Idaho Treasure Hunters

Location of historical marker:  Idaho 3 – Milepost 95.7

This military wagon road was constructed past here in 1859.  Mullan road was the first major engineered highway in the Pacific Northwest. Its 624 miles connected the Missouri River Basin to the Columbia River Basin, thereby greatly accelerating the development of the Northwest as an integral part of the United States.

Swamps in the St. Joe Valley had to be corduroyed with logs, and 70 men spent a week digging out sidehills south of here and chopping through three miles of forest.  But after all that work, spring floods made this route impassable.  Two years later, Mullan had to survey and build a new section of his road around the north of Coeur d'Alene Lake.

Location of historical marker:  Idaho 3 – Milepost 92.4

The Catholic mission to Idaho's Coeur d'Alene Indians began with services that Jesuit Father Nicolas Point conducted on December 2, 1842, on the north shore of Lake Coeur d'Alene where the modern city of Coeur d'Alene is located. Point had been living with a band of Coeur d'Alene since November 4, and he based the mission at their winter camp where the Spokane River flows out of the lake. When spring came, he established the mission at a site on a river he named after St. Joseph, northwest of modern St. Maries. By 1844 a hundred converts were assembled at the mission, which likely at first was also named for St. Joseph.

Because the riverside location was subject to flooding, the mission was moved in 1846 to a site selected by Father Joseph Joset above the Coeur d'Alene River west of later Cataldo. A temporary chapel and three log cabins housed the renamed Mission of the Sacred Heart until a large permanent mission church, designed in 1848 and under construction until 1855, could be completed. By that time, hundreds of Indians had settled at the mission and a dozen of their families lived in log cabins. A large barn, a flour mill, a dairy, and two hundred acres of cultivated farmland supported mission activities.

Anthony Ravalli, a Jesuit missionary from Ferrara, Italy, who had studied mathematics and science as well as theology and philosophy, had experience in both a mechanic's shop and an artist's studio. With skilled Coeur d'Alene craftsmen who used broadaxes, a whipsaw they had to make from local materials, augers, and ropes and pulleys from European sources, Ravalli managed to construct a spectacular church overlooking the Coeur d'Alene Valley. The structure depends upon heavy timber frames and braces, the intervening spaces filled with local forms of plaster, grass, and mud. Ravalli was building a European mission church to serve Idaho Indians who had not even come under United States jurisdiction until the mission moved to its new site in 1846, and he used Italian designs that reflected nineteenth-century styles in his native country. Such designs also became popular in United States architecture. His building—now Idaho's oldest surviving structure—made a great impression upon anyone who came by. It is still an imposing monument, maintained for the Coeur d'Alene people as an Idaho state park.

After three decades of operation at the site near Cataldo, a new location for the Coeur d'Alene Mission of the Sacred Heart was developed farther west, within the bounds of the Coeur d'Alene Reservation at Desmet, in 1877. But a pilgrimage by the Coeur d'Alenes to the old mission church and religious services are still conducted each August 15, on the Feast of the Assumption.

Name and location of historical marker:  Seneacquoteen – U.S. 2 – Milepost 15 

Long before white men discovered the Seneacquoteen river, Indians used to camp here at this important early crossing.

Fur traders, surveyors ad miners followed the old Indian trail that forded the river here at Seneacquoteen – a Kalispell word "crossing."  During the Kootenay gold rush of 1864, a wagon road came from Walla Walla to a ferry here.  The Wild Horse Trail – a pack route – ran on north to the Kootenay mines in British Columbia.

The picture above shows the ferry that crossed the Seneacquoteen river; date unknown.

Once or twice a week I am going to post information about historical markers placed along Idaho Highways.  This will be a great opportunity to learn about Idaho history as well as areas for metal detecting and treasure hunting.  Keep in mind that some of the areas referenced by the historical markers may be on private property or protected, so be sure to check before you go.

The Idaho Transportation Department and the Idaho Historical Society began promoting the historical heritage of Idaho through the use of highway markers in 1956.  Before the organization of this program, historical markers of various shapes and sizes were installed through the efforts of private organizations or by relatives of the pioneers.  In most cases, these markers were installed, properly dedicated and then left to the elements and vandals.  The new program organized, standardized and maintained the state's historical markers.

The Idaho Historical Society proposes sites and prepares information for the signs.  The Idaho Transportation Department directs the preparation, location, installation and maintenance of the four-foot by eight-foot wooden signs.

The signs are located at roadside turnouts or near other available parking so that you will not have to park on the shoulder of the highway to read them.  Road signs announcing the historical markers are typically posted about 1,000 feet in advance of the site to provide an opportunity to slow down and turn out safely.

The program was revitalized in 1986 with the installation of over 100 new signs in preparation for Idaho's centennial celebration of statehood in 1990.  There are now 244 historical markers along the Gem state's highways.

"History engulfs Idaho.  It resonates in her cities, cascades along her riverbanks and hides in her mountain valleys.  But finding history is an elusive task:  buildings crumble, landscapes change and generations pass on.  Historical landmarks and events can evaporate into the air around us, and seem just as invisible."  "Recognizing the Gem State's rich history can be difficult if you don't know where to look and what you are looking at.  Like so many things worth finding, a guide is needed.  Even Lewis and Clark had a guide."  (Taken from the "Idaho Highway Historical Marker Guide.)

The wife of one my friends (Brett) who is a fellow Idaho Treasure Hunters member, owns a daycare in Boise.  I was at the daycare a few months ago doing some repair work and Brett told me to bring my metal detector along because the property was a military barracks once many, many moons ago.  :)  I had a really busy schedule that day so I started at one end of the property and only finished half of the front before I had to leave.  My heart wasn’t in it as much as it should have been because of all the things I needed to do.  I found some coins, and small tool items, but nothing significant or related to the age of the property.

About a month later Brett bought an old White’s Coinmaster 5500 for $10 at Deseret Industries, one of the many local thrift stores.  It needed a battery pack and the plastic guard was missing off of the meter so I built a battery pack for him and cut and made a cover out of some acrylic I had laying around in my shop.  This is the same model of metal detector that I had back in the 1980′s that found a quart jar full of silver coins with dates ranging from the 1890′s to the 1920′s.  It was a great detector for it’s time.

I was over visiting Brett today and he showed me this great find from the other side of the daycare (that I hadn’t searched yet) with this “new” detector.  If I had not had prior commitments I would have been there all day and found it myself.  It was buried under just a few inches of dirt!  I thought it was a cool enough find to pass along to this blogs viewers and subscribers.

If anyone has a find from here in Idaho and would like to share it, send me an email mailto:steve@idahotreasurehunters.com with the story of where it was found, what you found it with, and a little about yourself, etc., and of course a picture of the find and I will post it here.