Abandoned Towns
A weathered false-front wooden store on an Idaho City street, with a tin roof, bunting and an American flag, pines behind

Gold mining town

Idaho City

In 1864 Idaho City was the largest town in the Northwest, with about 7,000 people. By 1920 it had 104. It never quite emptied, and its brick and frame buildings from the 1860s still line the streets of a small county seat.

43°49′43″N 115°49′56″W · ≈3,910 ft

Photo: Frank Schulenburg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Living town

Idaho City is an incorporated town and the Boise County seat, with 466 people at the 2020 census and about 460 by Legends of America's count, updated March 2026. Most of the old buildings are private homes, shops or offices, so see them from the street. The Idaho City Historical Foundation's site, read October 28, 2026, says its Boise Basin Museum opens 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily from Memorial Day to Labor Day and on weekends only in May and September, and the Pon Yam and Wildfire museums open only on special occasions. Call the foundation, 208-392-4550, before a visit.

Overview

The gold-rush capital of the Boise Basin

Idaho City from the air, about 1925, its grid of streets surrounded by bare dredge and placer ground
Idaho City from the air, about 1925, its grid of streets surrounded by bare dredge and placer ground · Photo: Albert William Stevens, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

In August 1862 a prospecting party led by George Grimes and Moses Splawn found gold in the Boise Basin, in the mountains northeast of today's Boise. Grimes was dead within days. The accepted story blamed an Indian attack; some said a greedy partner killed him. That autumn the camp at the meeting of Elk and Mores creeks was laid out as Bannock City. Legends of America gives October 7, 1862, and J. Marion More as founder; Wikipedia says December. Because a Bannack already existed across the mountains, the territorial legislature renamed it Idaho City in 1863.

It grew faster than any town in the region. By the end of 1864 it had about 7,000 people, more than Portland, and over 200 businesses, with three dozen saloons and two dozen law offices. About 25,000 people worked the gulches around it. Fire was the constant danger in a town of wood: blazes in 1865, 1867, 1868 and 1871 burned most of it, and the merchants rebuilt in brick. Those brick buildings are much of what survives.

Most of the miners left as the diggings declined, and the population fell below 900 by 1870, and many claims were sold to Chinese miners. Dredges worked the creeks from 1898 to 1952, but by 1920 only 104 people were left. The town kept the county seat, and that and later tourism kept it alive. Today about 460 people live there, among the old store fronts, the 1867 church and a hillside cemetery said to hold more than 2,000 graves.

Video

A summer day with the town's walking-tour guide

A traveling YouTuber rents a cabin in the middle of town and spends a summer day on foot. A local walking-tour guide talks through the town's story in Smoke Jumper Park, beside a cut section of a big tree. At the Boise Basin Mercantile, a woman shows the thrift store that now pays for its restoration and the old freight cellar below, set up as a history display. The tour goes on to the old bank vault, the courtroom still used by Boise County, the county records vault and the Boise Basin Museum in the old post office. The guide's numbers differ a little from ours: she gives seven or eight thousand people at the peak and 20,000 to 25,000 in the basin a year after discovery. Her story of an 1898 hanging is hers; we have not checked it.

Play “This Tiny Town Was Once The Largest In The Northwest: Idaho's Hidden Gem” from YouTube
“This Tiny Town Was Once The Largest In The Northwest: Idaho's Hidden Gem”, by Wandering Jeepsy Off Grid Life on YouTube. The player loads from YouTube when you press play.

