“Pretty Bill From Yam Hill” – Woody the Wise Guy
“Pretty Bill from Yam Hill – He never worked and he never will.”
That is the way Frank H. Woody (now Judge Woody) introduced William C. Darnold to Mrs. Jim Buckley at a dance in Missoula in the fall of 1866. Jim Buckley was sheriff. He and Woody didn’t care much about dances; they wanted to play a game of croquet and Woody volunteered to find an escort for Mrs. Buckley. So he picked out Darnold, a tenderfoot kid then, and took him around to the lady. When it came to the introduction, Woody couldn’t remember Darnold’s name, so he invented the “Pretty Bill.” And as long as he lived in Missoula Darnold was called “Pretty Bill” after that. Mr. Darnold, now a resident of Bremerton Wash., has been making Missoula a visit. He returned to the coast yesterday morning. While he was here he called upon a few of his friends, but his time here was so short that he had not time to see them all. He left a greeting for all of them, however, and asked the Man About Town to deliver it for him. “I struck Missoula July 20, 1866, said Mr. Darnold, in telling his early experiences here. “I had come up from Blackfoot with a bull team and I was glad to get to even the small town that Missoula was then. There were not very many people here then. I recall the men I learned to like as friends that summer. I was a kid of eighteen then and they were good to me. There was Frank Woody, of course; everybody in town knew him then, just as now. The list is not long; there were Frank Worden, Captain Higgins, Charles Hayden, A. Harding, Ned Bonner, Dan Welch, John Hall and Jim Buckley – I think that is pretty nearly the roll call of the whole voting list at that time. But it was a fine lot of men and they made things as pleasant for me as they could. I was never sorry that I came to Missoula, even though Woody did stick that “Pretty Bill” name on to me. I stayed in Missoula until 1872. Then I went away for awhile and came back. Now I am located on the coast. Four years ago I came back here with the body of my wife, who was a sister of Mrs. Frank Worden and who had died on the coast. I had not been here since until now. I wish I could stay long enough to see all of my old friends, but I have to hurry back and I wish you would just let them know I have been here and left my regards for each one of them.”
The above article appeared in The Missoulian on April 7, 1913.
https://www.newspapers.com/image/349058977/?terms=%22yam%2Bhill%22
Mr. Darnold became a salesman for Worden & Co. in 1870’s, moved to Ohio and came back to Montana by 1875. In the 1890’s he worked as a bookkeeper for banker A. J. Davis in a Butte, Mt. bank. He became entangled in a long court case involving the estate of this wealthy Butte banker, where it was alleged that he was paid for his testimony. Missoula’s Judge Hiram Knowles was an officer in Davis’ Butte bank.