Work and Play in a North Idaho Homestead

Published in the BCHS Newsletter May 12, 2020

Annie Moe, Lillian Geaudreau, and their children helped the men with this "haying." The women wore dresses throughout the hard work. Photo donated to the collection by Lillian Geaudreau Butler.

By Cameron Rasmusson

We’re all spending a lot more time at home these days — maybe a little too much for our liking. 

But for 150 years, home has been at the heart of North Idaho life. It was the center of gravity around which community, recreation and culture in the growing timber community orbited. The Bonner County home was, like many elements of North Idaho life, an evolving institution that reflected its historical moment.  

STAKING A CLAIM

It was the Homestead Act of 1862 that laid the foundations of North Idaho’s population growth. Under the act, any citizen could claim 160 acres of surveyed public land, which they themselves would own within five years by building a dwelling, clearing the land and planting crops. Between 1880 and 1890, the Bonner County population increased tenfold, growing from 970 to 9,490.

Only one problem: When homesteaders reached North Idaho looking to set up farming operations, they instead found acre upon acre of forestland. Nevertheless, many new arrivals rolled up their sleeves and set to work clearing their claims. Fruit orchards and dairy farming grew in popularity as a common backbone for local homes. A thriving timber industry provided an economic backbone for the region, with the first sawmill opening in 1880 and 20 mills working by the early 1900s. The Great Northern Railway’s arrival in the 1890s spurred growth ever further as North Idaho became more connected and accessible to the outside world.

WORKING THE FARM

For many early Bonner County residents, every aspect of life was connected to the farm. It was a hard life, full of long days and exhausting work. But it was also a sustaining lifestyle, one that built legacies and traditions that still echo today.

One thing was for sure: a Bonner County farmer, and especially the 19th-century homesteaders, could expect days filled with toil. Most work at that time was hand powered, from cow milking to tree chopping. It was in 1935, with the formation of the Northern Idaho Rural Electrification Rehabilitation Association, that the promise of an easier life sparked into reality.

The farm wives, perhaps more than anyone, created the demand for an electric North Idaho. Kitchens and living rooms suddenly broke free from daylight dependency. Illumination through dangerous open flame was a thing of the past. Feeding the family became considerably easier thanks to electric appliances and refrigeration. Electricity provided welcome shortcuts for daily duties that previously dominated a farm wife’s waking hours, a reality summed up by a Mrs. Paul Clagstone in The Pacific Homestead. 

 “A farm woman’s life is often one of nothing but drudgery, and yet why should it be so?” she wrote. “The old idea that ‘a man’s work is from sun to sun, a woman’s work is never done,’ has long since been dissipated.”

FINDING A LITTLE FUN

In her article, Mrs. Clagstone hit upon a concern common to farm families in the early 20th century: With so much work to be done, making time for fun and mental rejuvenation was even more important.Clagstone highlighted the pleasures of the affordable phonograph, which brought quality music to rural farmhouses across the nation.

“To be able, away back in the mountains, to hear the best music is a wonderful boon, and I find that if one is worried or tired, a bit of ragtime quickly changes one’s thoughts, and the children start dancing, and it certainly adds to the charm of country life,” Mrs. Clagstone wrote.  

Healthy play opportunities for the kids were just as important, and at the Clagstone ranch, they encouraged their children to occupy themselves with outdoor sports and tetherball.

Indeed, bringing a little fun into life seemed a chief concern for the Clagstones. It was Paul Clagstone who, in 1908,  began work to establish a Bonner County fair. In 1909, the Sandpoint Fair and Market Day Exposition kicked off at what is now Lake Pend Oreille High School on North Boyer. It served as an early prototype for the Bonner County fair, which had its official debut in 1927 with 20 communities participating. Preparing fruits, vegetables and other projects for the fair gave farm families fun projects to take pleasure in. And when the long-awaited fair day arrived, it strengthened community ties and formed traditions that resonate in 4-H activities today.

For decades between the late 1800s and the early 1900s, the North Idaho home was the ballast of the region's economic and social activity. It provides a fascinating contrast for modern lifestyles, where excessive time at home is an unnatural, uncomfortable dynamic. Many of us may be working from home, sure. But hey, at least that work probably doesn't involve milking the family cow.