Historical Marker · No. 165
Bonner's Ferry
Boundary County · Idaho
The crossing needed Kootenai consent as well as a territorial franchise: the state's riverfront panel says the ferry's operators negotiated an agreement with Chief Abraham. The tiny steamer was the Midge, which the English hunter and promoter William Baillie-Grohman brought in dismantled; it was hauled overland from the Northern Pacific station at Kootenai, east of Sandpoint, and launched here in 1883 or 1884, as sources differ. The sign puts the Wild Horse rush in 1863; the ferry's National Register nomination dates the rush, and Bonner's franchise, to 1864. A wagon bridge spanned the river by 1905.
What the plaque says
Bonner's Ferry Gold miners rushing to Wild Horse in British Columbia in 1863 were paddled across this river by Indians; in 1864 E.L. Bonner established a proper ferry here. The ferry and its trading store served the Wild Horse packtrains for many years. Steamers--the first tiny one dragged in overland--came to the river in the 1880's, and the Great Northern Railway arrived in 1892. A thriving town soon sprang up where once the ferryman and his family had been the only white people. 165 Text prepared by the Idaho Historical Society Marker made & installed by Idaho Transportation Department
Where it stands
48.70138, -116.31474 · Directions
More markers nearby
- Kootenai Tribe of Idaho — steps away
- Bonners Ferry — 3.6 mi
- Mary Allen Wright (1868-1948) — 3.6 mi
- David Thompson (1770-1857) — 3.6 mi