Kooskia

History

Chief Looking Glass lived in a village a short distance above what is now Kooskia with his band of Nez Perce. This regular home was well within the boundaries of the reservation created in 1863, but just before the Nez Perce War an American General was sent to arrest Chief Looking Glass and all other Nez Perce with him. When trigger-happy militiamen opened fire into the village, many Nez Perce died and their village was destroyed in the scuffle. Because of this incident, Looking Glass joined with the Nez Perce for the Nez Perce War. The name of the town is likely a contraction of the Nez Perce word "koos-koos-kia," a diminutive which refers to the Clearwater River, the lesser of the two large rivers in the vicinity, the other being the Snake. The town was first named Stuart, after James Stuart (1863–1929), a Nez Perce surveyor and merchant. The railroad arrived in 1899 and named its station "Kooskia," because there already was a railroad station named "Stuart" in the state. The town went by both names for the next decade until it was formally renamed in 1909. Kooskia is within the Nez Perce Indian Reservation. Similar to the opening of lands in Oklahoma several years earlier, the U.S. government opened the reservation for white settlement in November 1895. The proclamation had been signed less than two weeks earlier by President Cleveland. Starting in 1903, Kooskia was the terminus of an aerial tramway from the elevated Camas Prairie. It carried up to of grain per day in its 30 buckets and warehouse facilities were present at both ends of the cable line, with a combined capacity of . Following the completion of the Camas Prairie Railroad's second subdivision to Grangeville in 1909, the tramway gradually lost patronage and was discontinued in 1939. It…

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which, is land and is water.

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  179
• Song Sparrow

  Melospiza melodia (A.Wilson, 1810) · Aves
  145
• Common Raven

  Corvus corax Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  133
• Black-billed Magpie

  Pica hudsonia (Sabine, 1823) · Aves
  128
• Canada Goose (canadensis Group)

  Branta canadensis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  126
• Red-tailed Hawk

  Buteo jamaicensis (Gmelin, 1788) · Aves
  121
• Northern Flicker

  Colaptes auratus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  118
• European Starling

  Sturnus vulgaris Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  109

Most recent

• M 2.7 — 2021-12-15
  1 km NW of Lewiston Orchards, Idaho
• M 2.9 — 2021-10-16
  8 km SSW of Culdesac, Idaho
• M 3 — 2018-11-23
  11 km SE of Riggins, Idaho
• M 4.1 — 2018-11-20
  21 km SE of Stites, Idaho
• M 2.7 — 2018-07-29
  49 km NNE of Enterprise, Oregon
• M 2.51 — 2017-06-21
  29 km WNW of White Bird, Idaho