Archives West Finding Aid

Eleanor Bernice Day, the second child of Henry and Ellen Day, was born in Gold Hill, California, on December 23, 1867. She was close to her father and as she approached adulthood he relied on her in business matters. Her brothers also respected her astute business sense and sought her counsel. She graduated from the state normal school in San Jose, California in 1887 and taught school and served as an elementary principal in Spokane, Washington from 1887 to 1891. She then taught at Wardner from 1891-1894, Wallace 1894-1896, and Gem 1896-1901. She was a familiar speaker at teachers' meetings and was a supervisor of new teachers. Much of her income between 1890 and 1901 is said to have been invested in the Hercules.

At the age of 34 Eleanor married Edward Boyce, president of the Western Federation of Miners, in Butte, Montana on May 14, 1901. They honeymooned at his family home in Ireland. She then worked part-time in the Denver headquarters of the Western Federation of Miners as a volunteer. She often wrote her father about mining or smelting methods Ed had seen in other mining regions, suggesting them as possibly useful to the Hercules. When Boyce left the Western Federation presidency in 1902, they moved to Wallace and then to Portland, Oregon.

In Portland she indulged her interest in arts and crafts, became a lifetime member of the Portland Art Association, and an affiliate of charitable agencies. The Boyces held majority stock in the Portland Hotel from 1910 to 1942 and invested modestly in other real estate. They lived quietly, often passing the days sitting in the same room reading. After Edward died, Eleanor returned to Wallace, where she died on January 9, 1951, the last surviving child of Harry and Ellen Day.

Edward Boyce was born in County Donegal, Ireland in 1862, and was educated in local schools. He emigrated to Boston at the age of 19 and worked his way west through mining camps. In 1887 he reached Wardner, Idaho where he was employed in mines and became increasingly active in labor organization. As corresponding secretary of the Wardner Union he was jailed for his participation in the mining troubles of 1892. In 1894 he was elected to the Idaho State Senate as a Populist and came away from Boise disillusioned with the bureaucratic process. In 1896 he was elected president of the Western Federation of Miners, and continued in that position until 1902; he also edited its monthly Miners Magazine.

Following his marriage to Eleanor B. Day, he gradually separated himself from organized labor and declined to discuss his part in the miners' union. He was president of the Portland Hotel Company from 1911 to 1941 and in 1936 president of the Oregon Hotel Association. He was an avid reader who preferred social theory and Irish poetry. He died Christmas eve, 1941.