were grateful that he had been there when it really mattered.
Naval Battles in the Ring
World War II had already been raging for four years when Vern’s invitation from Uncle Sam arrived in the mail in the summer of 1944. Given the choice of services, he chose the Navy, where is older brother, Ronald Leo Dimke, then a Navy Chief, had already served with distinction through one of its darkest days, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941.
Vern, hoped to follow in his brother’s footsteps, bringing his local street fighting experience to bear on a conflict that really mattered. But, as he was completing basic training, in San Diego in early 1945, the war in Europe was all but over and the war in the Pacific Theater would also be coming to an end in a matter of months
So, compared with his teenage years at home, Vern was disappointed to find his military life as a gunner’s mate aboard a destroyer in the Pacific fleet to be comparatively uneventful. But, one thing did fascinate him. The naval boxing ring – the first actual ring he had ever seen. And, his years of experience, fighting his way to the top position in the gangs of Clarkston and Lewiston, had unexpectedly prepared him to compete in a far wider arena. He won his first boxing match handily. And, his successes continued to mount as, one by one, with surprising ease, Vern defeated virtually everyone he faced. His self-taught form was ragged and unpolished. But, connecting with his right-cross was most opponents’ last memory, until after the final count. He became a favorite of the fleet and narrowly lost his final bout in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, against the navy’s reining Brigade Champion. The decision was awarded on points - since, during the match, neither managed to land a single punch on the other. Not a bad beginning for a small-town street fighter without a single day of formal training. Yet, this would turn out to be only the first chapter in Vern’s boxing career.
The Great Eskimo Whale Hunt
Vern’s tour of naval duty ended in a naval supply depot in Anchorage, Alaska. He stayed on in Alaska for awhile to help build radar stations, at triple the hourly rate being offered in the lower 48 - due to difficult working conditions – ruthless icy winds interspersed with moments of calm accompanied by clouds of hungry mosquitos. But, he met another young man who seemed to be remarkably unfazed by the weather or the insects. He was an Eskimo from the nearby Slooko tribe. After finishing his building contract, Vern accepted the invitation to visit this young man’s tribal village and spent the next three months living with these native Inuit people.
To relate this entire experience in Alaska would require a book all its own. But, one adventure needs to be recounted. One morning while, jogging on the beach, playing nip and tuck with the surf, he nearly ran head long into a Right whale that was scratching his belly against the stones along the beach. Startled by, what to him was a most singular wildlife experience, he ran back to the village and announced proudly, “Guess what I just saw.” The response was unlike anything he had expected.
These normally quiet, calm, unemotional people became uncharacteristically excited. And, in all the time he had spent with them, he had rarely seen any of them actually make eye-contact. But now, for almost two minutes, he watched as Howard, the tribal chief, gazed unblinkingly into the eyes of the tribe’s lead hunter.
Before, living with them, Vern had never heard of the extraordinary extra-sensory perception skills of the native Eskimo people. But, since his arrival he had been witness to numerous examples of their amazing psychic abilities.
In these two minutes of eye-contact, the chief and the master harpooner had planned the intricate details of one of the most complex and dangerous Eskimo activities, a whale hunt. And, time was incredibly precious. At the close of this intense telepathic conversation, chief and harpoonist moved off quickly to complete their separate tasks. Within less than ten minutes, five skin boats filled with hunters, weapons and provisions were off in pursuit of one of the largest and most powerful animals on the planet.
As Vern was about to discover, the traditional Eskimo approach to hunting whale was both simple and elegant - perfected over countless generations and using nothing more than native, handmade tools. A more modern weapon, such as a rifle, was useless against these giants of the deep, since a bullet would do little more than lodge harmlessly in the thick layer of blubber that also protects it from the cold arctic water, as it calmly plunges beneath the waves of the Bearing Sea to safety.
Instead the Eskimo used bone-tipped harpoons tethered to walrus bladders that were filled with air. When they encountered the whale, less than an hour later, they were able to thrust three of these harpoons into its side before it dived into the inky arctic deep. A whale sounds to a depth of up to a thousand feet when attacked, going instinctively to a place it knows that no pursuer can follow. But, the Eskimo use its behavior to their advantage. The walrus bladders attached to the harpoons give the whale far greater buoyancy making it more difficult to dive deep and remain submerged. The Eskimo has a second psychic advantage of always knowing the whale’s exact location. Each time the whale surfaced for a breath, the hunters in their skin boats were right there, ready to plant another harpoon and then another, until after dragging more than two dozen walrus bladder floats, diving had become an insurmountable effort. The whale began to tire. It was only then, in desperation that the great marine mammal employed a second elusive strategy – hiding beneath a cluster of ice bergs. Here, between a cleft in the towering blocks of floating ice he could breathe and rest, before attempting his escape.
But, the Eskimo knew this tactic well. In response, the hunting party pulled their skin boats up onto the very ice the whale was hiding beneath, using the time to eat, drink and rest as they waited. As Howard Slooko, the tribal chief sat pensively on the one of the overturned skin boats, Vern decided to use this opportunity to explore their frigid floating island which was more than a thousand feet across. He had only walked about a hundred yards, when the usually soft-spoken leader shouted, “Stop!” with such emphasis that Vern froze in his tracks. Howard walked over to him, and with his whale-bone cane he tapped the ice directly in front of Vern’s feet. It fell away into a deep crevasse that groaned as one great island of ice ground relentlessly against the other. With just another step, Vern now knew that he would have been crushed and shredded between these two great walls of moving ice. “I was standing right here and I didn’t see any difference between the ice I was standing on and the ice in front of me. From so far away, how did you know of the danger here?”, Vern asked with a nervous mixture of fear and wonder.
Howard’s answer was as brief as it was unsatisfying. “Me know”, he replied. “Me know”.
