The namesake of Mack's Inn remains one of Island Park's Most Renowned Residents. "Doc" Mack was a legend long before his passing February 24, 1947. The day after Doc's death, the Idaho Falls "Post-Register" memorialized Mack as "part of the Island Park country" whose mannerisms represented "the symbol of western hospitality."
So who was Doc Mack?
Doc Mack's life story is clouded with conflicting accounts and will never be fully known. A few public records pin down some facts of Mack's life. The only narrative resembling a biographical sketch is rife with dubious details and downright errors. Anecdotal folklore seems to indicate Doc Mack was perhaps widely regarded as a "storyteller." Therefore any "reading" of Doc Mack's life should be taken cautiously in a general context without placing too much emphasis on factual certainty.
Without doubt, William H. Mack was born January 3, 1870, in Germany.
According to "The Island Park Story" by Dean Green and James Allison, Mack immigrated to America at the tender age of 12 during a time period which saw unprecedented numbers of Germans enter the United States. (Much later in life, Doc Mack would tell Census Enumerators he immigrated to American in both 1883 and 1884.) The youngster is then said to have traveled to San Francisco to work for an uncle who had financed the boy's ocean and transcontinental passages.
Green and Allison's account says Mack worked 16 hour days for two years in his uncle's large bakeries while learning English by reading newspapers. As a teenager, Mack worked as a cook for some of the San Francisco hotels.
No part of Green & Allison's biographical narrative about Mack is referenced to primary sources or verifiable facts. We presume the authors' account is based on accumulated hearsay laced with typical exaggerated embellishments and miscellaneous myths.
One of Mack's obituaries states that he became a naturalized U.S. Citizen in February 1891 in Madera County, California. Back then any county court could grant citizenship. The trouble with that purported fact is that Madera County didn't exist in 1891. It was formed in 1893 from part of Fresno County. We presume Mack did become a U.S. Citizen in February 1891 because he would have just turned 21 which was the typical age required to apply for citizenship. Our efforts to find his naturalization paper(s) continue.
Nothing else is known of Mack's life between his early-1880's arrival in America and subsequent events. There is nearly a 20 year gap in Mack's life story during this time.
As Green & Allison's story goes, Mack left San Francisco to go to work at the Bluebird Cafe in Logan, Utah. The Bluebird Cafe is a definitely a Logan Legend but it didn't go into business until 1914 by which time Mack was well entrenched in Island Park.
Mack certainly must have gone to Logan for some unknown reason. While there he met young Alberta Bigelow from nearby Milville. Alberta was 17 years old when she became pregnant with the unwed couple's first child. Myrtle was born January 10, 1901, in Springville, Utah. William H. Mack and Alberta Bigelow were married in Logan August 15, 1903. (In the 1930 Census, Mack told the Enumerator he was 21 years old when he was married. Alberta said she was 17 when first married. Ironically, the Enumerator taking down data for the Macks was their daughter Madeline!)
The Green & Allison account claims Mack took his bride to San Francisco where he enrolled in a Medical School. Supposedly, the couple endured the famous 1906 earthquake and Mack then sent his pregnant wife and young child back to Milville for safety.
Well, that account veers far from verifiable reality. William H. and Alberta Mack set up an optometry shop in Blackfoot, Idaho, in 1904 and were listed in the city's directory in 1905. Mack claimed to be a graduate of the South Bend College of Optics. The couple second child was born in 1907, well after the time frame purported in Green & Allison's account.
Green & Allison do mention: "For a short time, he (Mack) traveled around the nearby countryside, fitting glasses for farmers and sheep herders, where his business was much in demand."
The South Bend College of Optics was renowned for its correspondence course. For $25, any diligent student could become a Doctor of Optometry. This appears to be the way that Doc Mack learned his trade and also gained his lifelong nickname.
As of the turn of the century, we can find no evidence that an optometry school existed in or near San Francisco. It is fairly reasonable to speculate Mack completed his optometry correspondence course in the late 1890's and set up a practice in the Cache County region. Such a circumstance may help explain how he might have met and romanced young Miss Alberta Bigelow.
William and Alberta were married in mid-summer 1903 in Logan, Utah, and are listed as having gone in business in Blackfoot in 1904. Sometime after 1905, the couple moved to Rexburg where Doc Mack is reputed to have had a thriving optometry business.
