Priest River, Idaho

Priest River sits near the confluence of the Priest and Pend Oreille Rivers. This is an area that was ruled by large timber companies for many years, but that influence dropped off with the drop-off in logging that set in during the late 1980's. Still, a lot of local folks continue to make their living from some portion of the wood products industry.

In the 1890's, Priest River was a small settlement filled with "tie hacks:" laborers who came to cut railroad ties for the Great Northern Railway. Many of these folks were Italian and Priest River was known as Little Italy up into the 1950's. The original settlement was built just east of the Priest River but the great Pend Oreille River flood in 1894 caused the folks to move to higher ground just west of the Priest River and rebuild. There were annual log drives coming south on the Priest River from the Priest Lake area from 1901 up until 1949. That's about the time the timber industry started using different methods of production. Today, the economy of Priest River still rises and falls with the fortunes of the timber industry but recent efforts to attract other, more stable businesses are slowly changing that.