By nightfall, the whale emerged from beneath the ice and the pursuit continued through the night and much of the next day. Twice it nearly capsized one of the skin boats as they gave chase in the open sea. But, the final result was inevitable. In a state of total exhaustion, the great animal was subdued and quickly dispatched. Then, using the combined power of the five skin boat teams they towed the animal back to the village over the next two days. Of course, the entire village already knew they were coming and were ready to celebrate having enough meat and blubber to feed and warm every household for another full year.
Winning the Golden Gloves Title
When Vern returned from Alaska, he entered WSU (then called, WSC Washington State College) in Pullman, under the G.I. Bill. He’d been a football star in high school and hoped to make the college team. But, when he entered the athletics building, the first door on the hall was the boxing door. And, overcome by curiosity he walked in. The coach, Ike Deeter, took one look at the arresting steely-blue-eyed gaze of this unusually intense young fighter and said, “Let’s see what you can do in the ring.”
Over the next two years, 1947-1948, Vern literally fought his way to the Pacific Coast Golden Gloves Tournament Title, using an approach rarely seen in professional heavy-weight bouts and never before witnessed in the 175-pound division of collegiate boxing. Despite the lack of style and finesse, when Vern’s right fist connected with his opponent’s jaw the sheer force of the impacts would often drive the fellow over the ropes, out of the ring, and into the second or third row of the fans – to their sheer amazement and delight. “I learned to throw a punch by harnessing the strength in every muscle of my body, from my toes to my fist”. The result spoke for him. He was quickly pledged to SAE fraternity, whose members willingly tutored Vern, who had never been much of a scholar, in exchange the thrill of having among their ranks one of the best fighters they had ever seen.
The bout to decide the national Golden Gloves title pitted Vern Dimke, WSC Sophomore against Calvin Vernon a black Sophomore from (then) Wisconsin State University. The match was eerily similar to his last Navy fight. Vernon, a talented boxer with an artful dancer-like form had heard of Dimke’s wicked right and deftly prevented him from landing a single decisive punch in three rounds. The bout ended in a technical decision for Calvin Vernon on points - again. The rematch was scheduled in Kalamazoo, MI, but never fought. (No money for transportation.)
The Building Years
Vern returned to Clarkston, working for PFI (Potlatch) and other home builders before deciding that he liked building, but definitely wasn’t cut out to be an employee. So, shortly after marrying Shirley Spooner (who had grown up in Clarkston, just a few houses away from his own) on March 25th of 1953, with a loan of $1000 from his father, they built their first house on Ninth Street. While living there, they built the second of the total of 50 houses that they would construct together over the course of their career.
To this, they added the construction or renovation of 100 apartment units in various locations in Lewiston and Clarkston. Then, and by far, their most ambitious and memorable project, they purchased and renovated of Lincoln Junior High – a classic 1930’s era building that had been slated for demolition. This building held special significance since Vern and Shirley and all three of their children had attended this school. So, without significantly altering the vintage exterior design, Vern transformed each of the classrooms into an apartment, and carved the school Gym into eight more. The finished 40 units are now called ‘The Lincoln Estate”, preserving a structure and a legacy that is fondly remembered by three generations of Clarkston students.
His own home, affectionately known as Rafter Square Ranch, was also home, over the years, to a menagerie of horses, cows, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pigeons, peacocks, and many rescued birds of prey, as well as the Saddeliters 4-H club arena, and a treehouse, with electric lighting and a working elevator, that Vern helped build with his son.
Some of his lesser known projects included:
• Patronage of local artists – resulting in dozens of original works, including a life-sized oil painting of the Crucifixion of Christ.”
• An attempt to organize the construction of a locally-owned dam across the Snake River, the revenue from which would flow into community projects for Lewiston and Clarkston.
• The early stages of a metals reclamation facility, an artistic glass foundry, a wheat bran laboratory, a fiberglass tank plant, an ammunition factory, a Hawaiian pineapple plantation, the attempted construction of a practical flying saucer, plus a few other fanciful misadventures that might begin to strain credibility.
Life in Retrospect - Again
In his later years, Vern expanded the backyard of his Rafter Square Ranch, originally hewn from the heart of a one-time 18-acre apple orchard, to include a Modern Western-style guest house, a small mountain with several waterfalls, two koi ponds, an observation tower, and something rarely found in any backyard, anywhere in the world - a thriving Seventh Day Adventist Church with more than 17 million members.
He survived two plane crashes, the sinking of three boats, four fires, countless car crashes (including, but by no means limited to, a single day of driving at the stock car races – in which he managed to destroy several vehicles along with a wide swath of arena fence) and the loss of a snowmobile over a cliff – later rescued by helicopter. (His reputation for being rather hard on equipment was legendary.)
The final chapter of his exceptional life came to an uncharacteristically quiet close at 9:43 on Monday morning, December 22nd in Clarkston, surrounded by loved ones. He was 88.
Vern Dimke
June 25, 1926 – December 22, 2014
“I Searched for Adventure…and Found it Everywhere.”
Vern was preceded in death by his sister, Vivian Eileen (Dimke) Bellemere 1917-2013, his brother Ronald Leo Dimke, 1919-1999, and his beloved daughter, Debbie Lynn (Dimke) 1955-1994. He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Shirley M (Spooner) Dimke, his brother, Joe H Dimke 1925- , and his two other children, Dan Lee Dimke 1953- and Tammy Lane (Dimke) Poole 1958-, as well as five grandchildren and 7 great grandchildren.
Vernon Everett Dimke, the youngest of four, was born in Clarkston, Washington early on the warm summer morning of June 25, 1926 – at the height of “American Prohibition”. His father, William Leo Dimke(1893-1962), known and feared in those parts as “Bill”, spent many even warmer days inside the sweating bellies of industrial steam boilers, repairing them from the inside out. After hours he used those skills on smaller boilers of his own creation, distilling and selling the precious liquid that gave “The Roaring 20’s” its name. His mother Madelene Alameta (Van Tine) Dimke (1985-1985), affectionately known as “Madge”, was the cook at Clarkston’s Old Folks Home”. After the untimely death of her mother, Madge took on the task, at the age of 12, cooking for 25 farm hands. And, by the time she married, she had transformed her simple craft into what many considered an art form.
