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Pocatello is culturally in the middle between Boise and Idaho Falls. Mostly it's similar to either, but Idaho State U. has been there forever, so it's a college town. Pocatello also developed as more an industrial city than Idaho Falls, as it was a railroad junction, which always helps build industry, and it's close to the phosphate mines that lie to the south. The phosphate was processed in Poky and shipped out by rail.
The temps there are typically warmer than most of S.E. Idaho, and the culture is a bit more youthful than most of the other towns in the area. It's quite scenic, as it lies in a hole surrounded by mountains, and it's a pretty nice place.
Poky is only an hour away from I.F. on the Interstate, so if you visit Idaho Falls, it's easy to go down and check it out. Pocatello was the larger of the two cities for a long time, but Idaho Falls is the larger now by a little bit.
The Shoshone-Bannock reservation, Fort Hall is nearby, and some friends of mine who went to college there lived in a rental on the rez and loved it. The rent was cheaper, and they had a good time.
Pocatello is named after a famous Bannock chief.
Hi, banjomike,
You mentioned you have friends that lived on the rez and "loved it." Frankly, that sounds amazing.
Note, I am looking to be a teacher on the rez. How does one find a rental on the rez?
You mentioned you have friends that lived on the rez and "loved it." Frankly, that sounds amazing.
Note, I am looking to be a teacher on the rez. How does one find a rental on the rez?
Thanks.
It's important to understand that all the reservations have existed for a long time now, and their residents are just like other folks; some have done very well financially, while others are in the middle class, and still others are poor.
The rez tends to mix them all together closer than a suburb does, and much depends on the particular tribe and it's old relations with the white man.
The rez I was referring to was Fort Hall, located between Idaho Falls and Pocatello. It's an old Shoshone-Bannock reservation, and the 2 tribes have intermixed for a long time. They tend to call themselves Sho-Bans.
Both tribes were always pretty peaceful, and were native to this region. The Shoshone are the larger tribe, but the Bannock are their cousins, as are the Piutes. All have small bands scattered in Idaho, Nevada, N. Utah, and S.E. Oregon. There is a Sho-Pai rez just over the Idaho border in N. Nevada.
The Shoshone were always semi-nomadic, moving into good hunting grounds in the summers and into lower areas in the winter. Foraging for native crops such as camas was as important to them all as hunting was. It is thought that they moved eastward from the Pacific coast in early pre-history, and may have been here since the last ice age. as S. Idaho lay just south of the great ice sheet that once covered N. Idaho and everything northwards.
During the turn of the century- late 1700s to early 1800s, as the Great Plains warrior tribes moved westward- the Cheyenne, Sioux, Kiowa, Arapahoe, Blackfeet, and others- the Shoshone suffered a lot of predation from all of them.
The horse tribes were all originally from far eastward, and were driven west by the advancing white man. They had inhabited the great plains for far less time than we now think, and the intermountain west was the last area they moved to.
Only the Cheyenne had a long history on the plains, and the Northern Cheyenne only moved into the mountain west when the Sioux did, less than 100 years before the arrival of the first white men. The Southern Cheyenne remained on the southern plains to the end, and their range extended to Oklahoma and Arkansas. They had been fighting ever since the Spanish arrived, and were the true masters of the horse and the plains.
The Shoshone and their cousins the Bannocks were too small a tribe to ever out-fight the Cheyenne and Blackfeet, and the low, protected valleys in the Bear Lake region are still thick with game in the winters.
Back then, the great buffalo herds of the north also migrated into Bear Lake, then moved north into Wyoming and Montana in the spring. (That's why the buffalo in Yellowstone Park survived. They are the last pure bison, as they never cross-bred with cattle.)
All the big game animals still migrate there to winter, where the feed is better, and there is more protection for the newborn in the spring.
All the warrior tribes of the northern great plains hunted there during the winters, and the area is also the easiest crossing west to east, so war and trading parties passed through at all times of the year. And every band would thrash the Shoshone if the opportunity presented itself.
So it's easy to see why the presence of the white man there was good for the Shoshone. Many young Shoshoni men became Army scouts in the Indian Wars, as they were one of the few tribes the white men trusted.
Casting their lot with the white man offered them some protection that never existed before. The region had been their home for many centuries before the warrior tribes showed up.
