Life Along Idaho's
Last Wild River

The Nez Perce have inhabited the Clearwater region for at least ten millennia. At the time of Lewis and Clark, they were the largest tribe on the Columbia River Plateau — roughly 6,000 people commanding 17 million acres across Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Montana.

The Lochsa corridor is recognized as a Traditional Cultural Property — the ancient k'useyne'iskit ("Trail to Buffalo Country") linked the river to a vast network of gathering grounds, fishing holes, and sacred sites. Weippe Prairie, where Clark's advance party first encountered the Nez Perce in September 1805, was a major gathering point for baking camas bulbs. The Nez Perce were instrumental in creating the Appaloosa horse breed through generations of selective breeding.

In 1877, Chief Joseph and approximately 750 Nez Perce fled along the Lolo Trail, covering 1,300 miles over three months before surrendering just 40 miles from the Canadian border — one of the most remarkable and tragic passages in American history.

On September 11, 1805, the Corps of Discovery began the most harrowing leg of their entire expedition — a 120-mile crossing of the Bitterroot Mountains along the ancient Nez Perce trail. They nearly perished. Harsh weather, waist-deep snow, no game. They killed and ate horses to survive.

Starving and disoriented, the expedition was saved by the Nez Perce at Weippe Prairie. On the return trip in 1806, they camped near present-day Kamiah for nearly a month, waiting for the snow to melt. Lewis collected 170 plant specimens new to science. The highway you drive today traces the route they traveled — shown to them by the Nez Perce.

Fur trappers were among the first Euro-Americans in the Lochsa country. Jerry Johnson — the legendary trapper and prospector for whom the famed hot springs are named — kept a cabin along the river. Bud Moore grew up trapping these drainages in the 1920s and went on to spend 40 years with the Forest Service, becoming one of the region's greatest land stewards.

The CCC built the Lolo Motorway along the ridgeline in the 1930s. The first smokejumpers deployed at Martin Creek on the Selway in July 1940. Highway 12 wasn't completed until the early 1960s — making this one of the last sections of the American West to be connected by paved road.

Three New York hunters — led by Will Carlin and Abraham Himmelwright — their guide Spencer, and camp cook George Colegate entered the Bitterroots in September 1893. Record early snows trapped them on the Lochsa. Horses were lost, supplies exhausted. Colegate fell gravely ill.

The party made the controversial decision to leave Colegate behind on the riverbank. Multiple military rescue parties were dispatched from Missoula, Fort Spokane, and Kendrick. The survivors were rescued near Lowell on November 22. Colegate's remains were found the following summer, eight miles downriver. His grave at Colgate Licks along Highway 12 is a somber reminder of these mountains' indifference to human ambition.

The DeVoto Memorial Cedar Grove shelters Western Red Cedars that were ancient when Columbus sailed. The Lolo Motorway still follows the same ridgeline the Nez Perce traveled for millennia. The river still drops 31 feet per mile, untouched by dams. This is a place where history isn't behind glass — it's under your boots.