 Idaho,
the 43rd state, joined the U.S. in 1890. The state is
appropriately shaped like a logger's boot, and logging as well
as mining are big industries in the state. But the state is
probably best known for its potatoes. The state's name is
thought to be an Indian name, Ee-dah-hoe, which means "gem of
the mountains." Idaho has a rugged landscape with some of the
largest unspoiled natural areas in the country. Boise is the
capital and the state flower is the syringa.
Native people have lived in Idaho for more than 14,000 years,
beginning to create bows, arrows and pottery about 1500 years
ago.
The Louisiana Purchase, in 1803, included the Idaho territory.
That momentous event was soon followed by the Lewis and Clark
Expedition, which traversed Central Idaho in an unfulfilled
quest for a navigable route to the Pacific Ocean. Lewis and
Clark entered what is now Idaho at Lemhi Pass near Salmon only
to encounter seemingly endless, forbidding peaks ahead of them.
Traders and trappers would soon follow. Kullyspell House, the
first non-native establishment in the Northwest, was built near
Lake Pend Oreille in 1809, followed by Fort Henry near St.
Anthony in Eastern Idaho.
In 1830, Captain Bonneville escorted the first wagon train
across southern Idaho and in 1834 Fort Hall and Fort Boise were
established. By 1843, the Oregon Trail migration had begun but
most emigrants bypassed Idaho for milder climates in Oregon.
That would change soon, however, as French Canadians discovered
gold on the Pend Oreille River in 1852.
Henry Spalding established a mission near Lapwai in 1836 and
started Idaho’s first school, created the first irrigation
system, printed the first book in the Northwest and grew the
first Idaho potato.
Idaho’s first town, Franklin, was established near the Utah
border in 1860 and mining towns sprung up between 1860 and 1863
at Pierce, Idaho City and Silver City as gold and silver were
discovered. Idaho officially became a U. S. territory in 1863
with Lewiston serving briefly as its capital. By 1864, the
capital was moved to Boise. By 1870, Idaho’s population was all
of 17,000; a decade later it would be 32,000.
The Nez Perce Indian War occurred in 1877 as pioneers and
natives clashed and Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce tribe led his
people on a historic flight across Idaho and Montana before
uttering his famous words, “From where the sun now stands I will
fight no more forever.”
Electricity came to Idaho in 1882 when the first electric light
was turned on near the mining town of Ketchum. Telephone service
soon followed in 1883 in nearby Hailey.
In 1884, silver was discovered in the Coeur d'Alene area, which
would prove to be the nation's richest deposit. In 1889, a
constitutional convention was held and Idaho became the nation’s
43rd state by 1890. The population had swelled to over 88,000.
In 1889 the territorial legislature established the University
of Idaho at Moscow and the College of Idaho (now Albertson
College) held classes for the first time in Caldwell in 1891.
Butch Cassidy and his Hole in the Wall gang made headlines by
robbing a bank in Montpelier in 1896. Idaho’s population in 1900
approached 162,000. After the turn of the century, commerce
exploded as the Milner Dam brought valuable irrigation water
south of the Snake River near Twin Falls and the largest sawmill
in the country opened at Potlatch.
By 1910, Idaho had grown to over 325,000 people. That year was a
disaster for Northern Idaho as forest fires consumed one-sixth
of the region’s forests. Historic Wallace, now on the National
Register of Historic Places, was burned down and rebuilt in the
ensuing years. Idahoans elected Moses Alexander the first Jewish
governor in United States in 1914 and the Capitol Building was
completed in 1920. Also in 1920, a young man from Rigby began to
dream of concepts for the first television picture tube. Philo
Farnsworth was only 15 years old at the time and would go on to
be named the “Father of Television”. The first television
station in Boise would not open until 1953.
Craters of the Moon National Monument was established to
preserve a vast lava flow near Arco in 1924 and Averell
Harriman’s Sun Valley Resort opened near Ketchum in 1936. Sun
Valley was also the site of the world’s first chair lift. Grocer
Joe Albertson opened his first supermarket in Boise in 1939 and
entrepreneur J. R. Simplot dehydrated the first potato in
Caldwell in 1941, pioneering the way for the frozen French fry
to become quintessentially American cuisine.
Idaho’s population grew from almost 525,000 in 1940 to over
588,000 by 1950 and over 667,000 by 1960. A National Reactor
Testing Station was established in the desert west of Idaho
Falls in 1949 and by 1951 it was the first place to use nuclear
fission to generate electricity. Experimental Breeder Reactor
No. 1 would later be designated a national landmark and still
stands today between Arco and Idaho Falls.
Writer Ernest Hemingway died in his home in Ketchum in 1961.
Idaho’s population swelled to over 713,000 by 1970. More
disasters would occur during the 1970s as fire in the Sunshine
Mine in Kellogg killed 91 miners in 1972 and the new Teton Dam
collapsed in Eastern Idaho in 1976, killing 11 and forcing
thousands to flee. In 1980, the eruption of Mt. St. Helens in
Washington State left Northern Idaho covered in ash. An
earthquake near Challis measuring 7.3 on the Richter scale
killed two children and caused millions of dollars of damage in
1983.
An Idaho population of just over one million celebrated their
Centennial year as a state in 1990. By 2004, that population had
become almost 1.4 million as Idaho continued to grow and made
headlines in magazines as one of the best places to live and do
business. |
