Kootenai River

The Kootenai River is named for the Kootenai tribe, who lived and hunted in this part of Montana and adjoining territory in Idaho and Canada. In 1855 they were settled south of Flathead Lake with the Salish on the Flathead Reservation. They were friendly with neighboring mountain tribes but frequently suffered from incursions by their bitter enemies, the Blackfeet, who crossed the Continental Divide from the plains on horse-stealing and scalp-raising expeditions. The first white men here were trappers and traders for British fur companies as early as 1809, and placer discoveries and mining operations began about sixty years later.

Montana · United States