Watch this video, then read below!
I found the most detailed information I could find you on the internet. I would not have explained this any better!
http://www.rattlesnakestagestation.net/the%20land.html
Be sure to go there and check this bloggers information out! Incredible details!
This place had no name. It would eventually be named Rattlesnake Creek and then Mountain Home, by the Anglos. But it was just a meeting place at the intersection of several trails important to the First Peoples who hunted, gathered and traded here in the spring. The area was relatively productive. Game was plentiful. There were scads of edible plants, roots, berries and seeds.
Two of these trails dropped into the Snake River Canyon at sites near Glenn's Ferry and Hammett. One of these followed the creek until it disappeared near the site of Reverse.
The Paiute spent much time along the river especially during the annual salmon and steelhead runs.
Another of the trails continued up the creek past the site of Tollgate. It led to several higher elevation hunting-gathering sites between Bennett Mountain and Danskin Peak. It also went to the Camas Creek area near Fairfield which was used mostly by the Bannock peoples. The other trail followed the base of the hills to the lower Boise River valley which was used primarily by the Shoshone.
Please note that although all of the peoples who used this area spoke the same anomic language, they were not necessarily all friendly. This was especially true of the Paiute and the Bannock.
The Paiute were considered poor. They generally lived in stick-built wickiups and wintered in less desirable desert areas. They seldom owned horses or guns.
The Bannock had both guns and horses and were able to hunt bison. They were bullies who lived in teepees made of bison hides. They raided the Paiute to steal women or the few horses their poor cousins might acquire.
Not much changed in this area until the arrival of French and British traders and trappers shortly after the Lewis and Clark Expedition. The British actually sent expeditions into the area with instructions to drive the beaver to extinction. They hoped that with the beaver gone, the Yanks would stop coming
The Rocks and Rain
To truly understand this place, you need to understand both the geology and the hydrology. Mountain Home (both sites) are located upon the volcanic rocks of the Snake River Plain. The ground is heavily fractured and most of the water quickly disappears underground. There are very few perennial streams that flow all the way from the mountains and hills north of the Snake River and actually reach it. This is true from Rexburg to Boise. Rattlesnake Creek is no exception.
*The Wood River does often reach the Snake. It is called the Malad River at that point but a waterfall over 200 feet high prevents fish from moving upstream.
The average annual precipitation along the creek is 11.4 inches. Most of the water supplying Mountain Home's agricultural and domestic needs come from Camas and Long Tom reservoirs. The water table is fed by seepage from the canals.
As the population has increased so has demand for water. The water table has fallen dramatically. Older wells have had to be deepened and many of the few springs have gone dry. The fisheries up here were all artificially created. When the reservoirs and canals dry up the fish die.
It is also significant that this part of the county was once located under and along the shores of Lake Idaho which resulted in lotsa sand and gravel deposits which do not hold surface water. At one point there were three major gravel pits in this area. These were deep enough (20 or 30 feet) when I was a kid, that that they had ponds.
Vince and Vera White owned a small farm (now the city golf course) north of the donut tree where the creek exits Abbot Canyon. They remembered when the camas marshes still ran all the way to the end of 18th street. These went dry in the 60s and were filled to build ticky-tacky houses.
The marshes and high water table along the creek were the reason the railroad built a station at Mountain Home. The shallow well could supply water for locomotives there and at the Reverse and Cleft stops.
Flora and Fauna
The beaver were the biggest reason that the riparian area along the creek was once so bountiful. Their dams raised the water table and created marshes. The most important food source that thrived here was the Camas. It was sweet...easy to harvest and store...and very nutritious. (It did, however, attract bears.) There were plenty of mule deer and elk as well as hares, rabbits, ground squirrels, sage hens, etc. There wasn't much in the way of fishing.
The Great Basin wild rye and thick-spike wheat grass offered seed for flour. Several two varieties of wild onion were available for flavor. There was plenty of current, choke cherry, and service berry. At higher elevations huckleberry was plentiful. Salt was obtained by trade.
And Then Came the Anglos.
No one is quite certain what Europeans first came here or when. A tale said that Spaniards from Mexico once tried mining near Rocky Bar in the 16th century but it wasn't true. Some say that MacKenzie may have traveled here in 1819. or Jedediah Smith in 1824. Doesn't really matter much. Once the British trappers and traders arrived about 1810, it wasn't long until the natural value of Rattlesnake Creek began declining. The First People also began trapping and the beaver were quickly gone from Rattlesnake Creek. The British actually wanted the beaver destroyed in hopes that the trappers from the United States would stop coming.
The trails were first effectively recorded by Jedediah Strong Smith. Bonneville and Fremont both got lost trying to use them later on. Fort Boise was built in 1834 by the Hudson Bay Company in the British held Columbia District. Fort Hall was built the same year by America Nathaniel Wyeth to compete with Hudson Bay.
This area remained relatively unimportant until the arrival of Oregon bound immigrants beginning in 1843. Few of these people stayed and except for reducing wild game along the way, they had very little impact. The British failed to slow this immigration and finally ceded the area by treaty to the United States in 1846. It became known as the Oregon Territory. While the Oregon Trail did follow part of the creek it not go through Rattlesnake Station.
Gold and Silver Found - 1863.
Until gold and silver were discovered near Rocky Bar and Silver City in 1863 and 64 most Anglos were just passing through. Then things really went to hell. A horde of greedy uneducated jerks began arriving. Most were poor white trash and of the opinion that, not really people and that neither they nor the land deserved respect.
Some of the Oregon bound immigrants stopped to create farms and orchards to feed the miners. They of course took the best lands.
There were conflicts. The new people began paying bounties for First People scalps and drove them away.
It also meant that these people would need supplies and that it would be worthwhile to create freight roads to bring in manufactured goods and important stuff such as whores.
From trails to roads
The first improved road for freight ran from Kelton Utah to Boise. At first most freight came from Salt Lake City following a route which had been established by freight haulers, William Purvine, John Heard and Charles Teeter about 1843. This crossing used a primitive oar-driven scow owned by Samuel Clark.
The site of the ferry station is located within the Ritter Island unit of Thousand Springs State Park and is currently called the Payne Lewis Ferry. The route up from the ferry to the top of the canyon was definitely ugly. (find and inset trail photos)
At this point, I need to introduce you to John Hailey. He worked for Samuel Clark, who also built an improved road from the Buhl area down to the river about 1853. Clark sold his ferry to Payne and Lewis. They fired Hailey.
John Hailey then teamed up with Ben Holliday of Utah who had money. They managed to gain the stage, pony mail and freight contracts. They improved the road, building several stations and a few small bridges. They made money until the railroad to Boise was finished. Their most interesting station was at the ferry and included a brothel.
Holliday eventually got rid of Hailey who some how wormed his way into a position of note with the Idaho Historical Society.
The First People stopped coming here shortly after the miners arrived. They were driven away from the stations and most river crossings. The stations were abandoned when the Oregon Short line railroad was finished in 1883. Rattlesnake station which had been renamed Mountain Home earlier by the postal service, was moved downstream to the railroad stop at Mountain Home.
This land was once bountiful enough to sustain the people. That time is long gone.
I last visited Mountain Home and the Station in 2015. I wish I hadn't.
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