Fort Hall is one of the oldest reservations in the west. It was never a military fort; originally, it was built by the Hudson Bay Co. as a trading post, and later became a popular stop-over for the white migration on the Oregon Trail. The 'fort' was built as a way of keeping the goods from being stolen and a way of crowd control.
While the fort didn't exist when Lewis & Clark came through, the French trappers of Hudson Bay had been there for some time. The location is a natural spot for a trading post- like Jackson Hole, the Indians, trappers, and merchants would all join twice a year to trade furs for supplies and goods in rendezvous, which were always part business and part big party. The rendezvous were informal, but happened as regular as clockwork, so Hudson Bay just took advantage of what was already happening there and turned trade into a year-round enterprise.
Sacajawea was discovered by Lewis & Clark in the Fort Hall area; she was a Nez Perce from the Wallowa region in upper Idaho/Oregon, was captured and enslaved by a band of Indian marauders, possibly Blackfeet or another of the Montana tribes, and sold off as a wife to her French trapper husband.
And that's why the tribal relations have always been good since. The rez boundary lies very close on the south to the Pocatello city limits, so a house rental there can be available. I don't know how a rental could be found, but I suppose a listing probably exists in the town of Fort Hall; all one would have to do is check with the tribal council at their headquarters, which is essentially the same as a town hall.
I don't know anything about teaching at the tribal schools. But since Idaho State U. is so close by, I would suppose finding a teaching position there might be difficult. A lot of Indian kids attend ISU, and I'll bet some are always enrolled in Ed courses.
I also know nothing of how a rez school district operates. It may be different from the state's education system, as it is sovereign tribal ground.
Dang, Cassidy.
You shouldn't have gotten me started on local history. I apologize for that huge post.
Please, no apology needed or wanted. Your always informative and interesting posts are one of the best things about the City-Data forums. I can hardly wait to read the next adventures about our common ancestors.
Please, no apology needed or wanted. Your always informative and interesting posts are one of the best things about the City-Data forums. I can hardly wait to read the next adventures about our common ancestors.
.
Thanks, Volo. I often think I carry on far too much.
Here's an addition on that long rant above:
While the Shoshone were peaceful, they were no push-overs when they felt threatened enough by white encroachment.
Pocatello is named after a Bannock war chief who successfully drove the white settlers off the great Camas Prairie. The camas root, which is very similar to a potato in its nutrients, was a vital food source for the tribes, and was depended upon for winter food supply.
There were several pitched battles between the Sho-Ban and the Army over the Camas Prairie, but in the end, the Shoshone were too valuable a resource for the Army to fight, so one of the few lasting peace treaties of the Indian Wars was made, and the truce stuck.
Chief Pocatello had nothing to do with the treaty. He never conceded an inch to the white man, but was allowed to live out his days with a small band who lived in the Bear Lake district in peace.
The camas root was also vital to other regional tribes.
The Nez Perce in the north were also camas eaters, and were singular to all other western tribes. In fact, they were unique to all other western tribes. The Nez Perce were originally coastal, and are thought to have moved inland early on, becoming the native equivalent of Vikings.
They traded east-west from the Pacific to the Mississippi, and north-south from Canada to Mexico. Some of their early trade goods were shells, coral, turquoise and copper, and are believed to be the first far-western tribe to adopt the horse. Oral history says the Nez Perce began capturing Spanish horses from their first encounter with the Conquistadores.
They were the only native americans who ever practiced selective breeding of their horses. All the stallions that were found to be sub-par were gelded, and traded off to other tribes. This practice created the very best horse ever found for the needs of the great plains and life in the west.
While the tribe was never large, it was very much like the Swiss are today. No one ever messed with the Nez Perce, period. If some Kiowa kids (or any others), sought to score some points by stealing a horse from the Nez Perce trading bands, the horse had to be returned and the person punished, or the Nez Perce would never trade horses with that tribe again.
If the local tribe refused, or worse, attempted to attack the trading group, the Nez Perce would out-fight them, using Viking and Roman field tactics. And if a tribe was going to start a fight, the Nez Perce would always finish it. The following bands of traders would go out of their way to raid that tribe over and over, until they were either all dead or had moved away for good.
