Idaho Websites

Fur trading and missionary work attracted the first settlers to the region. In 1809, Kullyspell House, the first white-owned establishment and first trading post in Idaho, was constructed. In 1836, Henry H. Spalding established a mission near Lapwai, where he printed the Northwest's first book, established Idaho's first school, developed its first irrigation system, and grew the state's first potatoes. Narcissa Whitman and Eliza Hart Spalding were the first non-native women to enter present-day Idaho. Cataldo Mission, the oldest standing building in Idaho, was constructed at Cataldo by the Coeur d'Alene and Catholic missionaries between 1848 and 1853.

During this time, the Idaho region was part of an unorganized territory known as Oregon Country, claimed by both the United States and Great Britain. The United States gained undisputed jurisdiction over the region in the Oregon Treaty of 1846. The original boundaries of Oregon Territory in 1848 included all three of the present-day Pacific Northwest states and extended eastward to the Continental Divide. In 1853, areas north of the 46th Parallel became Washington Territory, splitting what is now Idaho in two. The future state was reunited in 1859 after Oregon became a state and the boundaries of Washington Territory were redrawn.

While thousands passed through Idaho on the Oregon Trail or during the California gold rush of 1849, few people settled there. In 1860 the first of several gold rushes in Idaho began at Pierce in present-day Clearwater County. By 1862, settlements in both the north and south had formed around the mining boom.