While Bill had a reputation for settling his many disputes with his formidable fists, Madge enjoyed an even wider reputation for bringing joys and happiness into the lives of her many elderly charges and their adoring families through her loving and cheerful personality, her infectious laugh, and her culinary mastery. A testament to this was her own funeral, one of the largest ever held in Clarkston, where the crowds of mourners at Merchants Funeral Home quickly filled all available space and then spilled out to fill much of nearby Vernon Park, where hundreds listened, over hastily improvised loud speakers, to the memorial of one of town’s most beloved daughters.
Vern was still very young as the “Crash of ’29” ushered in the “Great Depression” that would sweep the nation and the world. Regular jobs were now gone. And, with the end of Prohibition, the family’s last source of income evaporated – plunging them, along with millions of families across the country, into grinding poverty. But, this turn of events would prove to be Vern’s primary, lifelong motivation for success. He found himself often repeating his own version of Scarlett O’Hara’s mantra, “As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”
Vern’s first Plane Crash – at the age of 6
Gangs of the ‘30’s spent a lot of their time street fighting. Rank was determined, not with weapons, but by pugilistic prowess. Young Vern felt driven to be the best, a goal he would reach by the age of 15. His swashbuckling boldness was more than enough to earn him the company and respect of other boys twice his age. When several teenaged guys in the gang built their own glider from old wooden crates and spare parts, they were disappointed to discover that it had insufficient lift to carry any of them aloft. “Hey, let’s let Vern try it. He’s small enough and light enough that it might just work.” Jumping at the chance, Vern climbed into the little cockpit and signaled the Model T pick-up driver at the other end of a three hundred foot tow rope. He pulled back on the stick and in seconds, to the delight of everyone, the homemade glider soared upward nearly 80 feet into the air. Never having flown before, and a little panicked at how small everything below had suddenly become, he slammed the stick forward, and plunged to the ground, crashing and utterly destroying the glider. Defiantly, Vern stumbled out of the wreckage of his first plane crash, unaware that it would not be his last. “Are you hurt?” the other guys asked as they rushed over to him.
“No, I’m tough.”, he said. It was a phrase he would repeat after a long list of outrageous stunts, too numerous to mention, that would often come close to claiming his life, all the while adding to the mystique of his seeming indestructibility.
The Bungalow Bridge Dive
“We dare you to jump off, Vern”, a group of his friends taunted the leader of their gang as they stopped on Northern Idaho’s Bungalow Bridge. A couple of them had seen “Tarzan’s New York Adventure” in which Johnny Weissmuller jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River (after a stunt man had died in his attempt). Unlike today, in 1943, the Bungalow Bridge was a steel. bridge,. Vern, who hadn’t seen the movie, looked down over the edge of the guardrail and said, “That’s not too scary..” They all laughed. “. Do it…like Tarzan did it”.(It was maybe 30 – 40 feet down but the real challenge was that it was not very deep. )
“For how much?, Vern asked, as he eyed the maze of metal girders rising above them. They dug into their collective pockets and came up with $3.67. With minimum wage at around 40 cents an hour at the time, he agreed... With his own, hard-fought reputation at stake, he took a deep breath, arms outstretched overhead, hands pressed tightly together, and plunged headfirst into the cold embrace of the Clearwater River.
What happened next was completely unexpected. In the few seconds it took to fall to the raging river below, Vern vividly recalled that his entire life passed before him - seeing every major event in his young life’s story stream by like a high-speed motion picture. This rare moment of reflective reverie was abruptly shattered by the sting of impact of the shallow waters. When he finally surfaced, to the delighted and relieved cheers of his friends, he remembered thinking, “I can top this!”.
The Eagle Cap Mountain Incident
Perhaps is most spectacular stunt was entirely unplanned – yet one that Evel Knievel himself might have been proud of, even without a motorcycle. He and his long-time friend, Dan France, They, had just finished climbing Eagle Cap Mountain (9595 feet). It is not a difficult climb, from the southern face. In fact, in earlier years, working with the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) Vern had even helped to build part of the hiking trail that led up the back slope to the top. But the Northern face, is another matter - a spectacular view from the summit punctuated by sheer, “El Capitan-like” drop of hundreds of feet straight down. As Vern stepped out fearlessly onto the snow covered edge for a better view, Dan called out to him, “Be careful, Vern…”
Too late. At that moment, the edge of the icy crest collapsed beneath him, and he felt himself falling, along with several tons of snow and ice, to the valley below. Fortunately, the grade half-way below the summit is a steeply sloped glacial moraine, and in the early winter, it was already covered with a thick blanket of snow. Vern struck this steep, but narrow, natural ski slope with his back pack on a glancing blow, and found himself sliding downward feet-first at more than 70 miler per hour. Amazed that he had survived the initial fall, he used the shotgun clutched in his outstretched fists to steer and brake, managing to stay on the narrow slope and avoid another sheer drop, off to the left, of hundreds of feet more. But, at the base of the slope, centuries of fallen boulders had accumulated beneath the blanket of snow. It was there that his decent came to an abrupt halt. His shotgun discharged as it snapped in half, along with his left leg.
“Vern!”, Dan called out to him in horror. The only reply was the echo of Dan’s own voice bouncing off the hard face of the surrounding rock cliffs. Scrambling down the back of the mountain, it took more than two hours for Dan to reach him, wondering, all that time, how he was going to haul Vern’s lifeless body back to civilization. But, Vern’s reputation for indestructibility had not been earned lightly. Few people have ever fallen from such a height and lived.
