'The Coeur d'Alene'

COEUR d’ALENE — Kurt Satterlee loved his father. He overflows with pride when speaking of him.

Ned Albert Satterlee, he said, did many good things before he died Nov. 13 at the age of 86.

The Dalton Gardens man could rebuild any car. He knew North Idaho’s outdoors like few others. And he worked hard every day for God, family and friends.

“He was a simple man, and he was a great man,” Kurt Satterlee said.

But there was one thing few people knew about Ned Albert Satterlee. It's a small detail that made its mark decades ago and will continue to do so well into the future.

Ned Albert Satterlee is the man who came up with the name for The Coeur d’Alene Resort nearly 35 years ago.

A photo of Satterlee being presented with a $1,000 check for submitting the winning name by Resort owner Duane Hagadone, two men shaking hands, was published in The Press in 1986.

There were about 10,000 entries.

“People sent in suggestions,” Kurt Satterlee said. “And dad wrote, ‘The Coeur d’Alene.’ He thought that simple is best.”

It was.

That name is today one of the most famous in the nation. The Coeur d’Alene Resort. It conjures up images of a castle-like resort standing tall over a blue lake with green mountains in the distance. Which is the case.

Yet hardly anyone, family included, knew Ned Albert Satterlee was behind that elegant moniker. Or that he even sent in an entry.

“He rarely spoke of it,” his son said. “He never was a bragger. You had to pry everything out of him.”

Ned Albert Satterlee was born Dec. 31, 1933 in a farmhouse in Sandpoint. He was the seventh of 11 children.

He grew up on the family ranch off Gold Creek Road, about a mile north of the old Pack River school house. His grandparents homesteaded nearby. On the road from their homes, you would see Scotchman Peak in one direction, Schweitzer Mountain in the other.

“I'll tell you what, this family is close,” Kurt Satterlee said.

He served in the military in Korea two years, lived in Wyoming for a time before returning to Coeur d’Alene in 1961.

There were no jobs, so he packed a lunch and sat outside the Potlatch mill every day and waited “until they needed him.”

Finally, they did.

He bought a few acres in Dalton Gardens in 1956, where he and his wife Mary raised four children.

In the early '70s, he attended North Idaho College and earned an associate degree in forestry.

If he could have lived in the outdoors, exploring the wilderness, he would have.

“No one could outhike that guy,” Kurt said.

And when it came to vehicles, well, he knew all about those, too, and rebuilt many.

“Old cars and the woods is what he was all about,” Kurt said.

His father never upset another person, never stole anything, never lied, Kurt said. He lived an honest life. He didn’t talk a lot, but if you wanted something done, he was your man. He was, his son said, “tough as nails.”

“I’m so proud of him,” Kurt Satterlee said. “They just don’t make ‘em like that anymore.”

So what did Ned Albert Satterlee do with that $1,000 windfall? A boat? A trip? A vacation? Surely, some kind of a splurge?

Nope.

As was his style, nothing extravagant.

“He used it to pay bills,” his son said.