A Town is Born Along the Way

A Town is Born Along the Way. . The Lower Kootenai people, on their seasonal migrations, were the first to travel through this area. They walked time-worn forest trails and paddled their sturgeon-nosed canoes on the Kootenai River and through the valley marshlands. , In 1808 Canadian explorer David Thompson came by horseback and canoe, opening the way for traders, missionaries, prospectors and homesteaders. In the 1860s a rich placer strike in British Columbia lured hundreds of gold-seekers who traveled on the Wildhorse Trail which crossed the nearby Kootenai River. E.L. Bonner built a ferry crossing in 1864, later selling the rights to Richard Fry. , In 1883 Sam Smith started a stagecoach service from the new Northern Pacific Railway line at Kootenai Station near Lake Pend Orielle to Bonners Ferry, Crossport, and Kootenay Lake. , The following year the steamboat Midge was launched on the Kootenai River, initiating river commerce from present-day Bonners Ferry to Kootenay Lake. The completion of the transcontinental Great Northern Railroad line, through Bonners Ferry in 1892, improved transportation, leading to the demise of the stage coach. , The Village of Bonners Ferry was established in 1899. That same year the Great Northern completed the Kootenai Valley Railroad, extending rail service from Bonners Ferry to the lower end of Kootenay Lake in British Columbia. , The Spokane International Railroad, completed in 1906, connected Spokane to the Canadian Pacific railway lines across the border at Eastport, creating an international transcontinental line. , Railway service eventually made the steamboats obsolete. In turn, by the 1920s better roads and rubber-tired vehicles reduced the demand for passenger trains. Railroads developed as an efficient means of long distance freight transportation. , (side-bar at bottom:) , On July 19, 1926 a special Great Northern Railway train, the Columbia River Historical Expedition, stopped briefly at Bonners Ferry for the dedication of the Pathfinder Monument, which commemorated the first route of trade and travel across what is now the State of Idaho. The monument is in the park near the library, two blocks south.