Timeline

Gold, fire and a long decline

Placer mining with hydraulic giants at Idaho City, about 1920
Placer mining with hydraulic giants at Idaho City, about 1920 · Photo: Unknown author, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
  1. George Grimes and Moses Splawn lead a party that finds gold in the Boise Basin. Grimes is killed within days; the accepted story blames Indians, others a partner.
  2. J. Marion More, of the discovery party, founds the town, by Legends of America's account. Wikipedia and the Idaho Farm Bureau date it to December 1862. It starts as Bannock City.
  3. Renamed West Bannock in March and Idaho City in December, to end confusion with Bannack in what became Montana. The Pioneer Cemetery opens, and St. Joseph's Catholic parish is founded, the first in Idaho Territory.
  4. About 6,200 people live in town and about 25,000 in the hills around it.
  5. About 7,000 people, more than Portland, Oregon. The town has over 200 businesses, three dozen saloons and two dozen law offices. A county jail, soon also the territorial prison, is built above Elk Creek north of town.
  6. A fire that starts about 9 p.m. destroys most of the business district, a loss put at $900,000.
  7. A second great fire in May takes the hotels, the post office and St. Joseph's, which is rebuilt by November. The Grand Lodge of Idaho is founded in town. The Pon Yam House is built.
  8. Two more fires.
  9. Fewer than 900 people, and the census counts 1,751 Chinese, nearly half the town. Many placer claims are sold to Chinese miners.
  10. The building that is now the Boise County Courthouse goes up. The county buys it in 1909 for $1,000.
  11. Gold dredges work the creeks around town, leaving the tailing piles still seen outside it.
  12. The population is down to 104.
  13. The Idaho City Historic District, 87 acres with 15 contributing buildings, is listed on the National Register.
  14. Fire destroys five businesses on Main Street.
  15. The census counts 466 people. Idaho City is still the Boise County seat.

What's left

Walking the old town

The brick Idaho World building with its iron doors, August 2018
The brick Idaho World building with its iron doors, August 2018 · Photo: Frank Schulenburg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
The weathered board front of the Wells Fargo Express, August 2018
The weathered board front of the Wells Fargo Express, August 2018 · Photo: Frank Schulenburg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Idaho City is a living town, so most of what you'll see is from the street. Legends of America lists the survivors: St. Joseph's Catholic Church (1867), the Masonic Temple (1865), the Pon Yam House (1867), the only building left from the large Chinese community and now a Chinese museum, the Idaho World newspaper building (1867), the Boise Basin Mercantile (1865, with additions in 1868 and 1869), the I.O.O.F. Hall (rebuilt 1875), the 1873 building that became the Boise County Courthouse, and the Idaho City Hotel (1929). The Boise Basin Museum is in the old post office on Montgomery Street, built in 29 days after the 1865 fire. The Idaho City Historical Foundation, founded in 1958, keeps the museum, the Pon Yam House, the territorial prison, several historic houses including the Galbraith and Strauss houses, and the Pioneer Cemetery.

Photos from August 2018 show the board front of the Wells Fargo Express, the red brick Miners Exchange with its "Est. 1865" sign, and the painted sign of the Old I. B. Emery and Schlosser 1862 store. Up the hill is the Pioneer Cemetery, described below.

On the historic maps below, the 1894 Idaho Basin sheet draws Idaho City as a block of streets where Elk Creek meets Mores Creek, with Warm Springs to the southwest. The 1957 and 1998 Idaho City sheets mark Boot Hill Cemetery to the northwest, the Boise Basin Experiment Station, a landing strip and wide bands of tailings along the creeks. The 1982 sheet adds the Gold Hill Mine to the north.

  • St. Joseph's Catholic Church (1867)
  • Masonic Temple (1865)
  • Pon Yam House (1867), Chinese museum
  • Idaho World building (1867)
  • Boise Basin Mercantile (1865)
  • Boise Basin Museum, the old post office
  • I.O.O.F. Hall (1875)
  • Boise County Courthouse (1873)
  • Pioneer Cemetery (1863)
  • Dredge tailings along Mores and Elk creeks
USGS topographic map of Idaho City at the meeting of Elk Creek and Mores Creek, with ID 21 to the south
USGS The National Map, topo. The town sits where Elk Creek comes down to Mores Creek. ID 21 passes to the south, and Boot Hill is marked at the upper left.
Aerial view of Idaho City's streets among pine forest, with the highway across the bottom
Aerial imagery, same area. The grid of the old town in the pines, with the highway along the bottom.

The cemetery

The Pioneer Cemetery

The Pioneer Cemetery sign and walking-tour box at the gate, August 2018
The Pioneer Cemetery sign and walking-tour box at the gate, August 2018 · Photo: Frank Schulenburg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
The sign for the Chinese section of the Pioneer Cemetery, August 2018
The sign for the Chinese section of the Pioneer Cemetery, August 2018 · Photo: Frank Schulenburg, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

The Pioneer Cemetery, marked Boot Hill on the USGS maps, was laid out early in 1863 on a 40-acre site northwest of town. The sign at the gate, photographed in 2018, says the Masons and Odd Fellows took the central ground, Catholics the higher ground to the north and the Chinese the low southeastern corner, while convicted murderers were buried outside the eastern edge. It estimates 3,000 graves; Legends of America says more than 2,000. Both say only 28 of the first 200 burials were natural deaths, and that about 200 markers still stand. The sign counts 350 known sites.