The Nez Perce all wore high pompadors and big copper sheet earrings that glittered in the sun. This was to announce their presence. The spots their horses have are thought to have been selectively bred into the breed, as they made the horse as distinctive as the humans who bred them.
Unless they were hunting as they went, the Nez Perce played flutes and mouth bows on the move, as a way of announcement, and they had Spanish bells on their blankets.
Identification at a far distance was very important to all the horse tribes.When the Nez Perce arrived, a tribe would throw a party that could last for days. The Nez Perce would stay out on their trade routes for as long as 2 years at a time, swapping horses all along the way, until they decided to go home.
Girls were common trade stock; marrying into the tribe offered all their trading partners great advantages, and Sacajawea was a rarity- no one messed with the Nez Perce girls without great risk to their life, but she may have been traded to Carbinou, her French trapper husband by her father.
Sacajawea always claimed she was kidnapped, and may have been, but that may have been a tale told only to the white men, as Lewis & Clark had already fought the Sioux and Blackfeet, and Sacajawea was a natural-born diplomat.
She was still a teen, and had lived most of her life around Fort Hall, where she still has living descendants.
That's how the Appaloosa horse came to be a breed. The horse was the fastest on the plains, was the gentlest war horse of all, had the hardest hooves, the best vision, could go farther than any other breed, and could survive in any weather, on anything, and were the most intelligent. Crazy Horse rode an Appaloosa, as did other great war chiefs. Mares were the preferred war mounts, as they were the easiest to catch if a man was dismounted.
The Chief Joseph band was 90 souls in all, counting the old, the women and the children. They fought 2,000 Army cavalry, in all of the detachments sent against them, to a retreat with every engagement.
During the Nez Perce war, young warriors snuck into Army picket lines and stole the cavalry horse's manure, which was thick with undigested corn. This was fed to their own starving Appaloosa mounts, and that used-corn ration allowed the Nez Perce to outrun the Army all the way to the Canadian border.
Only winter and superior numbers forced their surrender. Sheridan was so afraid of the Appaloosa he had them all rounded up and killed after Chief Joseph surrendered the tribe. Only a handful survived the slaughter.
The Appaloosa was the 19th century super-weapon for tribal survival. The going rate was 5 to 1 in the north, and 10 to 1 in the south. The trades were only the best horses the other tribes owned. The Nez Perce never trifled with the poorer horses at all- only the best of the others were good enough for trading.
And the mighty Sioux, Cheyenne, Kiowa, Arapahoe, Mandan, and all the others only rode the second-rate Appaloosas. The Nez Perce always kept the best of the breed for themselves.
That's why the Nez Perce were able to charge up the Whitebird Hill at a full gallop, a distance of about 7 miles with on a 30º slope, so fast the field guns couldn't shorten their range fast enough to hit them. While the cannonballs flew over their heads, the Nez Perce breasted the summit, slaughtered all 200 of the solidiers, roped the cannon barrels and pulled them back down the hill, busting them up on the way down, and leaving the wreckage in the river.
Still at a full gallop. The White Bird fight was all over in about 45 minutes. Less time than it took to kill Custer and his boys, with the same cavalry loss and done by a fraction of the Indian fighters.
And then the Dads and their sons caught up with the others and all fled over the mountains for another 90 miles into Montana and southward to the Yellowstone.
The South can keep its Thoroughbreds. The Appaloosa, our state horse, might not be able to outrun one of those big critters in a mile and a half, but it will outrun them by the end of the day and be ready to go again when the sun comes up.
Last edited by banjomike; 06-27-2017 at 03:11 PM..
Mike, here's a summer hobby for you: (1) Go into your old posts, (2) start copying them into a separate file on your computer, (3) edit them into chapters, and (4) publish!
Mike, here's a summer hobby for you: (1) Go into your old posts, (2) start copying them into a separate file on your computer, (3) edit them into chapters, and (4) publish!
Amen! But, I want a first edition, signed copy. And signed by "banjomike", not Mike or Michael.