They found a small trapper’s cabin a short distance away where their perplexed host offered them what little he had, some food and a warm fire. This gave them a chance to get a little rest before setting Vern’s leg and tying a crude splint around it. Of course, Vern couldn’t walk. Fortunately, even with misgivings about their chances for survival, the old trapper gave them one of his game sleds that Dan used, to drag Vern for a day and a night and another half day, back to their truck on the main road.
In late spring, they returned to Eagle Cap Valley to thank the trapper again for his help. They were disappointed to find his cabin empty and they never met him again. But, they were grateful that he had been there when it really mattered.
Naval Battles in the Ring
World War II had already been raging for four years when Vern’s invitation from Uncle Sam arrived in the mail in the summer of 1944. Given the choice of services, he chose the Navy, where is older brother, Ronald Leo Dimke, then a Navy Chief, had already served with distinction through one of its darkest days, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941.
Vern, hoped to follow in his brother’s footsteps, bringing his local street fighting experience to bear on a conflict that really mattered. But, as he was completing basic training, in San Diego in early 1945, the war in Europe was all but over and the war in the Pacific Theater would also be coming to an end in a matter of months
So, compared with his teenage years at home, Vern was disappointed to find his military life as a gunner’s mate aboard a destroyer in the Pacific fleet to be comparatively uneventful. But, one thing did fascinate him. The naval boxing ring – the first actual ring he had ever seen. And, his years of experience, fighting his way to the top position in the gangs of Clarkston and Lewiston, had unexpectedly prepared him to compete in a far wider arena. He won his first boxing match handily. And, his successes continued to mount as, one by one, with surprising ease, Vern defeated virtually everyone he faced. His self-taught form was ragged and unpolished. But, connecting with his right-cross was most opponents’ last memory, until after the final count. He became a favorite of the fleet and narrowly lost his final bout in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, against the navy’s reining Brigade Champion. The decision was awarded on points - since, during the match, neither managed to land a single punch on the other. Not a bad beginning for a small-town street fighter without a single day of formal training. Yet, this would turn out to be only the first chapter in Vern’s boxing career.
The Great Eskimo Whale Hunt
Vern’s tour of naval duty ended in a naval supply depot in Anchorage, Alaska. He stayed on in Alaska for awhile to help build radar stations, at triple the hourly rate being offered in the lower 48 - due to difficult working conditions – ruthless icy winds interspersed with moments of calm accompanied by clouds of hungry mosquitos. But, he met another young man who seemed to be remarkably unfazed by the weather or the insects. He was an Eskimo from the nearby Slooko tribe. After finishing his building contract, Vern accepted the invitation to visit this young man’s tribal village and spent the next three months living with these native Inuit people.
To relate this entire experience in Alaska would require a book all its own. But, one adventure needs to be recounted. One morning while, jogging on the beach, playing nip and tuck with the surf, he nearly ran head long into a Right whale that was scratching his belly against the stones along the beach. Startled by, what to him was a most singular wildlife experience, he ran back to the village and announced proudly, “Guess what I just saw.” The response was unlike anything he had expected.
These normally quiet, calm, unemotional people became uncharacteristically excited. And, in all the time he had spent with them, he had rarely seen any of them actually make eye-contact. But now, for almost two minutes, he watched as Howard, the tribal chief, gazed unblinkingly into the eyes of the tribe’s lead hunter.
Before, living with them, Vern had never heard of the extraordinary extra-sensory perception skills of the native Eskimo people. But, since his arrival he had been witness to numerous examples of their amazing psychic abilities.
In these two minutes of eye-contact, the chief and the master harpooner had planned the intricate details of one of the most complex and dangerous Eskimo activities, a whale hunt. And, time was incredibly precious. At the close of this intense telepathic conversation, chief and harpoonist moved off quickly to complete their separate tasks. Within less than ten minutes, five skin boats filled with hunters, weapons and provisions were off in pursuit of one of the largest and most powerful animals on the planet.
As Vern was about to discover, the traditional Eskimo approach to hunting whale was both simple and elegant - perfected over countless generations and using nothing more than native, handmade tools. A more modern weapon, such as a rifle, was useless against these giants of the deep, since a bullet would do little more than lodge harmlessly in the thick layer of blubber that also protects it from the cold arctic water, as it calmly plunges beneath the waves of the Bearing Sea to safety.
Instead the Eskimo used bone-tipped harpoons tethered to walrus bladders that were filled with air. When they encountered the whale, less than an hour later, they were able to thrust three of these harpoons into its side before it dived into the inky arctic deep. A whale sounds to a depth of up to a thousand feet when attacked, going instinctively to a place it knows that no pursuer can follow. But, the Eskimo use its behavior to their advantage. The walrus bladders attached to the harpoons give the whale far greater buoyancy making it more difficult to dive deep and remain submerged. The Eskimo has a second psychic advantage of always knowing the whale’s exact location. Each time the whale surfaced for a breath, the hunters in their skin boats were right there, ready to plant another harpoon and then another, until after dragging more than two dozen walrus bladder floats, diving had become an insurmountable effort. The whale began to tire. It was only then, in desperation that the great marine mammal employed a second elusive strategy – hiding beneath a cluster of ice bergs. Here, between a cleft in the towering blocks of floating ice he could breathe and rest, before attempting his escape.
But, the Eskimo knew this tactic well. In response, the hunting party pulled their skin boats up onto the very ice the whale was hiding beneath, using the time to eat, drink and rest as they waited. As Howard Slooko, the tribal chief sat pensively on the one of the overturned skin boats, Vern decided to use this opportunity to explore their frigid floating island which was more than a thousand feet across. He had only walked about a hundred yards, when the usually soft-spoken leader shouted, “Stop!” with such emphasis that Vern froze in his tracks. Howard walked over to him, and with his whale-bone cane he tapped the ice directly in front of Vern’s feet. It fell away into a deep crevasse that groaned as one great island of ice ground relentlessly against the other. With just another step, Vern now knew that he would have been crushed and shredded between these two great walls of moving ice. “I was standing right here and I didn’t see any difference between the ice I was standing on and the ice in front of me. From so far away, how did you know of the danger here?”, Vern asked with a nervous mixture of fear and wonder.
