

Humans may have been present in the Idaho area as long as 14,500 years ago. Idaho Territory would later change its boundaries to the area that became the U.S. Regardless, part of Washington Territory, including Idaho County, was used to create Idaho Territory in 1863. It is unclear whether the steamship was named before or after Willing's claim was revealed. The county was named after a steamship named Idaho, which was launched on the Columbia River in 1860. The same year Congress created Colorado Territory, a county called Idaho County was created in eastern Washington Territory. Congress ultimately decided to name the area Colorado Territory instead when it was created in February 1861, but by the time this decision was made, the town of Idaho Springs, Colorado had already been named after Willing's proposal. Since the name appeared to be fabricated, the U.S. Willing claimed that the name was derived from a Shoshone term meaning "the sun comes from the mountains" or "gem of the mountains", but it was revealed later that there was no such term and Willing claimed that he had been inspired to coin the name when he met a little girl named Ida. Willing, a politician posing as an unrecognized delegate from the unofficial Jefferson Territory. Congress was considering organizing a new territory in the Rocky Mountains, the name "Idaho" was suggested by George M. The official state nickname is the "Gem State", a figurative expression which references Idaho's natural beauty. Idaho's agricultural sector supplies many products, but the state is best known for its potato crop, which comprises around one-third of the nationwide yield. A number of science and technology firms are either headquartered in Idaho or have factories there, and the state also contains the Idaho National Laboratory, which is the country's largest Department of Energy facility. Industries significant for the state economy include manufacturing, agriculture, mining, forestry, and tourism. The United States Forest Service holds about 38% of Idaho's land, the highest proportion of any state.

Idaho is quite mountainous, and contains several stretches of the Rocky Mountains. The state's south includes the Snake River Plain (which has most of the population and agricultural land), and the southeast incorporates part of the Great Basin. The state's north, the relatively isolated Idaho Panhandle, is closely linked with Eastern Washington, with which it shares the Pacific Time Zone-the rest of the state uses the Mountain Time Zone. Idaho was eventually admitted to the Union on July 3, 1890, becoming the 43rd state.įorming part of the Pacific Northwest (and the associated Cascadia bioregion), Idaho is divided into several distinct geographic and climatic regions. territory with the signing of the Oregon Treaty of 1846, but a separate Idaho Territory was not organized until 1863, instead being included for periods in Oregon Territory and Washington Territory. In the early 19th century, Idaho was considered part of the Oregon Country, an area of dispute between the U.S.

states.įor thousands of years, and prior to European colonization, Idaho has been inhabited by native peoples. With an area of 83,570 square miles (216,400 km 2), Idaho is the 14th largest state by land area, but with a population of approximately 1.8 million, it ranks as the 13th least populous and the 7th least densely populated of the 50 U.S. The state's capital and largest city is Boise. It borders the states of Montana and Wyoming to the east, Nevada and Utah to the south, and Washington and Oregon to the west. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia.

Idaho ( / ˈ aɪ d ə h oʊ/ ( listen) EYE-də-hoh) is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States.