- - - edited to add:
Your next project, banjomike, if you wish to accept... Why would my great-great grandparents live in Bullion? About five miles into the hills, southwest of Hailey. Can't really see a town there, just some scattered houses about; based on recent satellite imagery. Great-great grandpa died in Bullion in 1892 and his wife must have moved to Hailey, where she died in 1925. Both of them are buried in the Hailey cemetery. He was born in Ireland in 1844 and married his wife in SLC in 1877, so he must have crossed the pond as a young adult. Died fairly young, 47. Maybe he was a miner, as you mentioned previously about another of my Idaho family lines.
I can see that after I get the rest of my stuff up to Rathdrum, I'm going to have to take a road trip and visit the local historical societies in SE ID.
Amen! But, I want a first edition, signed copy. And signed by "banjomike", not Mike or Michael.
- - - edited to add:
Your next project, banjomike, if you wish to accept... Why would my great-great grandparents live in Bullion? About five miles into the hills, southwest of Hailey. Can't really see a town there, just some scattered houses about; based on recent satellite imagery. Great-great grandpa died in Bullion in 1892 and his wife must have moved to Hailey, where she died in 1925. Both of them are buried in the Hailey cemetery. He was born in Ireland in 1844 and married his wife in SLC in 1877, so he must have crossed the pond as a young adult. Died fairly young, 47. Maybe he was a miner, as you mentioned previously about another of my Idaho family lines.
I can see that after I get the rest of my stuff up to Rathdrum, I'm going to have to take a road trip and visit the local historical societies in SE ID.
.
This is only a guess.
The Irish came to Idaho for 2 main reasons- mining and sheep. The Celts did both well, ever since the bronze age, and Idaho had a lot of immigrants coming in around the same time as your Great-Great Grandpa.
Ketchum and the Wood River valley had a lot of both going on when he arrived. The Hecla mine is still there, and still operates, though not as full blast as it did 20 years ago. All the forested mountains around that area were all prime summer sheep range.
So, I'm guessing your ancestor may have come to Idaho to be a miner, but may have stayed on to work sheep after he married.
The sheep industry is mostly forgotten now, but sheep were once a huge industry in Idaho, back when wool was the most widely used fiber of all in the United States. My own family has a lot of sheepmen in it.
That's another possibility.
There were some very successful Mormon missionaries who worked in Ireland, Wales, Cornwall, and other Celtic areas. During the time your ancestor immigrated, the UK was transforming from an agricultural to an industrial nation. The population increased very rapidily, as did the wealth, and a lot of once-family farms were bought up for country estates in Ireland.
This left a lot of second sons homeless and uprooted. The LDS converted a lot of them, and they were eager for conversion as the church gave them a boat ticket and a train ticket out to Salt Lake City. That was an escape from the dreary life there to a life in the Golden West.
Sometimes the conversions stuck, sometimes they didn't. The church always had about a 40% fall-away outside of the Salt Lake Valley and environs. The farther away, the more it increased.
Once in Salt Lake, the church moved a lot of immigrants to Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, California, and anywhere there was a lot of free land to homestead. It was all communal, and often, very hard. The free tickets were all one way, so for many, there was no going back. (the LDS church and the Union Pacific had a deal, and it benefitted both.)
The immigrants were pretty much on their own once they reached their final destination, but the church did what it could to keep them going long enough to sink roots, and sheep were good for sinking roots because the wool paid so well. So was mining, but the camps were pretty rough until there were enough women to civilize them. Weather played a big factor, too.
It's possible your ancestors met each other through the church, married and were moved out here.
Your Great-Great could have worked the mines when they were paying well in season, and worked the sheep when the mines didn't deliver, or were closed due to the snow.
A lot of those mines played out pretty quickly. Bullion sounds exactly like a mining camp that boomed and then played out. Most of the non-converted miners left whenever that happened, so your ancestor must have made a pretty good start here, good enough to stick and stay instead of going off and chasing the next strike.
If you are really interested, I think checking the historical records in Gooding, Shoshone, or one of the railhead towns where the sheep were shipped east from may offer you some clues. There may be mining records in the county courthouse's clerk's offices as well.
Both cities are particularly good because a lot of sheepherders and miners were bachelors. During the winter, both Gooding and Shoshone had a lot of boarding houses, where the men would live, waiting for the winter to end and the mines and the range to re-open. The boarding houses were always full of Irish, Cornish, Basque, and Italians during the winters, but seldom saw any Swedes, Germans, or English, although some lived in them, for sure.