Howard’s answer was as brief as it was unsatisfying. “Me know”, he replied. “Me know”.
By nightfall, the whale emerged from beneath the ice and the pursuit continued through the night and much of the next day. Twice it nearly capsized one of the skin boats as they gave chase in the open sea. But, the final result was inevitable. In a state of total exhaustion, the great animal was subdued and quickly dispatched. Then, using the combined power of the five skin boat teams they towed the animal back to the village over the next two days. Of course, the entire village already knew they were coming and were ready to celebrate having enough meat and blubber to feed and warm every household for another full year.
Winning the Golden Gloves Title
When Vern returned from Alaska, he entered WSU (then called, WSC Washington State College) in Pullman, under the G.I. Bill. He’d been a football star in high school and hoped to make the college team. But, when he entered the athletics building, the first door on the hall was the boxing door. And, overcome by curiosity he walked in. The coach, Ike Deeter, took one look at the arresting steely-blue-eyed gaze of this unusually intense young fighter and said, “Let’s see what you can do in the ring.”
Over the next two years, 1947-1948, Vern literally fought his way to the Pacific Coast Golden Gloves Tournament Title, using an approach rarely seen in professional heavy-weight bouts and never before witnessed in the 175-pound division of collegiate boxing. Despite the lack of style and finesse, when Vern’s right fist connected with his opponent’s jaw the sheer force of the impacts would often drive the fellow over the ropes, out of the ring, and into the second or third row of the fans – to their sheer amazement and delight. “I learned to throw a punch by harnessing the strength in every muscle of my body, from my toes to my fist”. The result spoke for him. He was quickly pledged to SAE fraternity, whose members willingly tutored Vern, who had never been much of a scholar, in exchange the thrill of having among their ranks one of the best fighters they had ever seen.
The bout to decide the national Golden Gloves title pitted Vern Dimke, WSC Sophomore against Calvin Vernon a black Sophomore from (then) Wisconsin State University. The match was eerily similar to his last Navy fight. Vernon, a talented boxer with an artful dancer-like form had heard of Dimke’s wicked right and deftly prevented him from landing a single decisive punch in three rounds. The bout ended in a technical decision for Calvin Vernon on points - again. The rematch was scheduled in Kalamazoo, MI, but never fought. (No money for transportation.)
The Building Years
Vern returned to Clarkston, working for PFI (Potlatch) and other home builders before deciding that he liked building, but definitely wasn’t cut out to be an employee. So, shortly after marrying Shirley Spooner (who had grown up in Clarkston, just a few houses away from his own) on March 25th of 1953, with a loan of $1000 from his father, they built their first house on Ninth Street. While living there, they built the second of the total of 50 houses that they would construct together over the course of their career.
To this, they added the construction or renovation of 100 apartment units in various locations in Lewiston and Clarkston. Then, and by far, their most ambitious and memorable project, they purchased and renovated of Lincoln Junior High – a classic 1930’s era building that had been slated for demolition. This building held special significance since Vern and Shirley and all three of their children had attended this school. So, without significantly altering the vintage exterior design, Vern transformed each of the classrooms into an apartment, and carved the school Gym into eight more. The finished 40 units are now called ‘The Lincoln Estate”, preserving a structure and a legacy that is fondly remembered by three generations of Clarkston students.
His own home, affectionately known as Rafter Square Ranch, was also home, over the years, to a menagerie of horses, cows, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pigeons, peacocks, and many rescued birds of prey, as well as the Saddeliters 4-H club arena, and a treehouse, with electric lighting and a working elevator, that Vern helped build with his son.
Some of his lesser known projects included:
• Patronage of local artists – resulting in dozens of original works, including a life-sized oil painting of the Crucifixion of Christ.”
• An attempt to organize the construction of a locally-owned dam across the Snake River, the revenue from which would flow into community projects for Lewiston and Clarkston.
• The early stages of a metals reclamation facility, an artistic glass foundry, a wheat bran laboratory, a fiberglass tank plant, an ammunition factory, a Hawaiian pineapple plantation, the attempted construction of a practical flying saucer, plus a few other fanciful misadventures that might begin to strain credibility.
Life in Retrospect - Again
In his later years, Vern expanded the backyard of his Rafter Square Ranch, originally hewn from the heart of a one-time 18-acre apple orchard, to include a Modern Western-style guest house, a small mountain with several waterfalls, two koi ponds, an observation tower, and something rarely found in any backyard, anywhere in the world - a thriving Seventh Day Adventist Church with more than 17 million members.
He survived two plane crashes, the sinking of three boats, four fires, countless car crashes (including, but by no means limited to, a single day of driving at the stock car races – in which he managed to destroy several vehicles along with a wide swath of arena fence) and the loss of a snowmobile over a cliff – later rescued by helicopter. (His reputation for being rather hard on equipment was legendary.)
The final chapter of his exceptional life came to an uncharacteristically quiet close at 9:43 on Monday morning, December 22nd in Clarkston, surrounded by loved ones. He was 88.
June 25, 1926 – December 22, 2014
“I Searched for Adventure…and Found it Everywhere.”
Vern was preceded in death by his sister, Vivian Eileen (Dimke) Bellemere 1917-2013, his brother Ronald Leo Dimke, 1919-1999, and his beloved daughter, Debbie Lynn (Dimke) 1955-1994. He is survived by his wife of 61 years, Shirley M (Spooner) Dimke, his brother, Joe H Dimke 1925- , and his two other children, Dan Lee Dimke 1953- and Tammy Lane (Dimke) Poole 1958-, as well as five grandchildren and 7 great grandchildren.