The Chinese section's own sign says a meal was customarily placed on each grave and that by 1906 all the Chinese burials had been dug up and the bones shipped back to China. The cemetery belongs to the city and is looked after by the Idaho City Historical Foundation. The sign asks visitors to put out cigarettes and leave pets in their vehicles. Many graves are unmarked, so keep to the paths.

Historic maps

Idaho City on USGS maps, 1894–1998

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

USGS topographic map around Idaho City, 1894
Idaho Basin sheet, 1894, 1:125,000 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Map & directions

Getting there

Boise is the closest city and the usual start. The route leaves town on I-84 for two miles, then follows ID 21 northeast into the mountains to Idaho City. From Stanley, ID 21 comes the other way over the Sawtooth country, a much longer drive.

USGS topographic map of the mountains northeast of Boise with routes to Idaho City drawn on it

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

From downtown Boise40.6 miabout 1 h 04 min
  1. From West Main Street downtown, follow East Warm Springs Avenue and turn right onto South Broadway Avenue.3.6 mi
  2. Take the ramp onto I-84 east (US 20/US 26).2.2 mi
  3. Leave I-84 and turn left onto ID 21, which runs northeast to Idaho City.34.4 mi
  4. Turn left onto Main Street.0.2 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • ID 21 is the state highway from Boise to Idaho City and on to Lowman and Stanley.
  • The drive from Boise is 40.6 miles, about 1 h 4 min by the route planner. The Idaho Farm Bureau puts the town about 36 miles northeast of Boise.
  • In winter, check Idaho 511 for ID 21 conditions, especially beyond Idaho City toward Lowman and Stanley.
  • Many old buildings are private homes and businesses. Park on the street and look from the sidewalk unless a business is open.

Photos

Idaho City in photos

Visitor reports

Been to Idaho City?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

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Nearby

Other sites near Idaho City

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Idaho index.

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "Idaho City": county, 2WD road, climate, best time, remains, current residents, the saloons and breweries, the territorial jail, St. Joseph's.
  2. Wikipedia, "Idaho City, Idaho", retrieved October 2026: coordinates, the December 1862 founding as Bannock, the renaming, 7,000 in 1864, the four fires, 900 in 1870 and 104 in 1920, the 1,751 Chinese counted in 1870, the 2015 Main Street fire, the June 27, 1975 historic district listing (87 acres, 15 contributing buildings), 466 at the 2020 census, the county seat, the climate.
  3. Idaho City Historical Foundation, "Museums" and "Contact", read October 28, 2026 (the same text is in Internet Archive copies of June 10 and April 21, 2026): the three museums, the Boise Basin Museum's season and hours, the Pon Yam and Wildfire museums open on special occasions only, the phone number.
  4. Kathy Alexander, Legends of America, "Idaho City, Idaho: Queen of the Boise Basin", updated March 2026: the August 2, 1862 discovery, the October 7, 1862 founding by J. Marion More, the three names, 6,200 and 25,000 in late 1863, 7,000 in 1864, the 1865 and 1867 fires and losses, the surviving buildings and their dates, the cemetery figures, the Chinese claims, dredging 1898 to 1952, about 460 people today.
  5. Idaho Farm Bureau, "Destination Idaho: Idaho City", June 13, 2019: the 36-mile distance from Boise, Elk and Mores creeks, the 200 businesses, saloons and law offices, St. Joseph's parish (1863) and the Grand Lodge (1867), the tailings and Boot Hill.
  6. Idaho Heritage Trust, "Idaho City Historical Foundation", read October 2026: the foundation's 1958 founding and the museum, houses, prison and cemetery it keeps, at 503 Montgomery Street.
  7. Wandering Jeepsy Off Grid Life, "This Tiny Town Was Once The Largest In The Northwest: Idaho's Hidden Gem", YouTube, posted August 22, 2025: the video on this page; the mercantile thrift store and cellar, the courtroom and the museum in use.
  8. Signs at the Pioneer Cemetery, as photographed by Frank Schulenburg in August 2018 (Wikimedia Commons): the 40-acre site, its sections, the 3,000-grave estimate, the 350 known sites, city ownership, the visitor requests, the Chinese section and the 1906 removal of burials.
  9. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026.

Photo and map credits