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The Klickitat County News, Bingen, WA., November 22, 1934, page 1

BRIEF HISTORY OF FREDERIC H. BALCH, FORMER RESIDENT HERE
Mrs. Elizabeth Stultz, Goldendale, Remembers Famed Author Well;
Death Showed to Be Untimely; Had Great Literary Future in Store; Well Known Locally

(Editor's note: the following article, taken from the valuable historic files belonging to Mrs. Elizabeth Stultz, pioneer resident here, will bring out much of the information about which many interesting stories are told. Frederic Homer Balch, author of "The Bridge of the Gods," resided near Goldendale for many years. The butte near Goldendale was originally named in the author's honor and it is an expressed desire of the pioneers of this section to again name the butte - Balch Butte - a name which has come into disuse in recent years.)
Frederic Homer Balch was born at Lebanon, Linn County, Oregon, December 14, 1861. His parents were both pioneers. He was a boy of great ambition. At a very early age he learned to read and write; also at a very early age he resolved to win fame, no matter what it cost. Afterwards, referring to this resolution, he wrote in his journal: "It may have been a boyish fancy them, but it grew into a burning thirst in after years. Stories of war used to fascinated me. My ancestors have been soldiers for more than 100 years, and I was proud of my Welsh blood - the blood of the old Britons, a line more purely noble and English than Norman and Saxon. My ancestors were free men of England before the Saxons had heard of the "White Cliffs," or the Normans had sailed the Baltic.
When Frederic was about ten years of age, the family moved east of the Cascades to the Klickitat Valley, Washington, and they live there for his journal, "I rode on horseback over the prairies after stock and read all the books I could get, though the frontier libraries were very scanty. Half the education I have I owed to the ceaseless reading and re-reading of Macauley." Milton was one of his boyhood favorites, also "Nicholas Nickleby" and "Jane Eyre." At this time he was constantly writing historical essays and others, and, as he afterwards expressed it "wrote them almost by the bushel."
Young Balch's father encouraged his literary ambitions, and gave him time for his writing; his life was one long dream of future fame. The family again changed its residence, moving down to Mt. Tabor and remaining there two years. Here, as elsewhere, to become an eminent author seemed to dominate him. At this time he gave special attention to poetry and historical sketches. While at Mt. Tabor he attended school for six months.
On account of the mother's health the Balch family again went forth to seek a home. This time they selected a little town called Lyle, in eastern Washington, on the Columbia river. An older half-sister and her two children came to live with them and bought a small farm nearby. This sister, being a widow, it naturally fell to the lot of Frederic to make his home with her; he ever after attributed to his sister the molding of his entire character. Her goodness and wisdom must have been great, as his after life showed such singleness of purpose and pureness of heart.
All this while Frederic was still dreaming dreams and soaring into ambitious thought. But life was not always sunshine, for he was obliged to go into the world and do what ever presented itself in the way of work. The O.R. & N. Co. was then building its line up the Columbia and this gave the opportunity for labor; so Frederic Balch shovels sand and handled rock among the lowest class of humanity. Even while engaging in this manual occupation, his mind was filled with romantic thoughts and he completed an Indian tale, entitled "Wallulah." The name was afterwards used for the name of the heroine of the "The Bridge of the Gods," parts of which he later submitted to one of the first literary critics in the northwest at that time, Judge Matthew P. Deady, who gave it great praise. However, the manuscript was not accepted by the publishers. This romance was afterwards destroyed on account of the strain of infidelity which ran through it, which was at variance with his later convictions.