Vernon Everett Dimke, the youngest of four, was born in Clarkston, Washington early on the warm summer morning of June 25, 1926 – at the height of “American Prohibition”. His father, William Leo Dimke(1893-1962), known and feared in those parts as “Bill”, spent many even warmer days inside the sweating bellies of industrial steam boilers, repairing them from the inside out. After hours he used those skills on smaller boilers of his own creation, distilling and selling the precious liquid that gave “The Roaring 20’s” its name. His mother Madelene Alameta (Van Tine) Dimke (1985-1985), affectionately known as “Madge”, was the cook at Clarkston’s Old Folks Home”. After the untimely death of her mother, Madge took on the task, at the age of 12, cooking for 25 farm hands. And, by the time she married, she had transformed her simple craft into what many considered an art form.
While Bill had a reputation for settling his many disputes with his formidable fists, Madge enjoyed an even wider reputation for bringing joys and happiness into the lives of her many elderly charges and their adoring families through her loving and cheerful personality, her infectious laugh, and her culinary mastery. A testament to this was her own funeral, one of the largest ever held in Clarkston, where the crowds of mourners at Merchants Funeral Home quickly filled all available space and then spilled out to fill much of nearby Vernon Park, where hundreds listened, over hastily improvised loud speakers, to the memorial of one of town’s most beloved daughters.
Vern was still very young as the “Crash of ’29” ushered in the “Great Depression” that would sweep the nation and the world. Regular jobs were now gone. And, with the end of Prohibition, the family’s last source of income evaporated – plunging them, along with millions of families across the country, into grinding poverty. But, this turn of events would prove to be Vern’s primary, lifelong motivation for success. He found himself often repeating his own version of Scarlett O’Hara’s mantra, “As God is my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.”
Vern’s first Plane Crash – at the age of 6
Gangs of the ‘30’s spent a lot of their time street fighting. Rank was determined, not with weapons, but by pugilistic prowess. Young Vern felt driven to be the best, a goal he would reach by the age of 15. His swashbuckling boldness was more than enough to earn him the company and respect of other boys twice his age. When several teenaged guys in the gang built their own glider from old wooden crates and spare parts, they were disappointed to discover that it had insufficient lift to carry any of them aloft. “Hey, let’s let Vern try it. He’s small enough and light enough that it might just work.” Jumping at the chance, Vern climbed into the little cockpit and signaled the Model T pick-up driver at the other end of a three hundred foot tow rope. He pulled back on the stick and in seconds, to the delight of everyone, the homemade glider soared upward nearly 80 feet into the air. Never having flown before, and a little panicked at how small everything below had suddenly become, he slammed the stick forward, and plunged to the ground, crashing and utterly destroying the glider. Defiantly, Vern stumbled out of the wreckage of his first plane crash, unaware that it would not be his last. “Are you hurt?” the other guys asked as they rushed over to him.
“No, I’m tough.”, he said. It was a phrase he would repeat after a long list of outrageous stunts, too numerous to mention, that would often come close to claiming his life, all the while adding to the mystique of his seeming indestructibility.
The Bungalow Bridge Dive
“We dare you to jump off, Vern”, a group of his friends taunted the leader of their gang as they stopped on Northern Idaho’s Bungalow Bridge. A couple of them had seen “Tarzan’s New York Adventure” in which Johnny Weissmuller jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge into the East River (after a stunt man had died in his attempt). Unlike today, in 1943, the Bungalow Bridge was a steel. bridge,. Vern, who hadn’t seen the movie, looked down over the edge of the guardrail and said, “That’s not too scary..” They all laughed. “. Do it…like Tarzan did it”.(It was maybe 30 – 40 feet down but the real challenge was that it was not very deep. )
“For how much?, Vern asked, as he eyed the maze of metal girders rising above them. They dug into their collective pockets and came up with $3.67. With minimum wage at around 40 cents an hour at the time, he agreed... With his own, hard-fought reputation at stake, he took a deep breath, arms outstretched overhead, hands pressed tightly together, and plunged headfirst into the cold embrace of the Clearwater River.
What happened next was completely unexpected. In the few seconds it took to fall to the raging river below, Vern vividly recalled that his entire life passed before him - seeing every major event in his young life’s story stream by like a high-speed motion picture. This rare moment of reflective reverie was abruptly shattered by the sting of impact of the shallow waters. When he finally surfaced, to the delighted and relieved cheers of his friends, he remembered thinking, “I can top this!”.
The Eagle Cap Mountain Incident
Perhaps is most spectacular stunt was entirely unplanned – yet one that Evel Knievel himself might have been proud of, even without a motorcycle. He and his long-time friend, Dan France, They, had just finished climbing Eagle Cap Mountain (9595 feet). It is not a difficult climb, from the southern face. In fact, in earlier years, working with the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) Vern had even helped to build part of the hiking trail that led up the back slope to the top. But the Northern face, is another matter - a spectacular view from the summit punctuated by sheer, “El Capitan-like” drop of hundreds of feet straight down. As Vern stepped out fearlessly onto the snow covered edge for a better view, Dan called out to him, “Be careful, Vern…”
Too late. At that moment, the edge of the icy crest collapsed beneath him, and he felt himself falling, along with several tons of snow and ice, to the valley below. Fortunately, the grade half-way below the summit is a steeply sloped glacial moraine, and in the early winter, it was already covered with a thick blanket of snow. Vern struck this steep, but narrow, natural ski slope with his back pack on a glancing blow, and found himself sliding downward feet-first at more than 70 miler per hour. Amazed that he had survived the initial fall, he used the shotgun clutched in his outstretched fists to steer and brake, managing to stay on the narrow slope and avoid another sheer drop, off to the left, of hundreds of feet more. But, at the base of the slope, centuries of fallen boulders had accumulated beneath the blanket of snow. It was there that his decent came to an abrupt halt. His shotgun discharged as it snapped in half, along with his left leg.
