HILL’S COUNTRY
is perhaps remarkably distinguished for his present-day obscurity. The Sam Hill in question is not the Sam Hill referenced in “What in the Sam Hill are you doing?” That honor has been attributed to a slate of Sam Hills, none of whom is this Sam Hill. The formerly notable Sam Hill was a visionary businessman, arguably manic, who over a 50-year career worked for gas and phone companies and coal mines and had a hand in the expansion of the Great Northern railroad into the West. Marrying the daughter of railroad boss J.J. Hill (no relation) in 1888 didn’t hurt Sam Hill’s prospects. But later in life Hill became more enamored of two things: the rugged splendor of the Pacific Northwest and the creation of
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