Lower Payette River Heritage Byway Complete
Photo taken in 1976
Downtown Emmett - Mile Post 31
Emmett is the largest city in Gem County with a rich history of fruit, livestock, and lumber. In 1866, settlers established a ferry on the Payette River serving fur trappers, prospectors, miners, cowboys, Indians, and lumbermen. In 1902, the Idaho Northern Railroad came to Emmett, and business boomed. Ghost art from past businesses can still he found on building walls reminiscent of an era gone by.
Plaza Bridge / Pickets Corral – Mile Post 38
Picket's Corral, northeast of Emmett, was the base of operations for a notorious Southern Idaho outlaw gang of horse thieves and "bogus dust peddlers". This headquarters was the stopping place and last watering hole until you came out of the canyon near Montour for travelers and freighters on their way to Horseshoe Bend. In 1864, the Payette Vigilance Committee eliminated the gang, bringing safety for the citizens of the area.
Black Canyon Dam / Reservoir - Milepost 39.1
Constructed in 1924 and reconstructed in 1955, this $1.5 million concrete gravity dam has a 1,039-foot crest and a 183-foot structural height. A 29-mile canal, along with lesser ditches, serves 58,250 acres of valley farms. A power plant at Black Canyon Dam generates electricity for commercial use and irrigation pumping. Recreational Wild Rose Park, Black Canyon Park, and Triangle Park are managed by the Bureau of Reclamation.
Roystone Hot Springs / Triangle - Milepost 41
The Roystone Hot Springs in Sweet, Idaho, feature a geothermal spring naturally flowing at 143 degrees straight from the ground. Early settlers, owners, and locals from Sweet, Montour, and Ola dug several cisterns to control the hot springs and bring the water down the hill to a large catch basin and swimming pool. Still used a hundred years later, Eva Stone referred to it as the Sweet Sanitarium.
https://visitidaho.org/things-to-do/ziplining/lower-payette-river-heritage-byway/
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