Kootenai County Historic Preservation Committee history essays

First place winner - Middle school category

Student name: Malia Ditto

The Clark House: The History Behind the Mystery

The Clark House has great significance to Kootenai County's history. When it was built in 1910, it was the largest and most costly house in Idaho. F. Lewis Clark, a millionaire from Spokane, built the mansion on Hayden Lake. Lewis gained his riches from laboring in milling, real estate, mining, lumber, and banking. He was born in 1861 in Bangor, Maine, and after receiving his education at Harvard, he moved to Spokane, Washington in 1884. Tall, handsome, and brilliant, Lewis wooed Winifred Clark, and they were married in 1892. Winifred was born in Washington D.C. She was a gifted pianist, and studied music in France. They were a perfect match with Lewis's quiet personality and Winifred's compassionate, outgoing nature.

Sailing was something that Lewis loved, so in 1907 he set sail with his 12-year-old son and 16 other men for England, to compete in the Summer Regattas. Representing the United States, Lewis won numerous first place awards, but when he arrived in Germany, he lost to Kaiser Wilhelm. A banquet was held by the Kaiser at his palace in Berlin, and he presented two exquisite silver cups to Lewis, which are now placed in the dining room at the Clark House. While visiting the Berlin Palace, Lewis fell in love with the grounds and architecture. Upon returning to the United States, he began drawing plans for a smaller version of the palace, and thus began the construction of the Clark House. The residence was built on 1,400 acres, and was 15,000 square feet. Riding stables, barns, tennis courts, and exquisite landscaping completed the estate.

Three years after the completion of the home, Lewis became very ill. Lewis's fortune was almost all gone, Winifred and Lewis quarreled, and nothing was going as it should. On January 16, 1914, while in Santa Barbara, California, Lewis dropped his wife off at the train station. She never heard from him again. A day later, he was declared missing. After finding Lewis's hat near a pier in Santa Barbara, the police believed Mr. Clark had committed suicide jumping into the ocean. Their theory could not be proven, because the body was not ever found. For years, Winifred waited at Hayden Lake for her husband to come back, to no avail. So in 1922, after the bank took her treasured lake house, she moved to Boston to be with her son and died there in 1949.

The Clark house has been a home to different church groups, the U.S. Navy, a boy's home, and a restaurant, and eventually abandoned for 20 years. In 1989 it was purchased by Monty Danner and has now been restored to its former glory. Today, the house stands on 10 acres, and it is used as a Bed and Breakfast. So much history can be found in the Clark House, and it is very significant in Kootenai County.

First place winner - High school category

Student name: Erin Hague

The Blackrobes and the Coeur d'Alene

Circling Raven, Chief of the Coeur d'Alene Tribe, previously known as the Schitsu'umsh tribe, had a vision that one day men in black robes, carrying crossed sticks would bring them spiritual power. There did come a day, some 80 years later, that Circling Raven's prophecy came to be with Father Pierre-Jean DeSmet. Father DeSmet was a person that had a historical significance in the area we know now as Kootenai County.

Father DeSmet was a man born in 1801 in Dendermonde, Belgium. He journeyed to America in his early life to study the priesthood. His first contact with Native Americans was in Iowa with the Potawatomi tribe where he witnessed the horrors that were being done to them. He tried to help the natives through either his ministry or providing protection to them. Father DeSmet was called to the Northwest by a group pleading Indians from several tribes who had heard about the Christian message. They sought spiritual comfort for the sick and dying and for the children. Father DeSmet wrote, "I would willingly give my life to help these Indians." Father DeSmet traveled to the Northwest with the Native Americans and began his work with them. His first meeting with the Coeur d'Alene tribe was in 1842 where the Spokane River meets Coeur d'Alene Lake, currently the North Idaho College campus. Here, he set up his ministry, teaching Christianity to the Coeur d'Alene. With the help of fellow Jesuits in black robes and the Coeur d'Alene tribe he established the first mission named the mission of Sacred Heart, on Mission Point, along the St. Joe River just north of present day St. Maries. His teachings greatly affected the development and change that the Coeur d'Alene experienced throughout their history .

Due to flooding and continuing his teachings among the Coeur d'Alene, the mission, renamed Cataldo Mission, was rebuilt in one of its present day locations near Cataldo in the Silver Valley. Here, Father DeSmet's Christian teachings flourished within the Coeur d'Alene. The Jesuits taught the Native Americans new ways of farming, specifically self-sufficient farming. The Indians were considered to be successful farmers of oats, potatoes, and wheat using new farming technology and even hiring white laborers, all of this introduced to them by the Jesuits and Father DeSmet. The Cataldo Mission is an integral and important part of Kootenai County's history. It finished construction in 1853 and today is the oldest standing building in Idaho and the oldest mission in all of the Pacific Northwest. It served as the primary place for worship for the Coeur d'Alene tribe for more than ten years. As well as a place of worship, the mission served as a supply station for settlers and travelers, especially during the gold rush due to the fact that travelers had to pass along the mission to get to the mines. In 1877 the final relocation of the mission was to DeSmet, Idaho. Along with building the mission, DeSmet and the Jesuits built a three-story girls' boarding school, a rectory, the Gothic church, and a Jesuit seminary building. Children were forced to attend the Catholic boarding school where they cut their hair and stopped the use of the native language. These developments maintained a lasting effect on the Coeur d'Alene tribe.

Conflicts between Indians and whites were increasing immensely with the infringement onto the Coeur d'Alene tribe's lands that was spurred by the discovery of gold in the area in the 1860s. According to the "Jesuits and the Coeur d'Alene Treaty of 1858," Father DeSmet "played an important role in the relations of red men and white in the Indian Wars" from 1855 through 1859. The original mission of Desmet and his Blackrobes was to provide protection for the Coeur d'Alene against disease and the military strength of the Blackfoot tribe, but further protection was provided. Father DeSmet was able to provide protection from the United States military. He was able to negotiate peace terms and avoid the slaughter of many Native Americans and Americans that would have come with a full-fledged Indian war.

Father DeSmet had a major historical significance on the Kootenai County area. He largely altered the culture of the Coeur d'Alene. DeSmet did so by converting many of them to Christianity, developing their agriculture and therefore economy, and redefining their schooling methods. Along the way, he, the Blackrobes, and the Coeur d'Alene built three missions, two of which are still standing today and offer a glimpse in the history and past of the area. Today, you can visit the Cataldo and Desmet missions and witness some of the area's greatest works of culture and historical preservation.