Idaho

A Few Idaho Facts

Furby, the insanely popular interactive furball from Tiger Electronics, has Idaho roots. Tiger bought the the company in the late 1990s.
63% of Idaho is public land managed by the federal government. The Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness is the largest wilderness area in the 48 contiguous states - 2.3 million acres of rugged, unspoiled back country.

The world's first alpine skiing chairlift was (and still is) located in Sun Valley. Built by Union Pacific Railroad engineers, it was designed after a banana-boat loading device. The 1936 fee: 25 cents per ride.

The world's first nuclear power plant is located at the Idaho National Environmental and Engineering Laboratory (INEEL), near Arco, Idaho. The Atomic Energy Commission offered the town of Arco electricity generated by atomic energy in 1953.

The deepest river gorge in the North American Continent is Idaho's Hells Canyon - 7,900 feet deep. Yes, it's deeper than the Grand Canyon.

Sacajawea, a Lemhi Shoshoni from an area now on the Montana/Idaho border, escorted Meriwether Lewis and William Clark through northern Idaho to the mouth of the Columbia River drainage. Today, Highway 12 follows the old Lewis and Clark Trail along the Lochsa (pronounced lock-saw) and Clearwater Rivers until they merge with the Snake and continue their journey to the Pacific Ocean.

Five of history's pioneer trails, including the Oregon Trail and the California Trail, cross Southern Idaho. Wagon ruts are still visible all along the rugged terrain.

The Scott Ski Pole, an invention which helped revolutionize skiing, was invented by Ketchum's Edward Scott in 1958.

Nearly 85 percent of all the commercial trout sold in the United States is produced in the Hagerman Valley near Twin Falls.

Butch Cassidy , a.k.a - George Leroy Parker, robbed the bank in Montpelier, Idaho, on August 13, 1896. He got away with $7,165, allegedly to hire a lawyer for his partner Matt Warner, who was awaiting trial for murder in Ogden, Utah.

Shoshone Falls (212 feet), near Twin Falls, Idaho, drops 52 feet further than Niagara Falls.

The Snake River Birds of Prey Natural Area, near Kuna, is the location of the largest concentration of nesting raptors in North America. Thousands of visitors travel to the site each year, from March through August, to observe the birds.

Wilson Butte Cave, near Twin Falls, was excavated in 1959 and found to contain bones of bison and antelope, as well as some arrowheads and other artifacts that were carbon-dated to be 14,500 years old. This makes them "among the oldest definitely dated artifacts in the New World."

Craters of the Moon National Monument in southeast Idaho contains nearly 40 separate lava flows, some formed as recently as 250 years ago. The other-worldly area was used as a training ground for early astronauts. The lavish June display of wild flowers adds to the surreal quality of the landscape.

"Coeur d'Alene" means "heart of an awl" in French.

Between 1863 (when Abraham Lincoln signed the bill making Idaho a Territory) and statehood (27 years later), the Idaho Territory had 16 governors, four who never set foot in Idaho.

Appropriately named the "Gem State," Idaho produces 72 types of precious and semi-precious stones, some of which can be found nowhere else in the world.

The Silver Valley in northern Idaho has produced more than $4 billion in precious metals since 1884, making the area one of the top 10 mining districts in the world.

One of the largest diamonds ever found in the United States, nearly 20 carats, was discovered near McCall, Idaho.

In 1953, the engineering prototype of the first nuclear submarine, the Nautilus, was built and tested in the Idaho desert on the Snake River Plain near Arco.

Idaho's Salmon River, known as the "River of No Return" because of its difficult passage, is the nation's longest free-flowing river that heads and flows within a single state.

Did you know that Idaho has a seaport? The Port of Lewiston allows the exportation of millions of bushels of grain down the Snake and Columbia Rivers for overseas shipment.

After the great Wallace fire of 1910, the Pulaski, a mattock-axe tool used in fire fighting, was invented in Idaho.

When Bernard DeVoto, author of the 1948 Pulitzer Prize winning history Across the Wide Missouri, died in 1955, the U.S. Forest Service saw to DeVoto's wish that his ashes be scattered over Idaho's Bitterroot Wilderness.

The Statehouse in Boise and dozens of other buildings in the city are geothermally heated from underground hot springs. In fact, Idaho is well sprinkled with public and private hot springs.