Alturas County

A special election was held on the 12th day of September, 1881, for the purpose of determining the permanent location of the county seat of Alturas county, Idaho Territory. The minutes of the Board of County Commissioners under the date of September 25, 1881, are as follows: “The returns from … Read more

For several years Hailey had three daily papers which also were published weekly, and it continued to have two daily papers until 1919. It now has one weekly paper, The Hailey Times. Until this year, many of us believed that Hailey had the first daily paper in the Territory of … Read more

1880 was the year of the Wood River boom. Thousands of miners came and found ready employment in mines that were reputed to be making their owners “rich beyond the dreams of avarice.” So ubiquitous seemed prospectors that every mountain and hill was covered with them in their search for … Read more

John L. Baxter of Fairfield, Idaho, whose reminiscences of early days have lately been published in the Camas County Courier, has this to say of the early citizens of Hailey: “I want to say that the citizens of Hailey went very strong for anything that they wanted. They could raise … Read more

The records of the first Board of County Commissioners of Alturas county, now in the fireproof vault of the Blaine County Court House, and which are as legible today as the day they were written, namely, April 4, A. D. 1864, show that the Board consisted of Samuel Stover, chairman, … Read more

In 1860 gold was discovered on Oro Fino Creek by a party of prospectors led by Captain E. D. Pierce of California. In 1861 the Salmon River mines were discovered, while a search for a rich central gold deposit was made by prospectors, revealing the Florence diggings. In 1862 the … Read more