The big sheep ranches were all in more open country, around Bliss, Gooding, etc., but they only consolidated their sheep bands there during the winters, and the ranch owners typically laid off most of their sheepherders in the fall. The men didn't come back to work until after lambing had begun in the spring, and afterward, when the bands were made up for the summer season. A typical band of sheep had about 2,000 head, with 2-3 sheepherders, and the bands spread out all over the state to graze until the snows were too deep to continue.
Not all the sheepherders were single, though most were. Many young married men brought their wives with them for a life in the summer sheep camps, the first travel trailers.
The women were very appreciated, as they fed their men better, kept everything in better repair, and made the family a little extra money helping care for both the livestock and the herders. A thrifty couple could keep some sheep instead of being paid in cash, and a lot of immigrant families got their start living in sheep camps. Mr. Gooding himself was one, and he became a Governor.
Salt Lake City was a day's train ride away from Shoshone, so your Great-great Grandma may have gone there to see her family from time to time with the kids. Some of the wives lived with their parents during the winters, and re-joined their husbands in the spring until they had a place of their own. Their men would do the train ride instead.
The Idaho Historical Society in Boise may have something, and they may know how to go digging in the state and territorial records, I'm sure. The LDS genealogy records may provide something too. A family history as old as yours is right up their alley for both of those outfits. I believe there is also a Basque historical society.
The Basques tended to keep to themselves more than the others, but a lot of them were the boarding house's owners, and they all knew everyone else quite well. There were boarding houses all over Idaho, and some of them must have kept good records.
Good luck! It's sure an interesting way to spend part of your retirement! I suggest buying a good little recorder- oral history is often the only way some history is ever discovered. Zoom makes some really good pocket recorders. Old bars are always a good source, especially if there's a card game going in back in the afternoon. Learning how to play Pan may help you.
Last edited by banjomike; 06-27-2017 at 10:07 PM..
This is only a guess.
The Irish came to Idaho for 2 main reasons...
Good luck! It's sure an interesting way to spend part of your retirement!...
Now I know why this state is called the "Gem State". You are one of the 'crown jewels' of Idaho.
We're getting pretty far 'off topic', so we should refrain further diversion. However, that little idea for which I needed permission has been given approval, within certain rules, which I'll explain when you see it.
Mike, here's a summer hobby for you: (1) Go into your old posts, (2) start copying them into a separate file on your computer, (3) edit them into chapters, and (4) publish!
Oh, great... another hobby. I feel I write too much in my journal as it is!
Sorry, CFF; I just bought a new electric guitar, my first in over 30 years. I began playing one in 1971, but they were always just a working tool for me, and when I hung it up in 2000, I sold all the ones I owned.
Over the past couple of years, I fell away from making music, and that's not a good thing for my mental health. The guitar was the first to go, and though I would pick one up from time to time, my hands had forgotten the basics. Wrong fingers on the wrong strings, when once it was all automatic. Very frustrating and embarrassing.
Last December, I got to thinking about how much I actually enjoyed playing the electric guitar. By then, I hadn't picked one up in 7 years, so I got a hankering for a new one. Bought one finally at the end of January, and much to my surprise, the electric got me back into playing again at last.
Music has always been a way of meditation, exploration, and a challenge for me, right from the beginning. While I've never played every day, whenever I do, I tend to play for hours at a time, and right now, I'm going pretty deep when I pick it up.
One thing at a time. If I quit now, I know I'll quit and it will bug me constantly. I have most of a summer's work to do, painting my house, fence, shed, deck, and overhauling the inside of my home. Playing music will be my major relaxation, but maybe by next winter, the thrill will be gone again. (Though I hope not)
And my brother has been bugging me about getting back on a horse to do some team roping. We are both too old for that monkey business, even if we're still both brutally handsome.
I don't consider myself to be a historian, but I do love history in an amateur's way, and it's a little late in the game to try to develop a real writer's chops.
I would rather spend my time with some of my old friends with strings on them. Or spend a spare day on Pickle Head, now that he's too old to buck any more. Still hard to beat a summer's day in the mountains of Idaho on a good horse. Pickle was always reliable after the first 3 minutes aboard him, but could sure surprise me in his youth.
I'm flattered, though, and I appreciate your thoughts a lot.
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