“Vern!”, Dan called out to him in horror. The only reply was the echo of Dan’s own voice bouncing off the hard face of the surrounding rock cliffs. Scrambling down the back of the mountain, it took more than two hours for Dan to reach him, wondering, all that time, how he was going to haul Vern’s lifeless body back to civilization. But, Vern’s reputation for indestructibility had not been earned lightly. Few people have ever fallen from such a height and lived.
They found a small trapper’s cabin a short distance away where their perplexed host offered them what little he had, some food and a warm fire. This gave them a chance to get a little rest before setting Vern’s leg and tying a crude splint around it. Of course, Vern couldn’t walk. Fortunately, even with misgivings about their chances for survival, the old trapper gave them one of his game sleds that Dan used, to drag Vern for a day and a night and another half day, back to their truck on the main road.
In late spring, they returned to Eagle Cap Valley to thank the trapper again for his help. They were disappointed to find his cabin empty and they never met him again. But, they were grateful that he had been there when it really mattered.
Naval Battles in the Ring
World War II had already been raging for four years when Vern’s invitation from Uncle Sam arrived in the mail in the summer of 1944. Given the choice of services, he chose the Navy, where is older brother, Ronald Leo Dimke, then a Navy Chief, had already served with distinction through one of its darkest days, the Attack on Pearl Harbor, December 7, 1941.
Vern, hoped to follow in his brother’s footsteps, bringing his local street fighting experience to bear on a conflict that really mattered. But, as he was completing basic training, in San Diego in early 1945, the war in Europe was all but over and the war in the Pacific Theater would also be coming to an end in a matter of months
So, compared with his teenage years at home, Vern was disappointed to find his military life as a gunner’s mate aboard a destroyer in the Pacific fleet to be comparatively uneventful. But, one thing did fascinate him. The naval boxing ring – the first actual ring he had ever seen. And, his years of experience, fighting his way to the top position in the gangs of Clarkston and Lewiston, had unexpectedly prepared him to compete in a far wider arena. He won his first boxing match handily. And, his successes continued to mount as, one by one, with surprising ease, Vern defeated virtually everyone he faced. His self-taught form was ragged and unpolished. But, connecting with his right-cross was most opponents’ last memory, until after the final count. He became a favorite of the fleet and narrowly lost his final bout in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, against the navy’s reining Brigade Champion. The decision was awarded on points - since, during the match, neither managed to land a single punch on the other. Not a bad beginning for a small-town street fighter without a single day of formal training. Yet, this would turn out to be only the first chapter in Vern’s boxing career.
The Great Eskimo Whale Hunt
Vern’s tour of naval duty ended in a naval supply depot in Anchorage, Alaska. He stayed on in Alaska for awhile to help build radar stations, at triple the hourly rate being offered in the lower 48 - due to difficult working conditions – ruthless icy winds interspersed with moments of calm accompanied by clouds of hungry mosquitos. But, he met another young man who seemed to be remarkably unfazed by the weather or the insects. He was an Eskimo from the nearby Slooko tribe. After finishing his building contract, Vern accepted the invitation to visit this young man’s tribal village and spent the next three months living with these native Inuit people.
To relate this entire experience in Alaska would require a book all its own. But, one adventure needs to be recounted. One morning while, jogging on the beach, playing nip and tuck with the surf, he nearly ran head long into a Right whale that was scratching his belly against the stones along the beach. Startled by, what to him was a most singular wildlife experience, he ran back to the village and announced proudly, “Guess what I just saw.” The response was unlike anything he had expected.
These normally quiet, calm, unemotional people became uncharacteristically excited. And, in all the time he had spent with them, he had rarely seen any of them actually make eye-contact. But now, for almost two minutes, he watched as Howard, the tribal chief, gazed unblinkingly into the eyes of the tribe’s lead hunter.
Before, living with them, Vern had never heard of the extraordinary extra-sensory perception skills of the native Eskimo people. But, since his arrival he had been witness to numerous examples of their amazing psychic abilities.
In these two minutes of eye-contact, the chief and the master harpooner had planned the intricate details of one of the most complex and dangerous Eskimo activities, a whale hunt. And, time was incredibly precious. At the close of this intense telepathic conversation, chief and harpoonist moved off quickly to complete their separate tasks. Within less than ten minutes, five skin boats filled with hunters, weapons and provisions were off in pursuit of one of the largest and most powerful animals on the planet.
As Vern was about to discover, the traditional Eskimo approach to hunting whale was both simple and elegant - perfected over countless generations and using nothing more than native, handmade tools. A more modern weapon, such as a rifle, was useless against these giants of the deep, since a bullet would do little more than lodge harmlessly in the thick layer of blubber that also protects it from the cold arctic water, as it calmly plunges beneath the waves of the Bearing Sea to safety.
Instead the Eskimo used bone-tipped harpoons tethered to walrus bladders that were filled with air. When they encountered the whale, less than an hour later, they were able to thrust three of these harpoons into its side before it dived into the inky arctic deep. A whale sounds to a depth of up to a thousand feet when attacked, going instinctively to a place it knows that no pursuer can follow. But, the Eskimo use its behavior to their advantage. The walrus bladders attached to the harpoons give the whale far greater buoyancy making it more difficult to dive deep and remain submerged. The Eskimo has a second psychic advantage of always knowing the whale’s exact location. Each time the whale surfaced for a breath, the hunters in their skin boats were right there, ready to plant another harpoon and then another, until after dragging more than two dozen walrus bladder floats, diving had become an insurmountable effort. The whale began to tire. It was only then, in desperation that the great marine mammal employed a second elusive strategy – hiding beneath a cluster of ice bergs. Here, between a cleft in the towering blocks of floating ice he could breathe and rest, before attempting his escape.