The Klickitat County News, Bingen, WA., November 29, 1934, page 5

After a time the conviction came to him that he must give up his cherished literary aspirations and obey a command to enter the ministry. The struggle was intense, as he then felt that he was casting aside forever the great, overwhelming ambition of his life. After the final decision was made in favor of the ministry, and fearing lest the work at times with proved discouraging and his literary ambition would lure him again into forbidden paths, he decided to destroy the manuscript of "Wallulah." Its destruction was painful to all the family. His sister clung to him, begging him not to destroy it and trying to save some of it from the flames. But unfalteringly and with the look on his face that one might fancy was on the face of Cecil Gray, his hero of "The Bridge of the Gods," when he turned his back on New England and civilization to become a missionary to the Indians, the minister completed the work of sacrifice. Night after night he studied and wrote, many times by the flickering light of the pine knots in the open fireplace of a pioneer home, toiling hopefully toward the goal of the young author's ambition. Eight such years were thus represented in the completion of this historical romance.
About this time came the loss of the half-sister whose sympathy had been such an inspiring companionship and stimulus for the higher and loftier aspirations of life. In the year 1885 Mr. Balch entered upon his pastorate in Hood River Valley has a home missionary of the First Congregational Church. For the first two years his work in this chosen field paid him $1, his duties arduous and various. He rode all over the valley to minister to his scattered flock and to hold church services. He also served as pastor of a Congregational Church at White Salmon, Wash., just across the Columbia. His zeal was so great that he would stand a hay wagon into Hood River, four miles away, to give his church members and friends opportunity to attend his church service. He succeeded in having a frame church building erected, in which divine service is still held. It is a neat little white church on the edge of a woods, in the heart of the valley, and stands as a monument to his good work. His old home is opposite.
But against all discouragements Mr. Balch felt the crying need of religious work on the frontier, and never waiver a moment from the determination that had come to rule his life, but he threw himself into his speaking, riding and missionary work with the utmost zeal, spending almost all his days on horseback and his nights preaching. This close attention to his pastoral duties, the long rides, the exposures, keeping appointments through drenching rains and blinding snow storms, bore the usual fruits of over-taxation by undermining his health, so that presently he was obliged to give up some of his most arduous labors.
This gave him leisure to divide his time between the church work he retained and his dearly loved but long-denied literary field. In resuming his work in the paths of literature again he did so with a two-fold motive, hoping not only to assist in the uplifting of mankind with pure word and lofty thoughts, but also to preserve for future generations the sometimes beautiful and strange traditions of Indian Oregon, which he was so well prepared to portray. At different periods of his life he had given a great deal of time to studying the Indians, their customs, habits, language and legends. This had been an absorbing study from his boyhood. Often he had gone many miles to talk with some old Indian, both in Oregon and adjoining states.
About this time he went to British Columbia on a vacation and there commenced "The Bridge of the Gods," this Indian legend having appeared to his vivid imagination for years. Finding that he needed the advantages of theological course, and his health demanding a change, in 1889 he entered the Pacific Theological Seminary in Oakland, Cal. While there he revised "The Bridge of the Gods" and placed the manuscript in the hands of his publishers. Mr. Balch remained in the Seminary almost two years. His health now completely broken down upon from an attack of la grippe. He returned to Hood River Valley in March, 1891; but not regaining the desired strength, but the advice of his of his physician he went to the Good Samaritan Hospital. After being there the short space of two weeks, on June 3 he peacefully passed away. His remains were taken to his old home of Lyle, Washington and there laid to rest.
If one is a believer in inherited tendencies, he can hardly trace the deep religious convictions of Frederic Balch to his mother and his scholar attainment to his father Balch. Mrs. Balch was a woman of very strong Christian character with a firm adherence to what she thought was right. Having been left an orphan at an early age, she had formed the habit of sitting all her vital questions by herself. Her wish and hope had always been that her gifted son should follow the ministry. In fact and in thought she had dedicated him to that calling in his earlier infancy. The life of Mrs. Balch was one of devotion to her son, and she was always proud of his achievements. Her grief was so excessive that she survived him only a month or so. Mrs. Balch came across the plains in 1852 in the train and with Dr. Crawford, as his ward. She was then a girl of 16. The Crawfords settled in Linn County and there she married Mr. Balch.
James A. Balch, the father of Frederic, was a man of inventive turn of mind, but lacking practical endeavor. He was born in Sullivan County, Ind., in 1825, came to this coast in 1851, was in frontier service 1864-66, serving as a Lieutenant in Company F., Eighteenth Regiment Oregon Volunteer Infantry. In his early days in the Northwest he taught school while in various places, including Olympia and Tumwater. In his first manhood he attended Wabash College, Indiana, and adopted law as a profession. At one time he served as a County Judge in Klickitat County. An old daguerreotype portrays him as a man of fine presence and intelligence. His son described him as "a very handsome man, full of verve and grace, certainly gifted beyond most of men, a man of intense ambition. My earliest recollections of him is of his returning from the war of the rebellion. It was, I think, a rainy day. We children were all in the house, the others were all waiting excitedly for my father's arrival. I remember the anxious expectancy with which the older ones were awaiting something. Then we heard the stage horn and shortly my father entered the room, a handsome, stately soldier, dressed in uniform. It is a living picture standing there at the farthest limit of my memory."
Frederic Balch left a large accumulation of notes and outlines for future work. A new novel called "Kensaket" had been commenced, and the opening chapters completed. There were also the titles chosen, and outlines drawn for at least six historical romances relating to Indian Oregon. There is also a completed novel in the manuscript called "Genevieve", the plot being laid out near Washougal, Washington.
Oregon sustained an irreparable loss to the early death of Frederick Balch. His fondness for Oregon was a strong passion; her scenery, her views and mountains, her legends, all called to his romantic fancy; the spirit of the Indian past breathed through him. He had resolved to become the Walter Scott of Oregon, to make Oregon as famous as Scott had made Scotland, to make the Cascades as widely known as the Highlands, the Santiam as celebrated as the Tweed or Ayr, to make this splendid scenery of the Columbia and the Willamette the background of romances.
An old friend describes his personality: Tall, slight and dark, but with blue eyes, a man withal of beautiful Christian character. Wherever he was he carried his singular child-like faith with him and the gift of selling the good seed. No one was ever with him an hour without food for thought."

The Klickitat County News, Bingen, WA., December 6, 1934, page 7

(Editors note: Following a series of two articles on the life of Frederic Balch former resident in this valley and an author of note, Mrs. Elizabeth Stultz, pioneer resident here has consented to briefly outline her impressions and experiences as a young lady attending school with this famous man and members of the Balch family.)
"It was in the fall of 1870 when Captain S.H. Miller brought his family to Klickitat valley. We settled on a homestead two miles this side of the Number Six school house.
"The following year, Judge Balch came and settled on a homestead adjoining on the south. In '72 or '73, the Number Six district school house was constructed and four of us children went there to school.
"Martin Harper was our first teacher, Fred Balch went there also. We all rode Indian ponies. I remember that Fred's was a brown Pony with its ears trimmed and its tail cut short but it had a long mane.
"He rode with one end of his stake rope around the nose of the pony which was used as a bridle. We all carried ropes to stake our ponies on the bunch grass near the school.
"When Fred got his pony staked, he went to his desk and stayed there until time to go home.
"When at times I went to his home, he was always at his desk. He seemed to not realize any one was there. He was often seen going miles to get a book to read or to visit Indian camps to get all of the Indian lore he could.
"He was quite tall for his age and always seemed older than he really was.
"The Balch family lived here a few years and then went to a home seven miles northwest of Goldendale, partly located on a butte and now, as the butte was never named, our society has named it Balch Butte.
"I never saw Fred after the family moved to Lyle but heard of him often.
"But back to the Number Six school. Fred Balch, also Judge A.L. Miller and others I do not recall at this time, all of whom attended this little school there, have turned out to be noted men."