Around this time period, the facts and fiction merge into various confusing assertions. Supposedly, Doc Mack went into business at Trude Siding almost immediately after the railroad reached Yellowstone in 1908. The trouble with that account is that the 1910 U.S. Census clearly shows The Mack Family in Rexburg's 3rd Precinct on April 19, 1910.
Various accounts state that Mack became a Game Warden in Island Park and indeed he did. One 1912 snippet from the "The Bingham County News" states "Deputy Game Warden William H. Mack" visited Blackfoot in early October 1912. It is highly unlikely that Doc Mack would have been operating the first incarnation of Mack's Inn while still employed as a Deputy Game Warden.
At some point after 1912, Doc Mack did indeed go into the inn-keeping business at Trude Siding. There's no doubt about that. The big questions are when did he start the first Mack's Inn at Trude Siding and when did he morph that fledgling business into what has forever since been known as Mack's Inn at the highway bridge over The North Fork of The Snake River (AKA: Henry's Fork).
We will prepare a separate article attempting to decipher and detail the timeline of today's Mack's Inn. The most convincing smoking gun we've found so far pinpoints the creation of the modern Mack's Inn as being in 1921. Most modern accounts of Mack's Inn creation put it in the 1914-16 time frame. There's NO doubt it was 1921. We will discuss this and provide an irrefutable primary source in a subsequent article.
This article is about William H. Mack himself and not the timeline of various locations and buildings and so forth.
Whenever and however Doc Mack wound up established at the Yellowstone highway's bridge over The North Fork, he proceeded to endear himself with the local folks and the traveling public. Doc Mack's stock skyrocketed and burned bright through the 20's, The Great Depression and the early 40's. He was a "kind, gentle, humorously-gruff, sort of a man," Green & Allison said. People adored him as you will read below in the full posthumous tribute published by the Idaho Falls "Post-Register" the day after Doc's death.
Doc Mack built Mack's Inn into a veritable brand back when the only brands people knew were burned into cow hides. Mack's Inn was famous and its fame was due mostly to a larger-than-life character called Doc.
Eventually, the inevitable toll of age worn down Doc and Alberta. They wisely spent their late life winters in Southern California, returning to Mack's Inn just before the annual onslaught of tourists began to arrive. Doc Mack and Alberta could see the handwriting on the wall of their lives. The sold their beloved life's work to Harvey Schwendiman for $50,000 in September 1943. Alberta passed on May 1, 1944, and it wouldn't be too long before Doc Mack himself began to fade. By the time 1946 rolled around, Doc was in declining health and he spent almost 5 months in the hospital before his passing in late February 1947. His death certificate seems to indicate his heart began to fail over 10 months before that.
Although we would dearly love to know more about Doc Mack's early life story, what does it really matter? Doc Mack strolled out onto the stage of Island Park history and made a mark unlikely to ever be equaled. He set an incredibly high bar for hospitality the Old Fashioned Way--one person at a time. Doc Mack forged his own legend in his own way by doing what came naturally to him--being himself and full of himself.
Doc Mack's life story needs to see more sunshine at the newly rejuvenated Mack's Inn development. People need to know and would enjoy learning about the life of a man totally dedicated to promoting Island Park and making people feel welcome year-after-year.
Here is the February 25, 1947, Idaho Falls "Post-Register" tribute to Doc Mack. Few men or women have had such kind and loving words written about them.
"Doc" Mack is gone! The genial old pioneer of the Mack's Inn country, whose cheery greeting and friendly smile were the symbol of western hospitality to the thousands of tourists who stopped at Mack's Inn, passed away early Monday morning in California. With him went something of the spirit of the vacation land he helped to pioneer, something as genuinely a part of the Island Park country as the pines that waved in the wind over his resort. The obituary reported he was christened "William," but there were few who ever knew he had any name but "Doc.” That was a carryover from earlier days when he had practiced optometry. His given name didn't matter. It was "Doc" Mack, the easy to know, hearty, happy, handshaking personality who always met you as your car came to a stop at Mack's Inn among the pines. Whether you were going to stop over night, get a lunch or just a beer, "Doc" was always there. If he met you once he never forgot you, and he always gave the impression that he was "mighty pleased" to see you."Doc" Mack was part of the Island Park country. It won't be the same without him.