But, the Eskimo knew this tactic well. In response, the hunting party pulled their skin boats up onto the very ice the whale was hiding beneath, using the time to eat, drink and rest as they waited. As Howard Slooko, the tribal chief sat pensively on the one of the overturned skin boats, Vern decided to use this opportunity to explore their frigid floating island which was more than a thousand feet across. He had only walked about a hundred yards, when the usually soft-spoken leader shouted, “Stop!” with such emphasis that Vern froze in his tracks. Howard walked over to him, and with his whale-bone cane he tapped the ice directly in front of Vern’s feet. It fell away into a deep crevasse that groaned as one great island of ice ground relentlessly against the other. With just another step, Vern now knew that he would have been crushed and shredded between these two great walls of moving ice. “I was standing right here and I didn’t see any difference between the ice I was standing on and the ice in front of me. From so far away, how did you know of the danger here?”, Vern asked with a nervous mixture of fear and wonder.
Howard’s answer was as brief as it was unsatisfying. “Me know”, he replied. “Me know”.
By nightfall, the whale emerged from beneath the ice and the pursuit continued through the night and much of the next day. Twice it nearly capsized one of the skin boats as they gave chase in the open sea. But, the final result was inevitable. In a state of total exhaustion, the great animal was subdued and quickly dispatched. Then, using the combined power of the five skin boat teams they towed the animal back to the village over the next two days. Of course, the entire village already knew they were coming and were ready to celebrate having enough meat and blubber to feed and warm every household for another full year.
Winning the Golden Gloves Title
When Vern returned from Alaska, he entered WSU (then called, WSC Washington State College) in Pullman, under the G.I. Bill. He’d been a football star in high school and hoped to make the college team. But, when he entered the athletics building, the first door on the hall was the boxing door. And, overcome by curiosity he walked in. The coach, Ike Deeter, took one look at the arresting steely-blue-eyed gaze of this unusually intense young fighter and said, “Let’s see what you can do in the ring.”
Over the next two years, 1947-1948, Vern literally fought his way to the Pacific Coast Golden Gloves Tournament Title, using an approach rarely seen in professional heavy-weight bouts and never before witnessed in the 175-pound division of collegiate boxing. Despite the lack of style and finesse, when Vern’s right fist connected with his opponent’s jaw the sheer force of the impacts would often drive the fellow over the ropes, out of the ring, and into the second or third row of the fans – to their sheer amazement and delight. “I learned to throw a punch by harnessing the strength in every muscle of my body, from my toes to my fist”. The result spoke for him. He was quickly pledged to SAE fraternity, whose members willingly tutored Vern, who had never been much of a scholar, in exchange the thrill of having among their ranks one of the best fighters they had ever seen.
The bout to decide the national Golden Gloves title pitted Vern Dimke, WSC Sophomore against Calvin Vernon a black Sophomore from (then) Wisconsin State University. The match was eerily similar to his last Navy fight. Vernon, a talented boxer with an artful dancer-like form had heard of Dimke’s wicked right and deftly prevented him from landing a single decisive punch in three rounds. The bout ended in a technical decision for Calvin Vernon on points - again. The rematch was scheduled in Kalamazoo, MI, but never fought. (No money for transportation.)
The Building Years
Vern returned to Clarkston, working for PFI (Potlatch) and other home builders before deciding that he liked building, but definitely wasn’t cut out to be an employee. So, shortly after marrying Shirley Spooner (who had grown up in Clarkston, just a few houses away from his own) on March 25th of 1953, with a loan of $1000 from his father, they built their first house on Ninth Street. While living there, they built the second of the total of 50 houses that they would construct together over the course of their career.
To this, they added the construction or renovation of 100 apartment units in various locations in Lewiston and Clarkston. Then, and by far, their most ambitious and memorable project, they purchased and renovated of Lincoln Junior High – a classic 1930’s era building that had been slated for demolition. This building held special significance since Vern and Shirley and all three of their children had attended this school. So, without significantly altering the vintage exterior design, Vern transformed each of the classrooms into an apartment, and carved the school Gym into eight more. The finished 40 units are now called ‘The Lincoln Estate”, preserving a structure and a legacy that is fondly remembered by three generations of Clarkston students.
His own home, affectionately known as Rafter Square Ranch, was also home, over the years, to a menagerie of horses, cows, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pigeons, peacocks, and many rescued birds of prey, as well as the Saddeliters 4-H club arena, and a treehouse, with electric lighting and a working elevator, that Vern helped build with his son.
Some of his lesser known projects included:
• Patronage of local artists – resulting in dozens of original works, including a life-sized oil painting of the Crucifixion of Christ.”
• An attempt to organize the construction of a locally-owned dam across the Snake River, the revenue from which would flow into community projects for Lewiston and Clarkston.
• The early stages of a metals reclamation facility, an artistic glass foundry, a wheat bran laboratory, a fiberglass tank plant, an ammunition factory, a Hawaiian pineapple plantation, the attempted construction of a practical flying saucer, plus a few other fanciful misadventures that might begin to strain credibility.
Life in Retrospect - Again
In his later years, Vern expanded the backyard of his Rafter Square Ranch, originally hewn from the heart of a one-time 18-acre apple orchard, to include a Modern Western-style guest house, a small mountain with several waterfalls, two koi ponds, an observation tower, and something rarely found in any backyard, anywhere in the world - a thriving Seventh Day Adventist Church with more than 17 million members.
He survived two plane crashes, the sinking of three boats, four fires, countless car crashes (including, but by no means limited to, a single day of driving at the stock car races – in which he managed to destroy several vehicles along with a wide swath of arena fence) and the loss of a snowmobile over a cliff – later rescued by helicopter. (His reputation for being rather hard on equipment was legendary.)
The final chapter of his exceptional life came to an uncharacteristically quiet close at 9:43 on Monday morning, December 22nd in Clarkston, surrounded by loved ones. He was 88.
Bio by: Historic Preservation
Inscription
"For me to live is Christ
and to die is gain"
Phil 1:21
Family Members
Sponsored by Ancestry
Advertisement
Explore more
Sponsored by Ancestry
Advertisement
